Will the FPC start over on its search for permanent police chief?
One year after ousting Alfonso Morales, the Milwaukee Fire and Police Commission will return to its long-delayed effort at identifying a permanent police chief next week.
The commission called for a special meeting at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday to decide whether to pick up where it left off or end the search and start anew.
Any decision-making beyond that will occur at a later meeting after the commission’s August recess, according to Leon Todd, the executive director of the commission.
The commission’s police chief search has been sidelined since December. The commission at the time had six members, who tied 3-3 between two finalists.
By the time a seventh commissioner joined the oversight board, then-Chairman Nelson Soler suspended the search until after the city resolved its litigation with Morales.
Morales was pushed out of the chief job in August 2020 by the commission — a move that was later reversed by a Milwaukee County judge who called the commission’s actions “fundamentally flawed” by not providing Morales his due process rights.
Morales then filed a lawsuit in federal court alleging his civil rights were violated. It took Morales and the city six months to reach a settlement agreement worth $627,000 that would allow them to formally part ways.
The Common Council approved the agreement in late July. Todd said the settlement agreement is still missing the signature of City Attorney Tearman Spencer, but he was expected to sign the document “very soon.”
It would seem likely the commission will end its current search and start over, given the popularity of the city’s acting police chief and the fact that the commission has gone through an extensive makeover since December.
Four of the six commissioners who participated in the 3-3 vote in December are no longer on the oversight board, including the commission’s chair and vice chair. They have since been replaced with five new commissioners.
Meanwhile, Acting Chief Jeffrey Norman, who has led the department for the past seven months, has won over key community members and city officials. Five members of the Common Council have called for the commission to suspend its police chief search and see how Norman performs in the role.
Norman applied for the position last fall and was the only internal candidate named one of six finalists. But he did not survive the cut to three.
Were the commission to continue where it left off, there would be just one candidate to choose from: FBI Supervisory Special Agent and Milwaukee native Hoyt Mahaley. The other finalist from December, Malik Aziz, has since accepted a police chief job in Maryland.
Todd confirmed Wednesday that Mahaley has not removed himself from consideration.