As presumptive mayor-elect Adrian Fenty weighs the future of D.C.’s chief of police, he already has spoken to District Council Member Kathy Patterson about supervising the city’s emergency agencies, Fenty’s spokesman told The Examiner on Sunday.
Fenty and Patterson spoke Friday about the soon-to-be-open job of deputy mayor for public safety and justice, Fenty’s spokesman Alec Evans said.
“He and Kathy spoke about the possibility of her exploring a position, but it didn’t go much further than that,” Evans said.
Nonetheless, the two have been allies on the Council and personal friends for a long time. Both have been outspoken critics of the police department under Chief Charles Ramsey.
“I know Adrian has a high level of respect for Council Member Patterson — very high,” Evans said.
Fenty and Ramsey are scheduled to meet today todiscuss the chief’s future. The District Council is considering his pension package.
He is the longest-serving police chief of the Home Rule era.
Fenty told The Examiner in August that the department needed “new blood” and that, while the chief deserved credit for revitalizing the department, he hadn’t gone far enough. He reiterated those comments late last week, saying that he doubted Ramsey would last through Fenty’s term.
But Fenty also said he wouldn’t ask Ramsey to “clear out his desk” right away.
Patterson has been a vocal critic of the police department under Ramsey. She led hearings on what she said was excessive overtime, has criticized Ramsey’s leadership in the continuing failure to build and staff a DNA lab, and said that the police department has been too focused on “community policing” in rich neighborhoods.
Her criticism once earned the nickname of “fuzz buster.” As deputy mayor, she would supervise the police and fire departments. Fenty has also said that Fire Chief Adrian Thompson must go because his department fumbled the response to the mugging of retired New York Times reporter David Rosenbaum.
But Patterson also has been a vocal critic of the city’s faltering school system.
