Police leadership at issue in Lakewood

BY JOYCE BLAY
Staff Writer

The Lakewood Township Committee is interviewing a candidate who may succeed departing Public Safety Director Wayne Yhost, according to Committeeman Raymond Coles.

Coles declined to name the candidate, but said he is an Ocean County resident who has not previously worked for the Lakewood Police Depart-ment. Coles said the Township Committee had not advertised the position, but based its interest in the candidate on an unidentified reference.

“We have a candidate who we believe could be an extreme asset to the town,” Coles said on May 23. “If we decide to move forward, the township manager would negotiate with the candidate and his lawyer.”

Yhost was Lakewood’s second public safety director. He succeeded Mark Dorsey, who resigned in September 2003, seven months after beginning a two-year contract. Both men were formerly employed with the Philadelphia Police Depart-ment.

Dorsey cited personal reasons upon resigning, but recommended Yhost for the job. The committee accepted his recommendation. Yhost’s two-year contract was due to expire in September, but at the May 19 committee meeting, Mayor Charles Cunliffe announced that Yhost had accepted an unspecified federal government position. His resignation in Lakewood will become effective at the end of the month.

Coles said he did not anticipate hiring a new public safety director prior to Yhost’s departure, but maintained that

the temporary vacancy in

leadership would not affect the police department.

“More than likely, there will be an interim commanding officer on an as-needed basis,” he said.

Coles indicated that if the candidate who is being interviewed for the job of public safety director does not accept the job or if the township declines to offer it, he would consider hiring for the position from within the police department.

Last year committeemen scheduled a civil service test for chief of police that will still be taken this June by the department’s three eligible captains, said Coles.

“I agreed to call for a police test so that the township has all the options available to it,” he said. “I didn’t want to deprive the other committee members of their right to discuss other alternatives.”

When asked in February how each committee member would vote on the issue of a public safety director or a return to a police chief, both Coles and Cunliffe said they would vote to retain the position of public safety director.

“The public safety director is doing a great job, but being in the military and knowing the chain of command, [I believe] morale is always higher when [officers] know they can move up — in this case, to chief,” said Committeeman Menashe Miller, who is a military chaplain.

Committeeman Robert Singer told the Tri-Town News last week that he also supports a return to a police chief.

“We’ve gone through two directors now,” Singer said. “The turnover is more disruptive than helpful and I’m a believer that a police chief brings stability to a department.”

When Deputy Mayor Meir Lichtenstein was asked for his views in February, he did not commit to a position.

“I think the director’s doing a good job, [but] I don’t know [how I’ll vote] yet,” Lichtenstein said.

Lichtenstein said that he as well as Coles had at first been opposed to scheduling a police chief’s test to be taken by the department’s three captains: Rob Lawson, Charles Smith and Frederick Capper. As did Coles, Lichtenstein said he favored having the three captains take the police chief’s test, whether or not he chose to vote for the hiring of a new public safety director.

“The chief’s test is good for three years,” said Lichtenstein. “If we decided to go back to a chief, we would have three years to make that decision.”

A public safety director serves at the pleasure of the committee, while a police chief serves until he makes the decision to leave the police force.

Although the vote to hire a public safety director was made in 2001, before he was elected to the committee, Lichtenstein said that both Dorsey and Yhost were told before each signed a two-year contract that it would not be a permanent job.

“The directors know they weren’t hired forever,” he said.

Ultimately, said Lichtenstein, his decision would be based on factors other than the department’s past leadership.

“I would vote my conscience,” he said.

In a message left May 23 on a reporter’s voice mail, Lichtenstein said he continued to remain undecided on the issue of a public safety director vs. a police chief.

Coles said in a voice mail message last week that he believed a majority on the committee wanted to retain the position of public safety director and he anticipated that a new one would be hired in a few weeks.

A press release issued on May 23 by Capper, president of the Lakewood Superior Officers Association, the union that represents the police department’s 21 supervisors, called for a restoration back to a police chief and two deputy chiefs of police. The release said that the Ocean County Chiefs of Police Association supports the union’s position.

Lakewood’s last police chief was Michael Lynch, who retired in December 2002. Deputy Chief of Police Wayne LeCompte retired in 2004 and Deputy Chief of Police John E. Marshall retired in 2001, according to Capper.

Coles said a committee vote on the matter is expected sometime in June.