Kirkland Police Capt. Bill Hamilton, a 25-year veteran with the department, has assumed the position of interim police chief following the retirement of former police chief Eric Olsen.

Hamilton will serve as interim chief for six months, the time City Manager Kurt Triplett estimates it will take the city to fill the position. Hamilton will be working alongside other officers on the Police Strategic Plan, which will serve as a guide for the city and the department, much as the Fire Strategic Plan does for the Fire Department.

“Captain Hamilton has a long history of dedication to the department and the community,” Triplett said in a statement. “As the senior captain, he will provide continuity and stability as the search to find a permanent chief begins.”

First starting out as a police officer in New Jersey, Hamilton joined the Kirkland Police Department (KPD) in 1990 after visiting relatives. Unhappy with his department at the time, where he said there was a strong disconnect with the community, he noted the contrast with the KPD while doing a ride-along.

“It was everything I believed a police department should be,” he said. “I was impressed at how much the police officer interacted with the community. He was professional, very service-driven. It reminded me why I got into this. This is who I want to be. That’s never changed. I’ve never worked with a better group of people. They’ve never lost their sense of service to the community.”

Since 1990, Hamilton has also served as a patrol officer, detective, sergeant, lieutenant and captain. As a detective in the early 1990s, he was a member of the KPD’s gang unit, which investigated gang-related crimes such as drive-by shootings and stolen-gun sales.

“As you wade through policing, the roles may change, but the mission doesn’t,” he said. “As you go from officer to detective to sergeant and lieutenant, my role basically as a captain and interim chief is to maintain a culture that’s committed to quality service to the community and has a duty to keep the people safe.”

Whereas gang activity plagued the city in the 1990s, recently the city has seen an increase in auto-related thefts and residential burglaries, Hamilton said.

“We’re doing everything we can to proactively tackle that,” he said. “One of our challenges is to find ways to correctly mitigate and reduce property crimes.”

Hamilton has been acting as the operations captain since 2009, which oversees the patrol, traffic and K-9 units and emergency management.

Prior to this, he managed the Administrative Services Division, managing Kirkland’s municipal jail, the 9-1-1 dispatch center and Records and Training units.

“I think at every level in the organization there are challenging roles,” he said. “The complexity changes, but I think the hardest part of policing is dealing with crimes against the helpless – children, the elderly. I think the most difficult part of this job is being a service to people who’ve been victimized and remembering part of your duty is to give these people a voice that’s been taken away.”

Hamilton has also been assigned to various specialty teams, including the FBI Violent Crimes Task Force, SWAT, Dive Team, Gang Unit and the Crisis Negotiations Team.

“Every leader should have a strong basis of knowledge of what they are asking others to do,” he said, “but I think the thing I’ve learned over the years is the job of the police is to create a feeling of safety, because we’re also dealing with people and their lives and we need to treat people with empathy, with humility. I believe police officers need to be selfless in their actions.”

Hamilton was also part of the subcommittee that looked into switching the department’s work schedule, as well as the latest labor contract negotiations with the city that finalized the schedule. Under the previous schedule, officers would work 12-hour shifts four days a week, two shifts during the day and two night shifts. The new schedule has them working 10-hour shifts four days a week and during the same part of the day. The new schedule will be implemented in February 2016.

“It was probably the worst combination,” he said. “It was one of the worst schedules a person could work. The whole point of the schedule was to provide a healthier schedule for the officers to work.”

Now, Hamilton is working on the planning commission for the Police Strategic Plan, which was approved in the city’s 2013-2014 budget, but got pushed back to the 2015-2016 budget until after the Kirkland Justice Center was completed. The department was previously located at City Hall near downtown, but made the move to the Justice Center shortly after its completion late last year.

In addition to more space to operate in, Hamilton said the new facility gives them a more centralized location from which to operate throughout the city.

“It reflects the quality of people who work there,” he said. “I think it’s led to more efficiency and effectiveness.”

The strategic plan provides recommendations to the department and the city on how to respond to the police service needs in the city. It also provides policies on the use of new technology and how to respond to different crimes more common in some neighborhoods than others. The city will be hiring a consultant for it this month.

“Too often police departments focus on what they believe is best based on their experience,” Hamilton said, “but it should reflect what the community thinks is best for the community. It’s so much more than strictly enforcement.”

Another goal Hamilton said they’re looking to accomplish is creating a department more reflective of the communities where they operate.

“It’s important for any organization to reflect the people they serve, and that is a focus on hiring right now,” he said. “There is nation-wide attention to a divide between police departments and their community. I think we have incredible support of our community. It’s well earned, but it’s a fragile relationship. We have to work hard to not be disassociated with our community.”

Hamilton has the support of many in the city.

“Captain Hamilton has a deep understanding of how policing affects people and this quality has served him well as a captain and will continue to do the same as he serves as interim chief,” Deputy Mayor and Chair of the Public Safety Committee Penny Sweet said. “I am confident of his abilities and look forward to working with him on the Police Strategic Plan.”

Hamilton is a graduate of the Northwestern University of School of Police Staff and Command and the FBI-sponsored Law Enforcement Executive Development Seminar at Quantico, Va. He is a member of the International Association of Chiefs of Police and the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs.

The KPD has 99 sworn officers and 36 support personnel.

For more information about the KPD, go to kirklandwa.gov/police.