PORTLAND, Maine — After a very long and nationwide search, Portland city officials have sworn in Mark Dubois as the Portland Police Department's next police chief.
Dubois was the police chief in Braintree, Massachusetts for the past seven years and has been visiting Maine with his family for the past two decades. He says during the first few months on the job, he will be focusing on getting to know all of the people who work for the department and their tasks and reviewing internal issues.
The chief says right now his highest priority is recruitment for the force, and making sure those who are hired are happy and stay within the department.
"If you know of anybody who wants to be a police officer, we are recruiting for the January police academy. There are tons of ways to apply online or come down here. We are just trying to replenish the staffing levels to manageable levels where we can man all the specialty units and also be on basic patrol," Dubois said.
Dubois says the job is a great opportunity to make a difference in your community.
"I think it's the best job that we have. It's very interesting. You meet a lot of great people. You run into the most interesting issues that we have in society. And if someone has a concern about how law enforcement is perceived or what we do, I just ask them to come down and join, and be part of the solution," the new chief expressed.
Aside from staffing, NEWS CENTER Maine asked him if he had a strategy to tackle the city's 13 unsolved homicides.
"I have been updated, and there's officers and investigators working on those, but the strategy, no, I have not gotten that far on week two," Dubois said.
Dubois added he is reviewing and assessing procedures regarding how police officers address hate groups in the city, like the most recent neo-Nazi gathering in March.
"I don't have enough information on what occurred in that particular march. I know there have been discussions internally and city-wide about our response, so we are reviewing our procedures on that and how we handle those situations," Dubois said.
The chief is also working on figuring out the right approach toward drug use in the city. The number of drug overdoses in Portland has increased significantly over the last few years. As of Monday, there had been 325 overdoses in the city so far this year, with 31 deaths. That number has more than doubled since 2021 when there were 150 overdoses through the end of July.
"I can tell you that we administer Narcan quite often, and it's sad actually how often it happens. That's one response that we've had that has dramatically changed throughout the years. On my ride in to work this morning someone was giving out Narcan," Dubois said.
Another topic of conversation was homelessness. Dubois says he values the partnerships the police department has with other city organizations to help resolve this issue.
"We get a lot of calls for service with those individuals in those encampments. It does take up a lot of resources, responding to the activity down there, wether it's criminal or not criminal. A lot of it is just response, say, for an overdose, or just checking on the well-being, that type of stuff. And also, there's criminal activity with thefts and recovery of stolen items. And then there is some violent crime involved in those communities. So, the task force that the city has set up is addressing that. We are one piece of that response, and it's going to evolve as time goes on as far as how we make adjustments to dealing with those encampments," the new chief said.
Dubois says there has been a task force set up to help tackle homelessness in the city, and it includes different city departments partnering and working together to help those in need.
Dubois says he thinks the Portland PD has enough resources to fight crime effectively.
If you are interested in learning more about potentially being a police officer with the Portland PD, click here.