By MATT PIKE
St. Joseph Post
There's less than a month until he officially takes the seat of Police Chief, but Paul Luster is prepared to tackle the challenges that come with the position.
Luster says one of his biggest challenges will be building relationships, not only with his fellow officers, but with the community.
"Getting out, getting to know the community, getting to know all the peers I'll be working with, the department members, and just having the ability to build those relationships," Luster tells reporters following his introduction last week.
Luster says he believes there's a great foundation already built at the St. Joseph Police Department
"You know just bringing some maybe modern policing, some 21st century policing, that will continue to just get better and better," Luster says.
Luster says there's a mix of challenges in his new position, that range from nationwide problems to ones that are unique to St. Joseph.
"I know right now that staffing and retention is an issue, that's a national attention right now so I don't think that's unique to St. Joseph something that we've all been dealing with," Luster explains. "As far as that, as I get to know the community, get to listen to the community, I may identify some of those challenges that could be very unique to St. Joe, but anxious to work on them either way."
Luster was named Chief of Police after a six-month search that began when former Chief Chris Connally retired in September.
Luster hopes to bring some changes to the St. Joseph Police Department, and to do that he'll rely on everyone's help.
Luster says he hopes to hold some listening sessions once he begins his leadership of the department.
Luster says these sessions will be with everyone, all the way from internally at the police department, to externally talking to people in the community.
"I can come in with, and I have, with kind of an overarching vision for the police department that we're going to strive for organizational excellence, and that we're going to strive for high levels of community engagement, and we're going to strive to really utilize database policing, precision policing," Luster says. "But the rest of those goals come from this community and from this police department."
Luster, a 25-plus year veteran of the Kansas City Police Department, will take over the position of Chief on June 26th.