CENTERVILLE — Before he even had a chance to move into his new office, the city’s new police chief sat down to discuss a couple of his priorities for the Centerville Police Department.
Monday was the first official day on the job for Matt Brown, but he’s not new to the building, or the department where he has worked for more than two decades, most recently as the city’s interim chief for several months.
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“I think it gives me an advantage,” Brown said of his experience in Centerville.
The first goal he hopes to tackle is one residents may notice: officers connecting with the community with the help of social media.
“That’s one of the things we’ve been lagging behind, and with the help of some of our younger officers who are more adept at doing some of those things, we’ll take advantage of that and try to use it as much as we can,” Brown said.
His second goal is tackling a problem many police departments across the country are facing: recruiting new officers to join the force.
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“Our numbers are a little down, I would say, across the nation. I’m going to guess that there probably is some impact of the negative things that are happening across the country ... but it may just be a shift in demographics and what people want to do with their lives,” Brown said.
Brown, who served as interim chief since Chief Bruce Robertson retired earlier this year, said he also will have officers pay attention to traffic in the city, particularly in the Cornerstone/Wilmington Pike area.
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