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One-on-one with Killeen's new police chief

Posted at 10:52 PM, Sep 07, 2017
and last updated 2017-09-07 23:54:51-04

He's been on the job for just a week, but already Killeen Police Chief Charles Kimble says he's spoken to many of the approximately 400 members of the police department. Chief Kimble says he asked them all the same question and will continue to do so in the days ahead.

"What did they do?" Kimble asked officers and civilians who work for Killeen police. "What specifically did they do to lower the crime rate today."

Chief Kimble brought up Killeen's crime rate, which is above the state average, several times during News Channel 25's one-on-one interview with him today. He expressed a strong desire to lower the crime rate and laid out a plan to do it.

It's a three priority plan that Chief Kimble says will get the results he's looking for.

Step one, he wants officers to focus all of their efforts on reducing the city's crime rate.

Secondly, Chief Kimble says he'll look at the internal processes within the police department and streamline them.

"This is a great organization," Chief Kimble said. "It's made up of some very talented men and women, and I can't wait to learn them and meet them and integrate their skills, their hobbies, their abilities and merge that into the Killeen Police Department."

Finally, Chief Kimble says he wants to improve the relationship between officers and the people they serve.

"When you work hand in hand with the community, when you build that trust, crime is going to come down," he said. "We have more eyes out there helping us do our job."

Chief Kimble comes to Killeen from Fayetteville, North Carolina. He says his experiences working there with Fort Bragg next door will help him in Killeen with Fort Hood as a neighbor.

"Since I'm not a stranger to the way they operate it was really easy for me to integrate and talk with them dealing with some issues that we have in the Killeen and Fort Hood area," Kimble said of talking to military police on post.

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