Ramsey Wraps Up 8-Year Run As Philly's Police Commissioner
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey has cleaned out his office and officially retires on Monday, leaving behind an improved department under the leadership of his chosen successor.
"It's been a good run for me," Ramsey says reflecting on the past eight years.
In assessing his own performance, Ramsey lets the numbers do the talking.
"The year before I came, we came close to 400 murders. This year, we will finish right at about 275. This is the first time since 1969 we've had three years in a row under 300 murders in this city," he says, crediting the policing plan he developed within three weeks of taking the job in 2008.
"We redeployed a lot of our officers to our 'hot districts,' the ones that have the most violent crime. We engaged in foot patrols. We created a real-time crime center so we're able to get information in a real-time basis and adjust strategies and deployments accordingly. We have crime briefings on a regular basis."
Ramsey is also proud of technology upgrades, training advances and accreditation from the Pennsylvania police accreditation agency, "the largest municipal police department in the country to have that kind of accreditation," he says.
But his tenure has not been without controversy.
His stop and frisk policy is the subject of a federal consent decree and federal officials blasted the department's use of deadly force after an increase in police-involved shootings, though they later praised the department for taking their advice and he managed to avoid Baltimore- and Chicago-style unrest.
Ramsey has also fought against police corruption, losing several rounds to the arbitration process.
And he has seen tragedy. Eight officers were killed during his tenure.
He has enormous confidence in his successor, his First Deputy, Richard Ross.
"He's going to take this department a lot further along than I was able to in the time I was here."
Ramsey called building strong relationships with the community Ross's most important task.
"It's a constant effort, it's never done," he says. "They're very fragile and they'll always be fragile and we need to be mindful of that."
For himself, Ramsey already has two consulting gigs lined up-- with the Police Executive Research Forum and the Presidential Task Force, two national groups he led while Commissioner, and other offers he said he wasn't at liberty to disclose.
But will he miss leading the department on a daily basis?
"There's no question about it," he says. "I love the city, love the department... it's just time to move on."
Listen to more of Charles Ramsey:
