Alex Morse and Daniel Boyle, who plan to challenge Mayor Elaine Pluta in her bid for re-election, criticized her for how she has handled the police chief selection process.
Alan FletcherHOLYOKE – Capt. Alan G. Fletcher, the senior-most officer in the department, said Monday he feels Mayor Elaine A. Pluta slighted him by appointing another captain interim chief when Police Chief Anthony R. Scott retires Saturday.
Pluta also received criticism from Alex B. Morse and Daniel C. Boyle, who are running against her for mayor in the fall election, for how she has handled the police chief process.
Pluta said that she was confident that Capt. Frederick J. Seklecki would do well as interim chief and that Fletcher’s status as one of the 40 candidates for the chief job made him ineligible to be given the provisional position.
Scott has been chief since 2001. He turned 65 April 19, and he must retire within the month in which he turns 65, under state law. His yearly salary is $133,164.
Seklecki began with the department Jan. 26, 1983. Fletcher began Aug. 11, 1968.
“I’m very disappointed in the mayor, that’s all I can say, with the selection,” Fletcher said. “I’ve lived in Holyoke all my life. It’s a professional insult.”
Another potential interim chief candidate was Capt. Arthur R. Monfette, who began Oct. 20, 1978, but he was ineligible because he is on the search committee reviewing police chief applications, Pluta said.
“We have three good captains. Unfortunately, the other two were tied up. Capt. Seklecki was the logical choice,” Pluta said.
A search committee Pluta appointed Nov. 30 is reviewing candidates and will recommend three to five finalists from which Pluta said she will choose a chief by late June.
Morse for weeks has said the search committee should have been appointed sooner so a new chief would be ready to step in upon Scott’s retirement, a departure the city has known about for a year.
“I think that’s good common sense. I think the mayor should have had the foresight to begin the chief candidate search earlier so we wouldn’t have had to appoint an interim chief,” said Morse, youth counselor at CareerPoint here.
Boyle, a business consultant, said Pluta is contradicting herself by saying Fletcher’s candidacy omits him from interim chief consideration. Deputy Fire Chief William P. Moran has been provisional fire chief since September by vote of the Fire Commission, a three-member board Pluta appointed, and Moran is a candidate for the permanent chief job, Boyle said.
“So, how can Mayor Pluta treat Capt. Fletcher one way and Deputy Chief Moran differently? One contradicts the other. The citizens of Holyoke deserve to have the most qualified person as acting police chief and in this instance that police officer is Capt. Fletcher,” Boyle said.
Pluta said regarding the criticism from Morse and Boyle, “The committee did start later than I expected....It took me a couple of weeks to really get a good group of people together, with a diverse mix, that I wanted on this committee.”
Once the committee was chosen, she said, the Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day holidays made for scheduling problems.
A preliminary election would be held Sept. 20 to narrow the field to the top two finishers for mayor who would then compete in the general election Nov. 8.