POULSBO — Poulsbo Police Chief Alan Townsend resigned March 14, writing in a statement released by the mayor’s office that “I have become a distraction to the city and more specifically the police department.”

He referred to the department’s handling of a DUI involving a Kitsap County sheriff’s officer; and an incident in which Townsend was found alone in his darkened office late at night with a female officer.

Deputy Chief Andy Pate is acting police chief.

Mayor Becky Erickson said she did not ask Townsend to resign or threaten to fire him, but said she did call the meeting in which Townsend resigned.

Pate said he was met by Erickson as he arrived in the parking garage and was called into a meeting with her and Townsend in her office.

The Herald reported on Nov. 10 that a reserve officer discovered Townsend and the female officer alone together in the darkened office, and that the mayor reprimanded the police chief. The story was further investigated and reported on by the Kitsap Sun; that story led the Sun’s March 13 edition.

In between, the department was subjected to intense media and public scrutiny over its handling of the DUI, in which a sheriff’s sergeant, reportedly drunk and behind the wheel of his vehicle at Regal Cinemas, was allowed by a Poulsbo police officer to remain in his vehicle because it was parked in the parking lot and the keys were not in the ignition. The sergeant was later found in his vehicle in the driveway of his home. He was not cited but, according to the sheriff’s office, chose to retire from the department.

The Herald asked Erickson for a copy of the resignation Townsend submitted. She presented a copy of a statement, on her office letterhead, signed by her and containing what she identified as Townsend’s resignation.

“I believe I have become a distraction to the city and more specifically the police department,” the resignation states. “These recent distractions, from the KCSO DUI incident to the former Officer [Danielle] Branes incident, have taken their focus away from the excellent work our police officers do every day. It’s time to get back on that track, and it seems much more easily accomplished with my departure.”

Erickson wrote that an interim police chief will be named shortly. “At present, Deputy Chief Andy Pate will be in charge of the Poulsbo Police.”

CAME AS A SURPRISE
Townsend’s resignation came as a surprise to Deputy Chief Pate.

“I came in this morning and was getting out of my car and the mayor grabbed me and we went upstairs to a meeting and Al resigned,” Pate said. Then, just like in the movies, Townsend handed his department weapon over to Pate and his badge to Erickson and it was over.

“It’s been a tough 24 hours,” Erickson said. She insisted the decision to resign was Townsend’s.

Erickson said she believes the “caliber of policing” in Poulsbo is top notch. The department has two school resource officers, the department is “a pioneer” in the state in the use of body cameras, and the department’s crisis intervention officer has been recognized as the top in the state, she said.

But the department has been beset by several controversies over the past five years. A police clerk was arrested in 2011 after she was found to be in possession of a handgun she had signed off as being destroyed, and the state auditor ordered the department to improve its handling of evidence  after that incident and the loss of a stolen necklace being held as evidence.

Townsend was hired as Poulsbo police chief in March 2013, succeeding Dennis Swiney, who retired. Townsend had been Port Orchard police chief.

It was a tumultuous first year for Townsend. In April 2013, Sgt. Wendy Davis resigned; she stepped into a sergeant’s position — Erickson said it was a temporary appointment — after Davis and Pate, who at the time was her subordinate, became romantically involved. (The two married on April 26, 2015, Pate said.)

In June 2013, Police Officer Ricki Sabado retired, ending an investigation into whether he knew anything about his wife and son’s alleged behavior before their separate arrests for DUI and trafficking in stolen property.

In January 2015, Deputy Police Chief Bob Wright resigned amid an investigation into his alleged conduct during a dispute with his estranged wife, also a law enforcement officer.

Pate said Townsend was popular with officers. But, he noted, the police chief is held “to a high standard of integrity and morals.”

“The top is where the least accountability is — there’s not a whole lot of oversight,” Pate said. He said the need for personal accountability at all levels of law enforcement has never been greater. Still, he feels things are better now than they used to be.

“Things that were going on back in the ’90s when I first started, they’d never be tolerated now,” he said. “There’s more scrutiny today, the public is more educated about what law enforcement can and cannot do. People are paying more attention to law enforcement.”

Mayor Erickson said the City Council will hire an outside firm to conduct the search. She said the city would be “taking a hard look” at the structure of the chief and deputy chief positions.

“I have been a manager for a long time and one thing I know, when you have a position with a lot of turnover, it probably means you have inappropriate expectations,” Erickson said.

— With reporting by Richard Walker and Terryl Asla of the North Kitsap Herald.