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A little more than a year after the last director of Public Safety retired, a new director has finally been hired and is scheduled to begin Jan. 1, 2002.
Noel C. March, the current director of the Maine Community Policing Institute at the University of Maine at Augusta, was selected for the position following a year-long national search.
The search began in November of 2000, when Alan Reynolds announced his retirement after 33 years of service at the University of Maine. Charles P. Chandler, Jr. was named interim director and was expected to hold the position for a short time until another director could be hired. However, a search this summer resulted in several qualified candidates turning the job down. A second search began in August.
The position requires heading a full service, campus public safety organization. Twenty-one full service, state-certified police officers will work under March, as well as a full dispatch service and a security staff that mans the campus.
March’s qualifications for the position stretch back to his beginnings as a law enforcement officer in Meridan, Conn. in 1980. From there he went on to work as an officer in the Thomaston, Maine Police Department. He has also served as Chief Deputy Sheriff in both Knox and Cumberland counties and supervised the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency. He took a break from police work and became the assistant vice president for MBNA New England in 1993 and held that position until 1998.
He then returned to police work as the director of the Maine Community Policing Institute at the University of Maine at Augusta, a program that is the first of its kind in the country. Its purpose is to provide community policing education, training and technical assistance to the people of Maine and its police departments. It is funded by a surcharge on fines levied in state courts.
March holds an undergraduate degree in organizational leadership from the University of New England, as well as being a graduate of the prestigious FBI Academy in Quantico, Va. He is currently working towards a master’s degree.
His other qualifications include working as a guest trainer for the U.S. Department of Justice, as well as for the Canadian Mounted Police.
“I’m very excited to be joining the management team at UMaine,” March said. “One of Maine’s greatest assets is our system of higher education. The people who live, work and learn here at UMaine are a tremendous resource worthy of the safest environment possible. I certainly look forward to this opportunity to work with the students, faculty, employees and the great Public Safety staff.”
Bangor Daily News