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If police Chief Jim Farley is sincere about wanting to leave the turmoil in the Crystal River police department to pursue his interests in writing and the performing arts, his four-year tenure will have provided him with plenty of character-development material.
Farley, already a published novelist, has been an actor in many local stage productions that rival in intensity and incongruity the tragicomedies of City Council meetings.
With Playhouse 19 credits ranging from a captain of the Inquisition in Man of La Mancha and Buffalo Bill Cody in Annie Get Your Gun to a psychotic killer in Wait Until Dark and a judge in Wedding From Hell, the chief's experiences should have given him a special appreciation for the strange characters and bizarre plot twists of the city hall dramas.
As has always been the case in Crystal River, the police department is eyebrow deep in the town's personality-driven politics. Unfortunately for him, Farley has been unable to avoid being sucked into the bog.
He will leave Sept. 13 amid a whirlwind of federal lawsuits filed by fellow police officers and bitter feuds with certain council members, all with political subplots.
One of those suing, Sgt. Mack Ballard, claims the chief used an October 2001 staff meeting to endorse council candidates. Specifically, Farley is accused of telling police officers that if they supported then-council candidates Wes Stow, Kitty Ebert or John Kendall, their jobs would be in jeopardy. The other suits relate to depositions given during the Ballard case.
Farley said he just wanted to tell his crew that their department might be gobbled up by the Citrus County Sheriff's Office if certain people were elected. The merger has not occurred, but not long after taking office, Ebert and Kendall began complaining that the police department is too big. Ebert suggested that Sheriff Jeff Dawsy look into consolidation.
An internal investigation cleared Farley of any crime, but even he admitted later that holding the meeting "wasn't the wisest thing I've ever done."
Farley's other political performances have veered from high drama to low comedy.
At one council meeting, Farley seethed while Kendall scolded him for seeking money to fix up the police station, saying he should not be focusing on "accommodations and comfort."
In turn, Farley publicly lashed out at Kendall and Ebert later, blaming them for forcing then-City Manager Phil Lilly to resign. "Mr. Kendall has often proclaimed his management experience," he said. "But thus far, there has been no evidence of it. In fact, he has demonstrated the opposite repeatedly."
When a group of citizens tried to recall Kendall from office, Farley was one of those who signed the recall petition. It did not earn him rave reviews from the council member.
Farley's other headline-earning flaps have included his short-lived experiment with a mounted patrol police unit (Ebert was no fan); a battle with Ballard over the amount of reports officers should write (Farley wanted more, Ballard less); and an unfortunate run-in, literally, with a goose in the department parking lot.
Then there are the two recent farces when police work and politics collided, Kendall's threat last year to knock out the teeth of a rival who called him an a--, and former council member Alex Ilnyckyj's riveting monologue about a city worker who removed his campaign signs, "If I catch the motherf----- who's f------ with my f------ signs I'll break his f------ neck."
City police had to investigate both incidents. Mercifully, no charges were filed.
Farley's tumultuous tenure echoes that of his predecessors. In fact, he fits the profile.
In 1999, then-Chief Ray Kaminskas found himself walking a political tight-rope when he investigated an alleged sexual battery at a Crystal River nursing home whose administrator was a City Council member.
Before him, police Chief Bob Barchiesi and City Manager Roger Krieger both resigned in 1995 after an election, saying they could not work with the incoming City Council members. Krieger was entrenched in local politics himself having served as both city manager and police chief, sometimes simultaneously.
Farley, of course, was asked to wear both hats himself for a time. Small wonder why he found it impossible to concentrate solely on police work.
In his new endeavors, Farley will continue to assume the persona of famous characters from the pages of literature. Perhaps he will even pen a novel based on his experiences as chief.
Good luck finding a publisher who will believe those accounts, however. The truth in Crystal River really is stranger than fiction.