Her goal is a better police department

12/03/2006

By William Kaempffer , Register Staff

NEW HAVEN — Stephanie Redding took a break from the issues demanding her attention to talk about something important: Her 17-year-old son, Patrick. A senior at Xavier High School in Middletown, he plays high school football, hockey and track and he acts and sings. Recently, he was in a production at the Foote School in New Haven.

"He's really good. And I'm not just saying that because I'm his mom," said Redding, assistant police chief and 21-year veteran of the force.

"God bless my son for putting up with it for 17 years," she said.

Then the assistant chief switches gears, something she's become adept at since she took over her new position as assistant chief of administration.

In that post, her duties are far flung. She oversees payroll, budgeting, the property and records rooms, building maintenance, the police garage, grant writing and the planning, crime prevention and neighborhood services units at the department.

She's been forced to become an instant authority on recruitment and 911 consolidation and a lot of other projects that had been going on for weeks, months and even years before she became assistant chief.

"It's challenging to constantly switch gears," she said.

One moment, she's addressing a broken door at police headquarters and the next she's discussing the 911 consolidation project that has the fourth floor at 1 Union Ave. torn apart.

The administrative focus is a dramatic change from her duties as head of the Family Services Division, her last post. There, she oversaw a close-knit group of detectives in the sexual assault and bias unit, juvenile services and the domestic violence unit.

She doesn't miss sitting in on forensic interviews and medical exams for child sexual assault victims, but she misses working closely with the people.

"I do miss family services. They are just a tremendously talented group of detectives," she said.

Redding comes from a family of firefighters. Her grandfather was a fire chief and her father, William Johnson, is the fire chief of the West Haven Fire Department. Her brother is a fire lieutenant there.

She is married to New Haven police Lt. Patrick Redding, who is head of the internal affairs unit. They both were hired in 1986.

Years ago, she and her husband and Herman Badger, the other new assistant police chief, worked together on the midnight shift.

"It seems like we blinked and our children were teenagers," she said.

Redding, 44, became the first female assistant police chief in the history of New Haven, a point of pride but one that she doesn't want to define her.

"I'm proud to have that benchmark for women," she said. "But I'm proud to be the chief for everyone on the department, not just one group or another.

She attended high school with West Haven Deputy Police Chief Colleen Smullen, the first female to hold the post there. They talk regularly.

Sitting in her third-floor office at police headquarters, Redding spoke with affection about the police department. In conversation, she spoke with the confidence of a person comfortable in her position, the calming tone of a crisis negotiator and enthusiasm of a head cheerleading coach, which she is in her spare time at Sacred Heart Academy.

She said the future "face of this department" will be defined by solid recruitment, training, promoting good people and succession planning.

"There are things I want to accomplish here. I want to leave a mark," she said.