DeKalb County’s police chief – rumored to be ready to leave town – is staying put.
That will be the message delivered by Chief Cedric Alexander and interim CEO Lee May at a news conference Tuesday morning, sources close to the information told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution late Monday.
An official announcement of the news conference says only that the topic will be “the future of public safety in DeKalb County.”
Media reports out of New York had speculated for weeks that Alexander, on the job for nine months, would soon be offered the top job in the Rochester Police Department.
Alexander repeatedly declined to speak about the rumors. At a county Commission meeting last week he would say only that he was “happy to be chief in DeKalb.”
If Alexander had left, it would have been the latest in a string of departures and retirements among top-level county leaders as DeKalb struggles with the pending corruption case of suspended CEO Burrell Ellis.
Ellis hired Alexander, who at the time was overseeing TSA security for Dallas/Ft.Worth International Airport, to take over a demoralized department with its own corruption arrests, amid public worry about police understaffing.
Alexander has since become a very public figure, showing up at crime scenes and homeowners’ meetings alike.
He has won praise from May and county commissioners for quickly denouncing bad behavior by officers while simultaneously pushing for perks such as raises and take-home cars.
Monday, May unveiled a 2014 budget proposal that includes $6.6 million to hire 160 police officers next year, and another $600,000 to buy the first wave of take-home cars for officers.
Staying put means Alexander can take partial credit for those initiatives and continue to shape the department as he sees fit.
“I believe he has brought stability to our police department in a time of serious upheaval across the county,” Commissioner Elaine Boyer said. “I hate to think that he would leave right when we’re about to implement those plans.”
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