In a new twist to the long search for a permanent Oakland police chief, the civilian body responsible for choosing finalists for the job is opening the process to the public.
Not everything thinks that’s a great idea.
The open forum next Thursday will allow candidates for the full-time chief position — which has been vacant for just over a year — to be interviewed by members of the Oakland Police Commission, a group of volunteers with the power to establish a shortlist of prospects. It’s expected to shed light on the latest group of hopefuls to lead the embattled department, which is struggling to emerge from two decades of federal oversight.
It may also be a step toward resolving a political standoff between the civilian-led commission and Mayor Sheng Thao — tensions that have persisted since last February when she fired then-Chief LeRonne Armstrong over his response to an internal OPD scandal.
Members of the public will likely be able to ask questions of the candidates at the 6:30 p.m. forum at Oakland City Hall. That part of the plan has its share of critics, who contend that conducting the search in public actually discourages transparency among the candidates.
“It was like a pageant on Zoom,” said Barry Donelan, an outspoken member of the Oakland police officers’ union, of the panel forum held before Armstrong’s hiring in 2021. “I don’t know what the returns are, and you also scare off candidates who don’t want to apply to an employer who is not their own.”
An open forum is a new approach to the current chief search. In December, the commission sent a list of three candidates to Thao’s office for consideration, but did not publicize the names. At the time, Thao had said that she would review the finalists privately — a departure from the public interview process of her predecessor, former Mayor Libby Schaaf, who had held via a virtual panel of public-safety experts the last time a chief was hired.
Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao announces the firing of Oakland police Chief LeRonne Armstrong during a press conference at City Hall in Oakland, Calif., on Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2023. (Jane Tyska/Bay Area News Group) (Jane Tyska/Bay Area News Group)
Oakland’s city charter does not require the mayor to hold a public process, but they are increasingly common in an era of police departments facing heightened public scrutiny.
Late last year, Cal State East Bay held an open forum over Zoom where finalists for its chief job took questions from the public. San Jose similarly held a virtual forum before hiring its current police chief in 2021.
The names of the three OPD chief finalists in December became known only after Thao rejected all of them, explaining later that there were glaring flaws on their résumés — one had been on administrative leave from his job in San Leandro, one worked in faraway Tucson, Arizona, and the third was Armstrong himself.
Thao has made clear she won’t rehire the ex-chief after he publicly suggested without evidence that she is under the political influence of a federal official who oversees OPD’s affairs.
Armstrong, meanwhile, is suing Thao and the city for wrongful termination after an independent arbitrator determined in the fall that he probably shouldn’t have been fired over a misconduct cover-up scandal in his department.
The former chief’s spokesperson said in a recent interview that Armstrong is no longer actively seeking reinstatement — only damages from the city.
“He’s focused on his lawsuit, and he’s focused on coaching basketball,” said spokesperson Sam Singer, in reference to Armstrong’s current job as an assistant boys’ coach at Bishop O’Dowd High in Oakland.