Asked during his introductory press conference how he came to believe the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police was steeped in bad morale and distrusted by the community, incoming police Chief Cameron McLay was direct.
“I got that from all of you, the media. I’ve done my homework,” he said.
And as the first chief to ever come from outside the bureau, he said he will have lots more homework to do if he is to fulfill his boss Mayor Bill Peduto’s mandate of “restoring trust in the community and rebuilding morale within the bureau.”
Joined by the mayor and Public Safety Director Stephen Bucar, McLay, 56, laid out his general agenda for achieving those ends through leading by example, instituting a new era of community policing, and by instituting leadership the community can trust and the rank-and-file officers can respect.
“As police chief, my job will be to close the gap between the community and the bureau of police,” he said. “My first responsibility, my first priority is to restore the legitimacy of the police bureau—by number one, restoring the integrity of the accountability system.”
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