Who Will Be Florence's New Police Chief?

Current Florence Police Chief Rick Singleton is retiring next month. Yes, it's that soon. Rick is currently running for mayor of the largest town in the Quad-Cities, and we wish him luck. He will be leaving some large proverbial shoes to fill.

Tomorrow the City of Florence will be holding initial interviews for his successor. No applicants have been officially announced by the city, but we may expect each of the two deputy chiefs to apply.

The deputy chief with the longer tenure is Neal Rhodes, pictured at right. Rhodes has long served with the force and in 2006 graduated from UNA with an MS in Criminal Justice. He is married to Cindy Rhodes; the couple has two sons, Will and Wes. Neal rose in ranks from uniformed officer to detective to captain, before being selected as deputy chief.

The second deputy chief is Tim Shaddix, pictured at left. Tim rose to the rank of deputy chief when he succeeded current Tuscumbia Police Chief Tony Logan in April 2008. He and his wife Elizabeth own S&K Properties and reside with their children in Killen. Tim has been with the force since 1982.

Will there be other applicants? We would certainly think so, and while it hasn't been officially announced as being so, we will also assume this is the second round in the selection of Florence's new chief.

There is often a school of thought that a complete outsider functions best in offices of authority; in other words, a new broom with no previous connotations of staff sweeps both clean and best. We have never held with that tenet; we believe our new chief will best be selected from the ranks of the current police force.

We wish both deputy chiefs the best on Friday and in their future careers. Rick Singleton will be leaving a department in not just good stead, but great stead with the citizens of Florence. Let's keep it that way.

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Kudos to all those who keep up public websites. It's a time consuming task and one that usually offers few thank yous. With that being said, we couldn't help but notice the quality of the two pics above varied greatly. Looking at the stats on the two, the photo of Neal Rhodes is of a much higher definition than that of Tim Shaddix. We realize they were taken at different times and probably with a different camera and by different individuals. 

If this can be corrected, we would hope it will be. Second, we didn't want any of readers to think we had intentionally sabotaged anyone's photo.

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Thanks to Bailey Quarters for filling in here for a few days. We will be having some follow ups on her blogs in the next few day. Let's hope Bailey will continue to find more time to write for us on a regular basis.

Remember, guest blogs are always welcome!



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