After working in the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police for more than three decades, Christopher Ragland this week said he’s hoping to provide steady leadership and bolster recruitment as he steps into the role of acting chief during a turbulent time for the force.

Ragland takes the helm of an understaffed bureau that has struggled in recent years to recruit and retain officers and keep up morale.

It’s the equivalent of a battlefield promotion. Ragland, 53, of Downtown, is moving up from assistant chief only because Larry Scirotto, mired in controversy, last week announced his resignation after only 18 months as chief.

Scirotto personally chose Ragland for the position, according to Jake Pawlak, director of the Office of Management and Budget.

Scirotto’s departure comes amid substantial uproar. Critics have attacked Scirotto’s plans to balance running one of Pennsylvania’s largest police forces with a gig as a Big Ten basketball referee, condemned him for allegations he lied to City Council about secretive agreements struck with Mayor Ed Gainey, and raised concerns over an audit from Fort Lauderdale that claimed he was officiating on city time while he was their top cop.

Ragland on Tuesday tried to quell worries about what the change in leadership may mean for the bureau.

“The mission hasn’t changed,” he told City Council members during a public meeting.

Staffing is No. 1 issue

Ragland is taking command of a bureau struggling to maintain its numbers. While officials consider the force’s ideal size to be around 900 officers, it has only 751 officers on the job now. Gainey’s preliminary 2025 budget anticipates the bureau won’t exceed 800 officers within the next year.

Bolstering the rank and file’s numbers, Ragland said, will be a top priority.

He told TribLive he wants officers to know public safety leadership will support them and reward good work.

“Officers want to feel valued,” he said.

As an assistant chief, Ragland last year launched a citywide survey system that allows people to provide feedback after officers respond to a 911 call. It asks about whether people felt officers treated them with respect and whether their problems were resolved.

“We have overwhelmingly positive results,” Ragland said, and officers have told him they like seeing positive feedback from the public.

Ragland is running the bureau on an interim baseis — and collecting the chief salary of $185,400 per year — until a permanent replacement for Scirotto is chosen.

The mayor will pick a nominee, who needs approval from council.

When asked if he wants the job himself, Ragland told TribLive he thought he was up for the challenge.

“I think I have the ability to lead the organization into the future to increase public safety,” Ragland said.

North Side ties

Ragland, a native of Pittsburgh’s North Side, began his career as a city police officer in 1994. He became a lieutenant in 2001 and has spent more than 20 years in leadership roles.

During his career, he’s been the commander of the Special Deployments Division and the Office of Strategy, Accountability and Resiliency, as well as three police precincts: Zones Six, One and Three.

Most recently, Ragland served as assistant chief of the professional standards branch, where he oversees internal investigations, leads the training academy and helps develop bureau policies.

He also co-chairs The Hear Foundation, a local nonprofit that aims to improve police-community relations. One of its founders is Scirotto’s predecessor, Scott Schubert.

The foundation did not respond to requests for comment on Ragland.

Ragland on Tuesday touted his efforts to improve relations with the North Side community while he served as the Zone 1 commander.

He helped launch the Northview Heights Public Safety Center after seeing how people struggling with housing, health care, education and employment could fall into crime.

The center, funded by The Buhl Foundation, connects residents with a variety of resources and facilitates interactions with officers who police their neighborhoods.

The Buhl Foundation did not respond to requests for comment on Ragland.

“There’s no question he has the experience, he has the perspective — he’s been doing this for a long time,” Elizabeth Pittinger, executive director of Pittsburgh’s Citizen Police Review Board, told TribLive this week. “He’s certainly qualified for the job.”

Pittinger, like Ragland himself, said recruiting and retaining officers will be the biggest challenge he’ll face as acting chief.

He’s stepping into a difficult position, Pittinger said.

“Continuity and consistency is critically important,” she said. “We have a morale issue. The officers are tired. The community is not feeling 100% safe. He has to assure people that they will be safe.”

He’ll also have to assure officers that they’re respected and address frustrations that may pull some away from the bureau.

“He may not be the most popular with the rank and file, but he certainly knows the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police,” Pittinger said.

Not a ‘superhero’

During a public meeting Tuesday, Councilwoman Theresa Kail-Smith, D-West End, raised concerns to Ragland about disunity in the bureau and people leaving for jobs at suburban departments.

Ragland said he knows he’s got a lot of work to do to build relationships, unite the department and encourage people to stay.

“I think people leave this job for any number of reasons,” Ragland said. “I don’t want to say there’s a majority of people leaving because they’re unhappy here.”

Ragland said he wants to remind his personnel of why they wanted to be police officers in the first place and help them do their job well.

“When you become a police officer, you do so because you want to help people,” he said. “You want to make a difference.”

Council members and the mayor’s office this week declined to comment on Ragland.

Calls to the Alliance for Police Accountability and police union president Robert Swartzwelder were not returned.

Ragland, a self-described introvert, told TribLive he’s not looking to be a “superhero chief,” just a steady leader to guide the bureau.

“The focus for me is always on the mission,” he said. “As a leader, my job is to support.”

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