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GREENSBORO — In his 21 years with the Charlotte police force, Kenneth Miller has been a patrol officer, an investigator and a top administrator. He has earned the respect of colleagues and community leaders in Charlotte along the way.

Miller is the senior deputy police chief for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department, where he supervises the felony investigative divisions.

“I will tell you — he thrives on difficult challenges,” said Bob Schurmeier, a former deputy police chief at the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department who was once Miller’s supervisor.

“He’s not the type of guy to sit around and talk about concepts. He’ll talk about it and then you best get out of his way, because he’s going to get it done.”

Miller, 46, has been with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg police since 1989. He rose through the ranks from positions in patrol, planning and research and internal affairs to become deputy chief in 2006.

That’s what Greensboro City Manager Rashad Young liked about Miller: Young said Miller has proved himself to be a strong leader.

“He had such a breadth of experience,” Young said. “He really talked about modeling the appropriate leadership behavior and building a strong relationship with the officers and the community.”

Mary Hopper, executive director of University City Partners, a community-based economic-community development group in Charlotte, has worked with Miller on the city’s civil service board.

“He has an innate sense of how the pieces (of business, community and government) should work together,” she said.

Hopper said Miller has shown fair leadership through his relationship with the civil service board, which screens police and fire applicants and is a clearinghouse for disciplinary disputes.

“He’s even-handed and unflappable,” she said. “He will never lose his cool, but his demeanor demands respect.”

Ken Gill, director of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Foundation, a nonprofit partnership of residents, businesses and police, said Miller has worked hard to develop crime-fighting programs.

Among them is a program requiring repeat offenders to wear satellite monitoring ankle bracelets while out of jail on pretrial release.

“Chief Miller put that together himself and worked to solve a problem through us,” said Gill. “The city took the ball and ran with it from there.”

In a statement, Miller said he’s excited about the opportunity to possibly serve as Greensboro’s top police official.

“When I began my career in policing over two decades ago, Greensboro was one of only three cities I considered serving,” he said.

“It was and still remains a family-friendly city known for its high quality of life, excellent schools and richness in diversity. I am honored to be a finalist in consideration.”
 

Contact Ryan Seals at 373-7077 or ryan.seals@news-record.com