Kamloops’ top cop has been promoted and will be leaving Kamloops, with the search for his successor to begin soon.
It is the second time in four years the Kamloops RCMP is in need of a new superintendent. Syd Lecky arrived in 2018, replacing Brad Mueller, who transferred to Alberta.
According to a City of Kamloops release, Lecky has accepted a promotion to the rank of chief superintendent in the Northwest Territories, stationed out of Yellowknife, and will be the next commanding officer at that division.
The job posting and interview process for Lecky’s position in Kamloops has not yet begun and he will remain in his role until this fall, though no firm date has been provided for his departure. It is also not yet clear if an interim superintendent has been selected.
Candidates who apply for the superintendent’s position with the Kamloops RCMP will go through a selection and interview process led by the City of Kamloops mayor and chief administrative officer and the RCMP. The final recommendation of the selection committee will be reviewed and endorsed by the RCMP commissioner in Ottawa.
“Although I am moving on, I am confident the detachment's senior management team will continue to keep up the momentum and work toward positive change going forward,” Lecky said in the release. “Although I am looking forward to this new opportunity to serve the communities of the Northwest Territories, I would be remiss not to acknowledge that it was my time in Kamloops that prepared me for such a role. It is with both excitement and a heavy heart that I thank the people of Kamloops for our time together."
Mayor Ken Christian said he is both excited for Lecky in his career path, yet disappointed that Kamloops will lose him as detachment commander.
“As officer in charge of Kamloops, he has provided consistent and exemplary leadership through a series of disasters and emergencies unprecedented in our history,” Christian said in the release.
Christian added Lecky, in his four years at the helm of the detachment, has moved policing toward a more inclusive community police service model and laid the foundations for stronger responses to mental health, addiction and other domestic and social challenges.
Lecky arrived in 2018 from Terrace, where he had spent the previous four-and-a-half years, the last two of which he was in charge of the detachment.
Lecky joined the RCMP in June of 1996 and was initially posted to Kelowna for eight years. In 2004, then-constable Lecky was transferred to the Nootka Sound detachment in Gold River, a small community on Vancouver Island, followed by three years with the Terrace RCMP. In 2008, the now-corporal Lecky was promoted to the rank of sergeant and transferred to Prince George, where he was an advisory non-commissioned officer in charge of the Aboriginal policing program throughout Northern B.C.
In that role, Lecky travelled throughout the northern two-thirds of the province, working with detachments and First Nations communities. Following three years as the Mackenzie RCMP's detachment commander, he returned to Terrace in 2013 and was later promoted to the rank of inspector in March of 2016.
