WPD gets new police sergeant

WASILLA -- Wasilla Chief of Police Don Savage has announced the promotion of Officer Ray Chmielowski of the department to the rank of sergeant. According to Savage, Chmielowski's position is a new one for the department.

Chmielowski said on Saturday that his lifelong ambition was always to do police work. He remembers his first childhood encounter with an Alaska State Trooper near his parents' homestead located north of Glennallen. Awestruck, he decided on the spot that he would go into law enforcement.

One of five brothers and the son of a military veteran, Chmielowski knew that family tradition demanded he first do military service before going on to achieve his personal goals. And so, having finished requirements for his high school diploma, he joined the Army two months before the formal graduation. While his classmates partied, Chmielowski was in basic training at Fort Dix, N.J.

Chmielowski went from Fort Dix to Fort Leonardwood, Mo., and then, although he had hoped to see something of the world, he found himself back at Fort Richardson in his home state of Alaska. When his tour was up, he began looking for work in law enforcement in Alaska.

He found, however, that his experience as an Army combat engineer did not help him in his efforts to break into police work. After a few months, unsuccessful but not discouraged, he joined the Air Force and trained for the security police. Not only was he now in law enforcement, but, when he was sent to the South Pacific Island of Guam, he also was finally getting to see the world.

After two years he was transferred to Hill Air Force Base, Utah, where he was still stationed when his tour with the Air Force was up. With his Air Force police qualifications, he was able to secure a job with the Davis County Sheriff's Department.

Now that he was in law enforcement, he began to pursue his ambition to return and work as a police officer in Alaska. In 1987 he applied for and got a job with the Metlakatla Police Department near Ketchikan, and was sent to police academy training at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Marana, Ariz.

Finally wearing the uniform of a police officer in Alaska, Chmielowski moved from patrol officer to patrol supervisor, remaining in Metlakatla for the next six years. For the last nine months of that time he was the acting chief of police, but he knew he did not want to spend his career doing administrative work.

He applied to join the brand-new Wasilla Police Department then being born in the heart of Mat-Su. Angela Long, then the police department clerk and now an officer herself, called to tell him he had the job. Although he had to take an extensive battery of tests and profiles, he did not have to retake the police academy.

There were eight officers in the new department, he remembers, in addition to the clerk, and then Chief of Police Earl Stanbaugh.

Chmielowski recalled that the new officers were supposed to have a week or two of orientation to become familiar with Wasilla, but it was not to be.

"They gave us a map book, turned us loose and said may the force be with you," he laughed. The newly minted police force found themselves not only dealing with current issues, but trying to solve old crimes as Wasilla citizens called in incidents that had occurred months or in some cases even years earlier.

Chmielowski recollects that the first sergeant position was established in the department in about 1995. Now, with the growth of the department and the implementation of a new scheduling system, a second position became necessary to cover all the patrol shifts.

In his new job, Chmielowski supervises six patrol officers, reviews reports and performs other administrative work. He said the officers that work under him are so good that they make his life easy.

However, he also still does patrol work and said he would not be happy otherwise. He enjoys the opportunity that patrol gives him to meet different people from different walks of life and to experience the variety of things that happen in the city, he said.

"No two days are ever the same," he said. And boredom is never an issue.