ORANGE — Patience, honesty and accessibility are the most important traits for the police chief in a town like Orange to have — according to the man just selected for the job.
James Sullivan, acting police chief in Orange, has been chosen as permanent police chief, the Selectboard announced at its Wednesday meeting. He has been with the department since 2004, and has worked as a police officer for two decades.
“I applied to be the chief of police in Orange because I love working here. I love working in this town, I wanted to continue on doing that in a different capacity,” Sullivan said in his public interview for the job.
Having grown up in Athol, Sullivan added, “A lot of the business owners, a lot of the residents, are people I’ve known all my life.”
According to Selectboard Chairman Ryan Mailloux, Sullivan was “the first choice unanimously” after Selectboard members reviewed their assessments of interviewed candidates.
Following the announcement Wednesday night, the Selectboard voted to have Town Administrator Gabriele Voelker and Human Resources representative Trish Barnes begin negotiations with Sullivan for the position.
Sullivan has been acting police chief in Orange since March, when he took over for Craig Lundgren, who resigned and is now police chief in neighboring Athol. Prior to becoming acting police chief, Sullivan was a sergeant and designated second-in-command, performing police chief duties whenever Lundgren was away. He was also the police officer who caught convicted murderer Lewis Starkey III after a five-day manhunt in 2017, later testifying in court that Starkey told him, “You got the prize,” upon being apprehended.
Sullivan shared that some of his personal hobbies include camping with his family and going to the beach.
As a police chief, he said, “You’ve got to have patience — that’s one of the things I learned from Craig Lundgren — and you have to be honest. You have to care about people.”
Sullivan said he would listen and care about the concerns of his employees, as well as citizens as police chief.
“You have to be approachable and reachable by everybody, whether it’s someone who works with you, any other town department, town businesses, residents, they all have to be able to come in and talk to you about stuff,” Sullivan said. “You can’t just sit in your office and crunch numbers and be unreachable.”
In a small town, the most important crime prevention and crime-solving strategy is talking with people, Sullivan said. He also said that officers in Orange, with a relatively small police force, have to be versatile.
“In a town like Orange, when you get in a cruiser and go out, you have to have a good idea of how to handle everything from a skunk going around in circles to a homicide,” Sullivan said.
As part of the interviewing process, the Selectboard asked applicants for the job about grants, which Sullivan said he would pursue, specifically mentioning “click-it or ticket” grants to quell speeding. He recognized that the budget, in a financially constrained municipality, presents perhaps the biggest challenge as police chief. While Sullivan said he doesn’t see a need for the Police Department to grow very much, eventually he would like to hire a full-time detective.
Sullivan’s selection follows a several-months-long search process by a screening committee, formed by the Selectboard in February. The Selectboard interviewed the final four candidates last week. They included, in addition to Sullivan: Jamie Berger, detective sergeant in Wayland; Nathan Bowolick, detective sergeant in Boxborough; and C. Thomas O’Donnell, police chief in West Brookfield.
“Excellent talent out there — I’m appreciative to have had such a qualified pool of candidates in front of us to interview,” Mailloux said.
Reach David McLellan at dmclellan@recorder.com or 413-772-0261, ext. 268.