{"id":25161,"date":"2017-01-03T09:02:16","date_gmt":"2017-01-03T17:02:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/retiring-ketchikan-police-chief-looks-back-ahead\/"},"modified":"2017-01-03T09:02:16","modified_gmt":"2017-01-03T17:02:16","slug":"retiring-ketchikan-police-chief-looks-back-ahead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/retiring-ketchikan-police-chief-looks-back-ahead\/","title":{"rendered":"Retiring Ketchikan police chief looks back, ahead"},"content":{"rendered":"

KETCHIKAN<\/strong> \u2014 When Ketchikan Police Chief Alan Bengaard retires in early 2017, he\u2019ll be ending an almost 30-year career in law enforcement.<\/p>\n

Bengaard, 53, informed the City of Ketchikan in late November of his plans to retire in January. A Ketchikan native, he\u2019s been with the Ketchikan Police Department for about 28 years, and has served as chief since being appointed in December 2011, reported the Ketchikan Daily News.<\/p>\n

Some of the biggest changes to how the Ketchikan Police Department operates and the types of crimes it deals with have come about due to a transition away from logging and fishing, according to Bengaard.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow we\u2019re much more of a tourism and government-based economy, and you see that reflected in the calls that we have,\u201d Bengaard said. \u201cIt used to be very rough and tumble, (and) we just don\u2019t see much of that anymore. … The downtown core was just a number of bars \u2014 if I recall correctly, 12 or 13 bars in the downtown core \u2014 and back in the \u201880s we had a 5 a.m. bar break. So we ended up, in the summer months at 5 a.m., you\u2019d have hundreds of people in the downtown area getting out of bars.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a different dynamic entirely,\u201d Bengaard added.<\/p>\n

There was a period of time when Ketchikan averaged about one murder per year, according to Bengaard.<\/p>\n

The last murder in Ketchikan was committed in August 2015.<\/p>\n

Drug offenses committed in the First City \u2014 specifically, the types of drugs involved \u2014 also have changed over time, Bengaard said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur drugs and drug usage typically follows what you see in the Pacific Northwest and a lot of the West Coast, we\u2019re just a little behind,\u201d Bengaard said. \u201cIn the \u201880s, cocaine was huge here and there was a small heroin population. … Now we\u2019re seeing methamphetamine, which is the most common (drug) that we see on the street. And now heroin\u2019s having quite a resurgence. We\u2019re seeing it a lot more often than we have before.\u201d<\/p>\n

Opioids and prescription pain medicines also have been present in Ketchikan, Bengaard added.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest change we\u2019ve made in the last year, and I still see it\u2019s going to be something we adapt to over a period of time, is (Senate Bill 91),\u201d Bengaard said. \u201c … It\u2019s made a substantial difference in the way we approach our street work; line officers are affected the most by it. It\u2019s something that they have to learn and adapt to over a period of time.\u201d<\/p>\n

The bill, signed into law in 2016, is aimed at criminal justice reform in the state. The law reduces the severity of some drug charges and changes sentencing guidelines.<\/p>\n

Bengaard and his wife, Heidi, plan to move to the Lower 48, and have already bought a house in Vancouver, Washington.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur kids are all grown, (and) they live out of state, so we\u2019re pretty much going to chase them down,\u201d Bengaard said.<\/p>\n

\u201c … It\u2019s been a great time,\u201d Bengaard added about his career at the KPD. \u201cPeople in the community probably ought to recognize that, those of us in law enforcement in the community, this is a tough job to have when you\u2019re in a small, isolated community like this, because you\u2019re literally on the job 24\/7. Everywhere you go, everyone you talk to, they know who you are and what you do for a living.\u201d<\/p>\n

Members of the Ketchikan City Council, during a December council meeting, thanked Bengaard for his service.<\/p>\n

Bengaard\u2019s last day as chief will be Jan. 27. His successor will be appointed by City Manager Karl Amylon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KETCHIKAN \u2014 When Ketchikan Police Chief Alan Bengaard retires in early 2017, he\u2019ll be ending an almost 30-year career in law enforcement. Bengaard, 53, informed the City of Ketchikan in late November of his plans to retire in January. A Ketchikan native, he\u2019s been with the Ketchikan Police Department for about 28 years, and has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[230],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-25161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25161"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25161\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25161"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=25161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}