At a news conference at Yakima City Hall\ntoday, Yakima City Manager Cliff Moore announced he has selected Matt Murray to\nbecome the next Yakima police chief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMatt stood out among the five police chief\ncandidates who came to Yakima last week because of the vast amount of\nexperience he has gained during his long career in law enforcement, the\nsignificant breadth of responsibilities he has had serving in a variety of\nleadership roles, and his understanding and embracing of 21st<\/sup>\nCentury Policing principles,\u201d said Moore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Murray, who is currently serving as a\nlieutenant in the Denver Police Department, was one of five police chief\ncandidates who were interviewed by Moore and four separate panels last\nThursday. The police chief candidates\nalso participated in two \u201cMeet & Greet\u201d sessions last Friday \u2013 one with\nYakima Police Department (YPD) staff and one with community members. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Murray must still pass psychological and\npolygraph testing and undergo a comprehensive background check before\nofficially joining the City.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cLike the city manager, I have been impressed\nby Matt\u2019s depth of experience in law enforcement,\u201d Mayor Kathy Coffey said at\nthe news conference announcing Murray\u2019s selection as the next Yakima police\nchief. \u201cI am confident (he) is well\npositioned to take the reins of the Yakima Police Department and to continue to\ngrow the department\u2019s reputation as an outstanding law enforcement agency.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Murray began his career with the Denver PD in\n1991 as a patrol officer. During his\ntenure at the Denver PD, Murray has also served as a sergeant in the Volunteers\nin Policing Unit, the Homicide Unit, and the Major Crimes Division. In\n2008, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant and oversaw the Patrol Division\nin one of Denver\u2019s police districts. While\nserving as a lieutenant\/chief of staff, Murray led an effort in 2009 to launch\nthe department\u2019s social media efforts to combat biased information that was\nbeing distributed about the Denver PD. \nIn 2014, he became part of the Denver PD command staff serving as a\npolice commander\/chief of staff. About a\nyear later, Murray was made a deputy chief of police\/chief of staff by the\nDenver police chief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last year, Murray returned to his\nposition as a lieutenant in the Denver PD.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Murray holds a bachelor of arts\ndegree in management from the University of Phoenix and a master of science\ndegree in organizational leadership from Regis University in Denver. He is also a graduate of the Police Executive\nResearch Forum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Murray will succeed Dominic Rizzi, who held the Yakima police chief position from spring 2012 until fall 2018.\u00a0 Murray will oversee a department that includes about 190 total employees, both commissioned and non-commissioned.\u00a0 The total 2019 YPD budget is just over $30 million. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The tentative start date of Murray\u2019s tenure as Yakima police chief is May 1st<\/sup>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At a news conference at Yakima City Hall today, Yakima City Manager Cliff Moore announced he has selected Matt Murray to become the next Yakima police chief. \u201cMatt stood out among the five police chief candidates who came to Yakima last week because of the vast amount of experience he has gained during his long<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7162"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7162\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7164,"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7162\/revisions\/7164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yakimawa.gov\/media\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}