LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Three months on the job as chief of the Little Rock Police Department and Keith Humphrey has already been surprised by this city and its people.
In just 90 days, an interview with the Dallas native already has a lot of ground to cover with a new citizen review board approved Tuesday and hearings over an officer-involved shooting Thursday and Friday.
"We've still got a lot of people to contact in this city," Humphrey said in a sit-down interview at police headquarters. "That's my responsibility to do that. Because as a chief, you can't design initiatives if you don't know what's going on in your city."
Chief Humphrey figures he's met about 75% of the department's employees and has been meeting his new neighbors since arriving from Oklahoma. He's been pleasantly surprised so far.
"There's a lot of support for our department," he said. "From what you hear, you expect some anger. There are some fractures and we're fixing those fractures."
He arrived as the department investigated a deadly officer-involved shooting.
Two days after being sworn in, he met the family of Bradley Blackshire in the streets as they protested the man's death at the hands of officer Charles Starks.
"In letting the community know that I am engaged and that I will listen, I think that helped," he said of his initial meeting with protesters. He would urge calm days later when prosecutors cleared Starks later that week.
Humphrey eventually fired the officer for a violation of department policy. Starks is appealing to the civil service commission, looking for his job back.
"I can't talk about those personnel issues, but that was not an easy decision," he said while acknowledging he made the call to fire Starks.
Chief Humphrey has a new job to tackle after the city's Board of Directors narrowly approved a new citizen review board. He will have to train the appointees.
The two rank-and-file police unions are opposed to the new layer of oversight, and that's something else the chief feels he needs to teach.
"We've got to get both unions involved so that members of the unions understand the purpose of this commission," he said. "The other thing we've got to do is educate the community on why we're doing this."
Humphrey is closely tied to mayor Frank Scott Jr., who hired him after making the search for a new chief part of his campaign.
The mayor also pushed to create the citizen review board and cast the deciding vote Tuesday night. Humphrey says the mayor has demands, but in the end remains hands-off.
"He's not going to tell me how to do my job. He'll tell you that very clearly," Humphrey said. "He will tell you he's not a police officer and hired me to be the one who could lead this department."
Next on the agenda for both the mayor and chief: body-worn cameras in lieu of more bodies on the streets.
"I'd really love to see the body cams come to fruition in the next 90 days. We're waiting to see if we're awarded this grant," the chief said. "We're going to continue to look at some of our policies. We're working on improving our victim advocacy efforts, and we're always looking for ways to improve."