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Show Police chief resigns, submits to pressure Stahleand Wahlen feud comes to end g' y.j G AhTK, CLOPGETT ' j PVWOODS CROSS.-- Police Chief Niles Stahle resigned Friday, less than 18 months from completing 30 years with the police department. He had been police chief since 1962 when Woods Cross became a third-classcity.- The unexpected resignation ; followed two years of dispute between be-tween Chief Stahle and City Administrator Ad-ministrator Bret Wahlen. . No details of the resignation were released to the press, but several attempts at-tempts to contact the mayor and city administrator failed. A spokesperson spokesper-son at City Hall said, "They are in a meeting and don't want to be . disturbed." She asked that all calls ; be deferred to Mr. Wahlen. Chief Stahle said only that "It : was not my desire to resign, but I had no other choice." He organized the city's first two-man two-man police department" in March 1960, and two years" later was appointed ap-pointed the city's first police chief. Before that, he served as town mar-shall. mar-shall. Over the years, the department was built to seven full-time and three part-time officers, and featured 24-hour service, three patrol shifts, a detective, a combined combin-ed warrants' officer-bailiff, and an administrator. Clarence Montgomery is serving as acting police chief until an interim or full-time chief is approved approv-ed by the City Council. Asked about his police perfor-manceand perfor-manceand why he was pressured into resigning-Chief Stahle replied: "You'll have to ask the city officials offi-cials that question. My performance ft CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 -imp- '',"' f ; , -, - . :; . ' W . , NILESSTAHLE , Stahle reluctantly retires ; CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 has been rated excellent to superior every year until Mr. Warden gave me a poor rating the past two years. I don't believe that all of a sudden I was not performing my duties.", He noted that he has been reappointed reap-pointed by the City Council every two years for the past 28 years. "That's 14 reappointments without any serious questions about my integrity in-tegrity or performance," he said, . Chief Stahle said he has upgraded upgrad-ed his own qualifications with several hundred hours of law en-forcement en-forcement training in all phases of law enforcement-including nearly 300 hours of classroom and field ' training in police management and law enforcement administration. C "I feel that Woods Cross has had one of the most productive police departments in the state,', he said. "Operating with fewer personnel, our case load and arrests for Part One (major) crinfes has been higher than cities more . than twice our size." '.. - - He noted that a city-wide survey recently revealed ' that the public was "pleased with the results of the ,. Woods Cross Police Department." . "And they should be," he said. "The . men under ,me are great men . and have done a wonderful job of law enforcement." . ' , v. Chief Stahle said he will be seek- ing continued work in law enforce-. enforce-. mentor security. , |