St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Baker has narrowed his search for a police chief down to four, who some say aren't the strongest picks. However, it's really too soon to tell.

Not every St. Petersburg resident is thanking Mayor Rick Baker for taking the slow, public approach to picking a new police chief. A group of neighborhood activists says it wants to review all 113 applications, suggesting that Baker didn't pick the strongest candidates as finalists. Baker will stick to his plan, however, interviewing the four remaining applicants this week and, he hopes, having a new chief in place by early October.

The question arises: Is Baker doing as much as he can to find a competent replacement for Chief Goliath Davis III?

First, Baker should be given credit for going public with the selection process. When then-Mayor David Fischer announced that Davis (the city's first black police chief) would replace Darrel Stephens in 1997, the change was already a fait accompli. A mayor has that authority under the city charter. It was a different time, of course. Less than a year earlier, the city had been torn by two nights of racial violence, and Fischer wanted to improve relations between the Police Department and the African-American community. He was also under some pressure to move Stephens into a top administrative vacancy to work on inner-city revitalization.

Davis will assume his new duties as deputy mayor for economic development in October, which gives Baker time to name a replacement. So he made a good decision to do a national search and to bring in finalists to meet with city residents. Where Baker stumbled was in failing to closely screen the finalists. Embarrassing details have come out about two of the men.

Luther Hunter, a division commander in the Nashville Police Department, was suspended for 25 days earlier this year after he was accused of trying to intimidate another officer who stopped Hunter for a traffic violation. Hunter says he is the victim of department politics, and he should be given a chance to present his side. But Baker opened himself to criticism by not discovering Hunter's controversial record before naming him as a finalist.

Mack Vines, a police veteran and former St. Petersburg chief, had trouble in two previous jobs. As Dallas' police chief, Vines was fired after being indicted on a perjury charge, but was acquitted. As director of the police academy at St. Petersburg College, Vines received some critical job evaluations before leaving after eight years. "I hope and pray that the decisionmakers will look at everything with an open mind," Vines said, and he deserves that consideration.

Overall, Vines has had a distinguished law enforcement career and has been a positive influence in St. Petersburg. Vines is no embarrassment on the finalist list, but at 62 he is near the end of his career.

The other two finalists have reached administrative positions where the next logical advancement is to police chief. Both Chuck Harmon, St. Petersburg's assistant police chief in charge of patrol, and Patrick Stephens, in a similar deputy police chief position in Cleveland, have earned consideration.

Could other strong candidates have been added to the mix? Probably. But from this group, Baker said, "I'm convinced I'm going to have a great chief."

That's not an irrational conclusion. St. Petersburg doesn't need a reformer or a change agent as its police chief. Davis filled that role, leading the department through a difficult period with his political savvy and dominant personality.

The mayoral contest earlier this year that put Baker in office was, in part, a referendum on the direction Davis has taken the department. Baker said during the campaign that he would keep Davis as chief. (Only after Davis insisted he wanted to move on did Baker offer the chief the deputy mayor job.) Losing mayoral candidate Kathleen Ford made no secret of her disapproval of Davis and his policies. But the election settled that argument.

Under Davis, the Police Department achieved declining crime rates and improved relations in many neighborhoods, and it made progress on innovative community policing programs. So Baker is looking for someone to take over a successful department and keep it on track.

Maybe Baker is right when he says that one of the four finalists is up to that job. He and St. Petersburg residents will have time to judge for themselves on Wednesday when the four men will be available to answer questions from the public.

The selection process got off to a shaky start, but it is too early to say it won't produce a chief capable of leading the Police Department.

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