Boston’s nationwide police commissioner search is broadening with a search firm, the strongest indication yet that Mayor Michelle Wu and her five-member search committee intend to look seriously beyond the city’s limits for its next reform-friendly police leader.
While Wu’s five-member search panel and the soon-to-be-announced firm scour the nation for candidates, city residents are weighing what it would mean to have an outsider shepherding the Boston Police Department through a period of reform.
Those in support of an outsider point to the department’s history of resistance and recent scandals. They say it’s clear the police should not be responsible for straightening out their own ranks. Meanwhile, those hoping for an insider say it would be difficult for someone to get acclimated to the force’s complexities, build morale within the ranks and enact Wu’s reform agenda without stumbling over the Boston’s idiosyncrasies.
Preston Williams, who is Black and a former Boston police officer, said a local candidate would have a better grasp of the politics and problems within the department.
If Wu taps an outsider, Williams speculated, “they won’t last long.”
“He’s not going to know the system, he’s not going to know the city and he’s going to come in blind trying to figure out what’s going on here,” he said.
Williams, who worked under renowned reformer Robert di Grazia, pointed to the resistance di Grazia faced while changing the department in the 1970s.
A 1975 MIT report on the challenges of di Grazia’s tenure named the Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association his most effective opposition and said some of the tension was owed to the fact the commissioner was an outsider with an “inability to grasp the nuances of BPD politics and diplomacy.”
Williams added that the city has long had “good talent” among its officers of color.
“But they never use it,” he said, suggesting minority officers are routinely overlooked when it comes to leadership opportunities.
Williams’ experience seeing officers sidelined within BPD has been echoed by attendees at recent virtual public meetings of Wu’s commissioner search committee. Multiple attendees called out historic disparities in promotional opportunities and disciplinary outcomes need to be addressed as part of the future commissioner’s reforms.
Those concerns were repeated by BPD Det. Jeffrey Lopes, president of the Massachusetts Association of Minority Law Enforcement Officers, who said an overwhelming insider preference has emerged from his conversations about Boson’s next commissioner.
“We have people from within that have the ability to lead — and to lead with a reform mindset, with strategic initiatives and a strategic plan that can focus on diversity, equity and inclusion,” Lopes said in a recent interview with GBH News.
Officer David Hernandez, vice chair of the Latino emergency responders’ social group Llego Boston, agreed that working toward diversity, equity and inclusion throughout the department is also a priority for his group, along with most of the task force recommendations put forward by the 2021 Boston Police Reform Task Force assembled by then-Mayor Marty Walsh.
“We have members that have been fighting for change for a very long time and I think it’s important to not overlook those individuals,” said Hernandez.
Both Llego Boston and the Massachusetts Association of Minority Law Enforcement Officers have already met with Wu’s search committee.
Asked about an insider’s ability to effectively deliver reforms to a department embroiled in multiple scandals in a city that’s averse to change, Lopes pointed to new developments like the city’s Office of Police Transparency and Accountability and the new oversight of the department handling internal affairs investigations.
“Those are all moving towards a positive direction and making sure that police department is being held accountable,” he said.
Read More: Should Boston’s Police Commissioner be an ‘insider’ or an ‘outsider’?