BYU-Idaho Radio · A New Police Chief in Jackson Hole
The town of Jackson, Wyoming recently swore in a new police chief. Michelle Weber became the new chief on January 26.
Weber is a 16-year veteran of the Jackson Police Department and has worked with the city for the last 22 years. She’s been the acting chief of police for six months already after the retirement of former police chief Todd Smith.
In an interview with BYU-Idaho Radio, she talked about what her goals are for the department.
“Mostly, I want to engage with our community a little better than we have and tap into some of the stakeholders we have and utilize them to create a vision for our police department,” Weber said.
She also said she wants to work on increasing training for police officers, as well as working on recruiting and retaining them. And she has already gotten to work. Only a couple of weeks into her job, and she has already backfilled six different positions in the department.
Being the chief of police isn’t an easy job. Especially in a world ravaged by a pandemic, Weber has had a difficult time over the past year and being chief of police has added to that intensity.
“I’d like to be out in the community doing more one-on-one interactions with our community members, but that’s a little hard to do during COVID,” Weber said. “We’re just dealing with it on a day-to-day basis here and trying to keep people safe and healthy and keep our businesses open.”
Even though the job is difficult, Weber said she still has a lot to enjoy.
“I really enjoy communicating and participating in the community and just sharing the goals and messages of our police department,” she said.
Ultimately, Weber is excited for where the police department is going from here and wants to let the public know she’s ready to serve them.
“I’m very proud of the men and women of the Jackson Police Department. The past 12 months have been really challenging for law enforcement in general, but our department has stepped up and done a good job attending to the needs of the community despite the challenges that are going on,” Weber said.