I am truly honored and humbled to be serving along side you as your new Police Chief. It’s a great time for the City of Tampa and the Tampa Police Department. Crime is down more than 50% since Mayor Pam Iorio began to lead our City. This is in large part because of the vision, leadership and guidance of Chief Stephen Hogue. He changed the way we police in Tampa and for that we owe him a debt of gratitude. Each of you, officers and employees, played an integral part in this success and for that you should be very proud. Your unwavering commitment to doing your job well has truly made our community safer. I want to personally thank you for your hard work and dedication.

During my tenure as Chief, we will continue with our mission to reduce crime and improve the quality of life through a cooperative partnership with all citizens. What we will do differently is to look for ways to work smarter and more efficiently. To this end, we will use homeland security technology that is already in place to assist us in fighting crime. I am very aware that our crime fighting efforts have been honed and fine tuned throughout the past six years, and that each of you gives 110% daily to proactively prevent crime in your zones, sectors and districts. It is my plan to arm you with information that will enable you to focus your efforts on known offenders. Offender management is our next step in continuing to cut the crime rate. As many of you already know, a small number of offenders commit the majority of crime. Targeting these repeat offenders through technology and deployment efforts will help us keep our citizens safe by reducing crime even further.

The economic downturn is a reality we cannot ignore. In the coming year we will face the challenge of continued budget shortfalls, so it is imperative that we look for innovative ways to streamline police operations without affecting the level of service we provide the community. We are very fortunate that during these tough economic times, the Tampa Police Department is one of the only agencies in the State of Florida still hiring officers instead of cutting police positions. We have one person to thank for that and it’s Mayor Iorio. Her support of public safety is immeasurable and has been the foundation for our success in reducing crime.

The tremendous support we have received from the community is another key to our success. The daily interaction and dialogue with citizens, community leaders, neighborhood watch groups and activists, not only guides the direction of our efforts, but acts as a force multiplier. We will continue to build upon and depend on these partnerships for years to come as we move forward in our shared mission to improve the quality of life in Tampa.

I’ve lived my entire life in Tampa and have spent the past 25 years serving its citizens as a police officer. I look forward to working with each of you as we continue along this successful path we have forged. We’ve accomplished much but still have much to do. Together we will make Tampa a safer city in which to live and raise a family.