By Jodi Hausen,Staff Writer

WILTON – At the helm for just over six weeks, new Police Chief Wayne Gallant wasted no time tackling a plethora of problems prior to receiving a damning review of the department from the Maine Chiefs of Police Association last week.

Selectmen hired the association in December after Franklin County assistant district attorneys requested an investigation into the department’s conduct.

“That report needed to come out,” Gallant said Wednesday.

“They could have been harsher,” he added, referring to police chiefs of Augusta, South Portland and Gorham, who wrote the report.

Former Police Chief James Parker was unavailable for comment Wednesday. He led the department during the period that was investigated.

John Rogers, director of the Maine Criminal Justice Academy, said Parker is “a really nice guy.”

However, he wasn’t surprised with the report.

“A chief is the guy who steers the ship. In this case, he steered them in the wrong direction,” he said.

Among the findings of Chiefs Wayne M. McCamish, Ronald W. Shepard and Edward J. Googins were:

• A lack of community trust.

• Significant inadequacies in reporting, documentation and filing.

• Dirty and unhealthy conditions in the public safety building.

• Poor departmental morale, including an “every man for himself” atmosphere.

• Questionable practices in crime investigation and federally mandated reporting.

• Inconsistent policies and procedures.

• Insufficient training opportunities for officers.

“Enlightened law enforcement administrators accept as a basic (tenet) of their profession the statement that the police should be a part of the community and not apart from it,'” the chiefs wrote.

“It was apparent,” they wrote, “that the department is lacking considerably in this philosophy. This lack of commitment to community involvement has led to a belief by citizens that the department is unaware of their concerns, and in some cases does not care,” they continued.

Steve McCausland, spokesman for the Maine Department of Public Safety, said Wednesday that departmental problems in no way affected the investigation into the December 2003 murder of Raymond “Butch” Weed. State police responded immediately and have been working with the Wilton department to investigate, he said.

He also said there have been no apparent lapses in uniform crime reporting for more than two years. Reports have been timely, he said, although he has no way of knowing if they are complete.

Selectman Norman Gould said the department’s problems developed over time.

“It wasn’t anything that happened overnight,” he said. “But we’re on the right track now, and it takes time to make change.”

By all accounts, Gallant is moving in the right direction.

In his report to selectmen Tuesday night, Gallant listed several outreach programs he has or will put in place. Included were:

• His appearances and talks to audiences on two occasions.

• His and Officer Edward Leahy’s each volunteering one hour a week for Big Brothers/Big Sisters.

• A bicycle lottery planned for summer, in which several unclaimed stolen bicycles will be given to children.

• A “hello neighbor” program utilizing volunteers from SeniorsPlus to call local shut-ins. An unanswered call will prompt an officer to go to the resident’s home to check their well-being.

He has undertaken a major cleaning of the public safety building. An overhaul of the department’s filing and reporting systems has been under way as well.

Gallant said an investigation into the conduct of two officers, requested of the Maine Criminal Justice Academy by the assistant district attorneys in December, has been turned over to him and is almost complete. He said he had not expected to have that responsibility on top of everything else, but “it’s like triage for a paramedic.”

“The tires were flat,” he said of his department. “But there’s air in the tires now and we’re rolling.”