Merit board reduces suspension of officer who ticketed 7-year-old

You make some interesting points and I don't want to come across as disrespectful, but I want to share an interesting observation I have made. It seems to me that a lot of the disagreement within the LMPD regarding who should lead the Department comes down to who is perceived as the "best leader". It seems there are many officers who have this military-only mindset and if any candidate does not have the brawn and personality of a military general, they should not be leading this civilian police department. In my opinion, that is a mistaken desire. These officers tend to have military backgrounds themselves or come from military families, and dare I say it, tend to lean Republican. Every argument these officers make about who should become the next leader has a common theme and that is who they feel confident could "lead" them into a tactical situation. Also, these officers are typically very judgmental of other officers. They think every other officer is an idiot besides themselves and a few other officers they have identified to think like they do. (I love the endearing phrase, "He's squared away.")

What these officers fail to recongnize is that the police profession has evolved tremendously in the past 30 years. It is no longer the haven for the ex-military type your father retired from. Instead, it is ran like any other American corporation. It needs diversification, community input, top quality personnel among other things like a corporation. I am in no way dissing anyone who has been in the military (I am retired Army myself), but that's not what it's all about. You will be saving yourself a lot of unnecessary grief if you would learn how to think outside the box and reduce your expectations (no, I didn't say reduce the standards-huge difference). All the police schools you referenced in your post are tried and tested by scholars and doctors in their professions. It is NOT necessary for one to have ever been a police officer to teach police management as it is NOT necessary for one to have ever been in the military (or act like the military type) to "lead" LMPD. Our last three Presidents (Clinton, Bush, Obama) have not served in the military yet they are the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces.

If you hire a Chief who spent most a career going up the ranks in one of the country's most troubled police department, you bring that trouble to your own department. Louisville already had problems of its own but they've been compounded by White's tenure. The Mayor should only keep the command if he's prepared to accept the blame for all the problems that started under Abramson and continue today. Only a new Chief from the outside would be motivated to clean house.