Kroeker ‘Wants to Lead’ LAPD

Portland, Ore., Police Chief Mark Kroeker said Saturday that he is “ready to come home” to be Los Angeles’ next police chief.

“I hope that you’ll have me,” Kroeker, a former deputy chief of the LAPD, told members of the National Alliance for Positive Action, a nonprofit advocacy organization based in Inglewood. “I am ready to occupy a very, very difficult, challenging position in a very challenging time.”

The breakfast round-table meeting Saturday capped a four-day visit to Los Angeles, part of Kroeker’s ongoing efforts to become chief--a job for which he was runner-up in 1997, when Bernard Parks was chosen.

Kroeker worked for the LAPD for 32 years before retiring in 1997 to supervise the reconstruction of police agencies in Bosnia. He became Portland’s police chief in December 1999.

Speaking before 25 members of the alliance, Kroeker described his childhood in what was then the Belgian Congo as the son of missionaries. From his parents, he learned the merit of helping others--a quality he said he brings to his job as a police officer.

“Today, I come as a servant,” Kroeker said. “I come as a person that wants to help, that wants to serve, that wants to lead. There is a need for leadership in our city and in our police department.”

Kroeker described his three biggest goals for the LAPD as a reduction in crime, an improvement in the quality of life for the citizens of Los Angeles, and a positive working relationship between the citizens and the police.

Having a diversified police department with the best technology available is inherent in accomplishing those goals, he said.

Throughout the discussion, Kroeker advocated community policing as the best way to address crime in the city. Alliance members expressed concern about gang presence in their neighborhoods, the “code of silence” within the ranks of the LAPD, and the need for police training to recognize the mentally ill and homeless as patients rather than criminals.

Asked by alliance President Earl Ofari Hutchinson about racial profiling, Kroeker said the issue must be addressed by the department “forthrightly and with vigor.”

Kroeker made the case for his appointment to the chief’s job based on his own familiarity with the city and its challenges. He called Los Angeles the “ancestral home” of his policing career.

“I have been here before,” he said. “I have walked here before.”

Kroeker said he has been told that applications for the post will be accepted between Monday and July 19. A headhunting firm will winnow down the number of candidates and present a list to the Police Commission in early August, he said.

The commission will present the mayor with a list of three finalists, in ranked order, in mid-August, and the mayor is expected to send his choice to the City Council for a confirmation vote in early September, Kroeker said.

Alliance member Laura Castro said the group has invited all major candidates for the police chief’s job to its round-table series. Art Lopez, chief of the Oxnard Police Department, will appear before the group next week.

In an interview after the forum, Kroeker said he has been meeting with city leaders and community groups in an effort to raise his profile and to address any potential drawbacks to his application for the job before the Police Commission considers candidates.

Kroeker said he has paid particular attention to making inroads with the gay, lesbian and transgender community. He came under fire two years ago after a video surfaced in which he called homosexuality “a perversion.” Kroeker has since said that his views have changed and he would not tolerate any bias in the department.

But, he said, much of his visit to L.A. has been spent learning what is important to the communities served by the LAPD. “By coming and talking and listening, I am making sure I have a good grasp of the issues,” Kroeker said. “I made a lot of mental notes about what issues are important to people.”