112 Apply to Be Lakeland’s Next Top Cop

LAKELAND | There’s a few familiar names who have applied to be Lakeland’s next top cop, among them former Police Chief Sam Baca.

He’s one of 112 applicants who have applied for the position held now by Chief Roger Boatner.

Baca, 61, lives in Albuquerque and, while retired, works as a criminal justice consultant, according to his resume.

He did not return calls for comment.

Three candidates for the job come from within LPD – assistant chiefs Charles Thompson, 64, and Bill LePere, 53, and Capt. Victor White, 49. LePere is in the Deferred Retirement Option Program and is scheduled to retire in 2014. Thompson and White are not in the retirement program, called DROP.

Former Mulberry police chief and Polk sheriff’s official Lawrence Cavallaro is also among those who have applied.

Boatner, 57, has been Lakeland’s police chief since February 2003 and is set to retire Dec. 23, when he completes his five years in the DROP program. Boatner is paid $128,253 per year.

City officials advertised the position on 15 websites, including the Florida Police Chief’s Association, International Association of Chiefs of Police, the National Association of Black Law Enforcement Officers, Latin American Police Association and the Florida League of Cities.

A decision on who will replace Boatner is expected to be made by City Manager Doug Thomas by Dec. 15, according to Tommy Hamrick, the city’s civil service director.

If Baca is selected as chief, an approval will also have to come from city commissioners since he officially retired from the department in 2000, said city spokeswoman Kevin Cook.

Baca then would have to be hired as a contract employee, the same way Recreation Director Bill Tinsley and other department heads stayed with the city after they retired, Cook said.

Baca’s last few months at the LPD in 2000 were tumultuous.

Baca was accused of interfering in a police investigation when an LPD officer pulled over then City Manager Gene Strickland.

Strickland failed a field sobriety test but the officer was ordered by his supervisor to halt the investigation and Baca was called to the scene.

Baca said Strickland was not impaired and drove the city manager home that night, according to a The Ledger account at the time of the incident.

The incident was investigated by the State Attorney’s Office, which ruled Baca and the officers had acted within their discretion.

In more recent years, Baca was accused of domestic violence in 2008, when his wife and daughter filed for an injunction of protection against him. The injunction was later denied by a New Mexico judge.

Lakeland Mayor Gow Fields said nothing prevented Baca from applying for the position, and added that he was pleased with a pool of 112 applicants.

“To me, overall it tells you Lakeland is an attractive city,” he said. “The number candidates, the quality of the candidates and that you have internal candidates and a former police chief applying speaks well for the city.”

SEMI-FINALIST LIST EXPECTED IN NOVEMBER

The process to whittle down the field of applicants will continue during the next few months.

While the city has not officially closed its application process, advertising for the position has ceased, officials said.

However, if someone wants to apply, they still can, Cook said.

A city panel will meet in a few weeks to discuss and review the applications and outline the selection process, according to records.

Candidates will be eliminated during three meetings of the panel and a semi-finalist list is expected to be completed by the beginning of November.

The City Commission does not participate in hiring department heads, such as the police chief. But a time for input from the public and city commissioners with the police chief finalists will be held at some point, Fields said.

FEW FEMALE APPLICANTS

The field of applicants come from 26 states, with many from Florida.

The applicants are overwhelmingly male.

“We actively recruited female candidates using a variety of strategies, however, we were unable to significantly increase their numbers as an overall percentage of the applicant pool,” Hamrick said in a city report.

Of those who applied, only about 3 percent were women, city records said. Broken down by ethnicity, about 76 percent of the applicants were white, 13 percent black and 6 percent Hispanic.

A TUMULTUOUS YEAR

The last year has been a tumultuous one for the department.

Boatner and the department have endured the death of an officer in a traffic accident, the arrest of an officer on charges of unlawful compensation and misuse of confidential information, and decertification by the Commission for Florida Law Enforcement Accreditation.

Former Lt. Ralph Schrader was found guilty by a jury of a misdemeanor charge of stalking his ex-wife, which has spurred several internal investigations by Donald “Craig” Harper, a former Orlando police investigator.

Boatner’s handling of the Schrader case remains under scrutiny and is the subject of one of Harper’s investigations.