Joliet gets 4 deputy police chiefs again

Police Chief Al Roechner has appointed four deputy chiefs, putting back in place a command structure that had been unstable for months.

The four new deputy chiefs will be formally announced at the city council meeting on Tuesday.

They are Sgt. Darrell Gavin, Lt. Marc Reid, Lt. Mike Batis and Sgt. John Perona.

Their appointments restore a command structure that was established in 2014. But there have been no deputy chiefs in place since September due to retirements throughout the year and Roechner's rise to police chief.

Roechner was one of two deputy chiefs left when he was named interim chief in August.

At that time, he replaced Brian Benton, who was retiring. And, the only other deputy chief, Ed Gregory, was due to retire the next month.

By the time Roechner was named police chief on Dec. 4, there were no longer any deputy chiefs in the police department.

Roechner will introduce the deputy chiefs at the start of the city council meeting on Tuesday.

He said Monday that he will keep the command structure that was put in place in 2014 with deputy chiefs for investigations, operations, administration and technical services.

Roechner had been appointed deputy chief of investigations and served in that capacity until his appointment as interim chief.

The same deputy chiefs had been in place until Brian DuPuis retired in January as deputy chief of technical services. Tab Jensen retired in July as deputy chief of administration. Gregory had been deputy chief of operations before his retirement in September.

None of the vacancies have been filled since.

Benton announced his retirement a day after a request to fill one of two deputy chief vacancies was pulled off of a city council agenda. At the time, former City Manager David Hales said he wanted first to resolve a union dispute over the future of four captain positions before setting the future command structure for the police department.