Noble Wray
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Noble Wray is currently the Madison Police Department Chief since October 2004 and is a graduate from the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee. He has been with the Madison Police Department since 1984.
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Personal Biography
Born in 1960, Wray grew up poor in Milwaukee, Wisconsin during an era when police were a menacing presence for poor black people. The seventh of 10 children raised by Catholic parents, he lived across the street from St. Boniface Church, ground zero for Milwaukee's turbulent civil rights movement. The brutality he witnessed made him resent law enforcement. http://www.thedailypage.com/isthmus/article.php?article=4634
As a teenager, the first wave of Chicago street gangs arrived, which prompted Wray's parents to secure him a place at a boarding school in northern Wisconsin.
Following high school Wray attended UW-Milwaukee where he intended to pursue a political science major, until he switched into criminal justice instead. He graduated from the college and received a bachelor of science in criminal justice. After college, Wray briefly worked at a liquor store until at age 23 and married, he filed an application at the Madison Police Department. He was then hired in 1984, and has been employed with the MPD ever since.
Early Career with Madison Police Department
In his early patrol officer years Noble was assigned as the first neighborhood officer for the department. His work there won him department wide recognition. Wray consults on a national basis in the areas of problem solving, community policing, and total quality management. He has also consulted for the Police Executive Research Forum, the Police Foundation, and the International Chiefs of Police Association. Wray rose through the ranks from being Assistant Chief of MPD to head Chief of the department. [1]
Candidate For Madison Police Department Chief
Following the retirement of the now former Chief of Police Richard Williams in April 2004, the search for a new chief began in March of that same year. Wray, who was then the Assistant Chief, along with Capt. Cheri Maples and Sgt. Mike Koval, were candidates to fill in the new opening position. Wray would be named Acting Chief for the department throughout the six months of deliberations.
The decision to pick a new chief before Halloween was considered crucial for many people, realizing that this particular time calls for a leader to contain the chaos infamous during the holiday.
On October 21, 2004, the Police and Fire Commission selected Wray as the city of Madison's police chief. Their unanimous decision "took time due to committee member John Talis's reservations to approve Wray as chief. [2]" However, in a meeting before Wray accepted the new position, Talis joined other members of PFC in supporting Wray as the new chief. In a statement, Talis wrote in regards to Wray: "There can be no doubt (as the votes of my colleagues show) that a reasonable person could conclude that he is the candidate best qualified to serve as chief of the Madison Police Department. [same as before]”
Career as Madison Police Department Chief (2004-????)
Since accepting his new position in October 2004, Wray immediately focused on creating a safe Halloween weekend and proposed a "Trust Base Policing" initiative, something that he hoped will establish a firm trust in the MPD and seal the gap between citizens and officers. The initiative comes some community members having expressed doubt in trusting the police department, one aspect that Wray addressed that he wanted to change as police chief.
In a February 2009 Wray presented a report of crime statistics as the following: Violent crime numbers increased 5.9 percent despite an overall 1.3 percent decrease in reportable crimes in Madison during 2008.
Controversy
Chief Noble Wray spoke out against a hoax phone call Governor Scott Walker participated in during the course of protests surrounding Walker's proposed budget repair bill. During the hoax call, Walker told a person he believed to be David Koch, one of his wealthy supporters, that he had considered placing crowd instigators in with the peaceful protesters to create a diversion. Wray publicly spoke out against Walker's comments. Wray asked Walker to publicly elaborate about what exactly was being considered and to what degree it was discussed by his cabinet members.
