Only 25 names remain in the running for the Columbus police chief position.
After receiving 82 applications, Columbus Mayor Robert Smith, Chief Operations Officer David Armstrong and Human Resources Director Pat Mitchell spent Thursday afternoon dwindling the pool to 25 qualified applicants.
The next step is for a 21-person committee to choose around five applicants and bring them in for interviews. The committee is comprised of local pastors and members of the media, police chiefs from nearby municipalities, city officials, councilmen and community activists.
What criteria the group will use to pick their top candidates is yet to be determined.
“We’re working on the protocol for that right now,” Armstrong said about what the committee should look for when discussing the applicants. “Then (the committee) will make the top two or three recommendations to the mayor and council.”
City officials previously said the applicant pool would be cut to around 40 people, but an influx in unqualified applicants caused the number to lower, Armstrong said.
“It surprised me that the majority didn’t meet the qualifications,” he said.
The city requires applicants to have at least 10 years of law enforcement experience, including supervisory experience as a division commander, assistant police chief or police chief. Armstrong said all those without the required qualifications were eliminated from consideration.
“There were some people that applied that had no law enforcement background at all,” Armstrong said.
The date and time for the committee’s first meeting has not been set, and Armstrong expects the next step to take longer than just a few hours on a Thursday afternoon.
“Narrowing from 25 to around five will be a little more difficult,” he said.
Mitchell previously said six of the 82 applicants are from within the Columbus Police Department; two others are local, and there are no applicants from the Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office.
Armstrong said the applicants ranged from 26 different states and one foreign country.
“The vast majority are from outside Mississippi,” he said.
Selvain McQueen, former head of the Criminal Investigations Division, has held the role of interim police chief since the City Council fired Joseph St. John from the post in July. While McQueen was one of the original 82 applicants, Armstrong said he could not state whether he is one of the 25 coming before the committee.
“I just cannot release any names right now,” he said.
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