DALTON, Ga. — The Dalton Public Safety Commission on Monday unanimously selected Cliff Cason to be the city’s next police chief. Despite the 3-0 vote, not all members of the commission think Cason is the best choice to lead the police department.

PSC member Carlos Calderin made a motion to select Capt. Chris Cooke — the other finalist for the position — as the city’s police chief. However, PSC members Terry Mathis, Keith Whitworth and Kenneth Willis voted for Cason when the original motion for him to be chosen as chief was called for a vote. Calderin abstained from voting. Commission chairman Bill Weaver usually votes to break ties.

The Dalton City Council approved the hiring at its meeting Monday night.

Cliff Cason named Dalton’s new police chief

Cason was the assistant chief and was interim chief after former chief Jason Parker was hired as Dalton’s city manager in January.

In January, the PSC initially opened the job only to members of the Dalton Police Department with at least 12 years of total law enforcement experience showing increasing responsibility in a city or similar agency, at least 10 years in the Dalton Police Department and at least a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice or a related field to apply.

That meant the only qualified candidates for police chief were white males. Only after pressure from community groups, including the Dalton-Whitfield NAACP, did the PSC open the job to candidates outside of the department.

According to data supplied by the department, of the department’s 82 sworn officers, only four were Hispanic and none were black. All of its 20 executive, command and supervisory positions were filled by white males. Commission members then decided to open up the applications to candidates from outside the department, with 18 outside applicants joining the six in-house candidates. Both Cason and Cooke are white males.

“I think we had a strong set of finalists and I think we picked the one who will best meet the needs for this,” Weaver said. “That was our intent from the beginning. I think the primary difference was the experience the assistant chief already had.”

Cason said he takes making the force more reflective of the community seriously. Saying he wants his officers more involved in schools and community activities geared toward the next generation of police officers, Cason said he hopes his department can inspire students toward public service careers.

“It is kind of hard to put a number on the number of women and minorities you want to bring into the ranks this year due to the fact that you don’t know how many are going to apply,” Cason said. “We want to engage students and hopefully increase minority applicants and with that increasing the number of qualified applicants. The long-term goal of getting out in schools and working with youth athletics is to push them to be cops and firefighters and maybe join the armed services.”

Cason said he was grateful for the process to come to a close.

“When you come into work everyday and you don’t know if you are going to be the long-term head of the agency, or if you are just filling a void until a decision is made, there is a little bit of stress involved. We have had some significant events taking place in that time and the men and women of the Dalton Police Department have risen to those challenges and done a great job with it. I attribute my being successful in the past four months with the fact that we have a lot of quality men and women in place. I am inheriting a department that was very well-run already.”

Cason joined the DPD as a patrol officer in 1993. He has had several positions, including as a detective and a drug unit detective in the Criminal Investigations Division and division commander in both the Support Services Division and Patrol Division.

He was promoted to assistant chief in April 2015. He attended the FBI’s National Academy and has specialized management training from the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police, the Police Executives’ Research Forum and the FBI LEEDS (Law Enforcement Executive Development Seminar).

He has a master’s degree in public administration from Columbus State University and a bachelor’s degree from Covenant College.

“I am looking forward to the challenges and plan on hitting the ground running and making some positive changes in both the department and the community as we move forward,” Cason said. “You are going to see a lot more of the community involvement with the police department when it comes to both inside the schools, not specifically (school resource officers), but law enforcement candidate workshops inside the schools to help bring young people along and encourage them to engage in public service as a career.”