Lakewood police unions call for Chief Smith’s removal after no-confidence vote
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- Lakewood police unions voted no confidence and demand Chief Smith’s removal.
- City manager will investigate complaints. Mayor says chief has helped crime rates fall.
- Unions cite communication failures, leadership disengagement and staffing losses.
The two unions representing Lakewood police officers, sergeants and captains are calling for Police Chief Patrick Smith to be removed from his position after a majority of their members voted last month that they had no confidence in the chief’s leadership.
A union for civilian employees in the Lakewood Police Department also sent a letter to city leadership expressing support for the police unions’ votes. It said concerns raised by the police guilds reflected issues that have affected morale, communication and employees’ ability to effectively perform their duties.
In a phone interview Thursday, Smith pushed back on claims that he had exhibited a pattern of poor communication, disengaged leadership — including sleeping during meetings — and a lack of contingency planning in dealing with officers leaving the Police Department for other agencies.
Smith pointed to falling crime rates in the city and the fact that there were zero homicides last year as evidence his leadership was effective. Asked about staffing, Smith said there are four or five vacancies and described expecting to hire five people by the end of the month. But signing bonuses offered by other police agencies have made retaining and hiring officers challenging.
“This is a personal attack,” Smith said. “This isn’t anything to do with getting the job done.”
Smith described himself as an outsider to the Police Department and said some people just can’t handle change. Smith, who is Black, asked The News Tribune to look at the demographics of his agency and said there were only maybe two African American officers.
The News Tribune analyzed many Pierce County police departments’ demographics between 2020 and 2024 in a story published last year. It found a large disparity between the diversity of Lakewood residents and the Police Department. In 2020, the department was 26 percent whiter than the city’s population.
Lakewood’s new mayor, Paul Bocchi, agreed that the dent in the city’s crime was at least partially attributable to Smith’s leadership. He acknowledged that crime rates have fallen nationally. Bocchi said Friday that City Manager Doug Russel, whom Smith reports to, would investigate the claims made in the letters.
“The department is still doing a great job top to bottom,” Bocchi said. “At the same time there’s these issues out there that they’ve identified, and, you know, the city manager is going to have to work through those and try to figure out what’s going on.”
“This is personnel matters that need to be dealt with,” Bocchi added. “I am concerned about the impact on morale and how that is going to impact operations, but I believe in the professionalism of the department.”
Russel declined to comment on the no-confidence votes. Through a spokesperson, he said, “The city will investigate the complaints it receives.”
Dan Thenell, an attorney for the Lakewood Police Independent Guild and the Lakewood Police Management Guild, said Friday that his clients had met with Russel to discuss the concerns that resulted in the vote of no confidence. He said the officers, sergeants and captains trust that the city will review the matters thoroughly and reach conclusions grounded in fact.
“However, both guilds firmly believe there is no viable path forward that permits — or should permit — Chief Smith to remain with the Lakewood Police Department,” Thenell said in an email. “Allowing him to do so will result in the continued departure of officers to other agencies and further erode an already strained department.”
Thenell said Smith did not have the trust, credibility or leadership necessary to return the Police Department to the professional standing it once held, and that morale could not be restored under him.
Julius Brown, chairman of the Lakewood African American Police Advisory Committee, told The News Tribune the no-confidence votes were a “hit job.”
“All of the issues and all of the complaints they’ve got are feelings complaints,” Brown said. “They’re not really grounded in anything.”
Asked about claims that Smith was disengaged at meetings, Brown said Smith is the type of person to sit back quietly and observe things before he speaks. Brown said the chief is just taking everything in.
“Believe me, he catches things that I didn’t even hear sometimes,” Brown said.
Police unions give lists of grievances
The police unions’ letters, both dated Dec. 22, said 87 percent of the Lakewood Police Independent Guild participated in the vote and 75 percent of those voters endorsed the no-confidence vote. The Lakewood Police Management Guild unanimously passed a vote of no confidence.
Smith was hired as police chief in 2023 to replace retiring Chief Mike Zaro. He has more than 35 years of law enforcement experience and came from Birmingham, Alabama, where he was police chief from 2018 to 2022, when he resigned. His resignation came almost a year after he received a vote of no confidence from the leaders of the Fraternal Order of Police lodge, citing increasing crime and violence against police officers.
Last year, Smith placed former Assistant Chief John Unfred on paid leave when he notified him in March that a professional-standards investigation was brought against him. Unfred remained on leave for months until the city approved a $420,998 settlement rescinding the investigation in exchange for his early retirement and promise not to sue.
Since then city leaders have never addressed what the investigation was about. Unfred said he had done nothing wrong.
Unfred’s removal was among a long list of grievances outlined in the police unions’ letters. They said Unfred’s abrupt removal occurred without explanation, created instability in the command structure and resulted in the loss of a funded executive position, forcing the department to backfill leadership responsibilities.
“The Chief’s sole explanation for this executive-level termination was a single email referencing an alleged policy violation that was never substantiated, clarified, or supported with facts, further damaging credibility,” the Lakewood Police Independent Guild’s letter stated. “Furthermore, the Chief’s stated reason for launching that investigation was inconsistent with current policy and past practice of the department.”
Asked about Unfred’s removal, Smith said Unfred worked directly for him as an appointed staff member.
“While they may not like it, it doesn’t fall in the union rules,” Smith said.
The Lakewood Police Management Guild’s No. 1 reason it had lost confidence in Smith’s leadership was a “chronic lack of communication and physical disengagement.” The union’s letter said Smith routinely isolated himself from daily operations and failed to maintain communication with command staff, commissioned officers and support staff, resulting in confusion and eroded trust.
Smith said he had meetings weekly with command staff to “go over every single thing with the department, provide direction, everything else.”
Chief Smith says he has been ‘extremely ill’
The Lakewood Police Independent Guild’s letter said Smith had been seen sleeping during meetings several times and during at least one “critical incident.”
Smith did not directly address claims that he had slept during meetings but said he has been “extremely ill” and was hospitalized last year for almost a month. He declined to get into the specifics of his illness but said he lost 30 pounds in two weeks and received specialized treatment in Seattle.
“A lot of people don’t know everything that I had to go through medically, all of the medications that I was taking, all of the side effects that this medication had on me, my body and my wellbeing,” Smith said. “And to take that and try to use that against me for their own internal purposes I think is just absolutely disingenuine.”
After being in the hospital for almost a month, Smith said, he took time off for about two months.
Addressing the letter from non-sworn employees represented by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) supporting the no-confidence votes, Smith said a lot of it has to do with complaints within the department.
“I won’t get into that because I cannot, but I think in due time you will see that there’s a whole lot more to this story than what they are saying,” Smith said.
The AFSCME letter, which was not dated, described similar concerns about Smith’s leadership as the police unions’ letters. Those included a “persistent and systemic inability to communicate clearly and consistently with leadership and support staff.” Also contradictory direction given to different groups on the same issues and a pattern of deflecting responsibility for communication failures.
