For many years now, law enforcement responsibilities in Mansfield have been shared between two agencies – the Mansfield Police Department and the Mansfield Marshals.
Although each of them have their own unique functions, a lot of what they do during the day overlaps. They say that can get complicated.
“There’s a lot of tasks that I do, and then Chief Fowler is doing the exact same task,” said Chief Marshal Tracy Aaron.
City leaders felt that didn’t make much sense and decided to simplify things by combining the two agencies.
“It just makes better sense to combine those resources and provide that service to the citizens in the most cost effective way,” said Police Chief Gary Fowler.
That also means combining two chief positions into one. Fowler decided he would step back and become an assistant chief.
“I’ve been with the city for 24 years and I’ll hopefully stay six more so I can get to 30,” said Fowler. “But this is a long term plan. And that’s where Chief Aaron falls in.”
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Aaron will take over as police chief Thursday.
“I really believe it’s going to be a smooth transition,” said Aaron. “You know, a lot of chiefs come in and they never have the opportunity to have an assistant chief with the wealth of knowledge Chief Fowler brings to the table.”
City officials said no one else will lose their job as part of the transition. Apart from the new chief, the only other change they believe citizens will notice is that all the Marshal vehicles will be replaced with police ones.
