No stark differences in approach came out of a public meet-and-greet and panel on Wednesday, but residents gained a closer look at the personalities and potential fit of the three seeking the position. They are Minot’s interim chief, Dale Plessas, a 23-year veteran of the department; Michael Frye, who heads campus policing at Bismarck State College after retiring from the Minneapolis Police Department in 2024; and Edward Orgon, Jr., chief of the village of Lake Hallie, Wisconsin since retiring after 23 years with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

Plessas spoke about his focus on establishing relationships between the department and community members.

“As a police department, we serve the community. We’re a tool of the community. Our only existence is at the will of the community, and so for us to do a job, it has to be at the benefit of making the lives of our citizens better,” he said.

“We are servant leaders, and I believe in servanthood and I will infuse that in my officers, from command staff on down. Everyone will be, as we want to say, kind humans, and we won’t tolerate rudeness,” Frye said. “The biggest thing that you will find with community engagement is people are frustrated. They want active listeners. They want somebody to hear them. I want to make sure that I give you that ear, and that it is just not lip service.”

Orgon said community outreach is twofold, encompassing transparency and accountability.

“I would hold myself accountable – the officers accountable,” he said. He spoke about his efforts in Lake Hallie to get out in the community, to work with the homeless coalition and give talks on drug dangers and substance abuse.

Regarding building trust with the community, Frye said trust comes human to human.

“We have to talk and communicate. I can put something on paper all day long, but will you believe me? If you know me as an individual, then you know that my world is bond and that how my officers are going to respond is bond,” he said. “My office will be open. It’s conversations, people to people, and that’s what you’ll see.”

Orgon called trust a core value in law enforcement. He also noted the culture of a department starts with the chief. If the culture is to ensure officers have the support and resources to do their jobs, they will come and they will stay, he said. It includes getting officers involved in the decision making.

“I don’t know everything,” he said. “I have a lot of experience over my career, but I like different ideas. I like people to tell me ideas. Sometimes dissenting ideas are good for a conversation. Including them in the conversation is how you build trust inside the police department.”

Building relationships and establishing solid policy are critical to building trust, Plessas said. He outlined how the Minot department has adopted policies of best practices that are continually being updated and developed.

“We hold our people accountable to that policy. We established a professional standards unit, which is responsible for investigating all complaints, all citizen complaints, and we make those complaints open record,” Plessas said. “The public has to be able to see what we’re doing and agree that it was the appropriate action.”

He added officers want to do a good job.

“Providing them the tools, the training to do that is also critical in building trust,” he said. “The more training you have, the more your abilities to actually handle a situation appropriately, the more your behaviors and your interactions will show that you’re worth trusting.”

The candidates fielded panel questions on recruiting and retaining officers and taking care of their mental health.

Orgon said he installed mandatory wellness visits for officers and encourages time off.

Plessas said the department started a wellness program that includes a trained peer support team, decompression space, an online app for clinical counseling and a requirement for two mental health check-ins a year.

“If we can remove that stigma by changing culture, by making mandatory check-ins so it’s no different than what your peers are doing, and making confidential ways for employees to reach out and seek help, then we’re making everybody healthier,” he said.

Frye called mental health an important factor in his leadership and was pleased to hear the great ideas taking place in Minot.

“That made me feel even better about this place for the simple fact that they’re already in the process,” he said. He spoke of the traumas and his own mental health challenges over his career and the significance of chaplains in police departments. He also spoke of monitoring behaviors and random audits of body cameras to catch signs of mental stress early.

The candidates’ discussion on recruitment and retention efforts also came back around to culture.

“Money will recruit somebody,” Plessas said. “But to retain a person, you have to establish a culture within the department that they want to maintain that job … They have to have a feeling that, one, they’re part of the team that’s doing something important, and that their contribution is an important factor in moving the department forward.”

“Start with the culture at the top,” Orgon said. Officers need to be treated equally and given opportunities to achieve their career goals, he said. If officers like where they work, they will tell others.

“It all starts with the culture, and changing the culture of the police department, coming from the outside, is going to take time,” Orgon said. “I’m ready to invest that time.

“I think I would do a great job here in Minot. It’s a great opportunity to move the department forward. I know there’s been some issues,” Orgon added. “I don’t have the knowledge of what happened, nor do I care. It’s something that has happened and there’s a need to move forward, and I would take that seriously.”

Frye, who served on a retention and recruitment team previously, said part of the effort is to infuse joy and a vision and give people opportunities to grow. He said he wants to bring in additional learning opportunities so officers can advance.

“I believe that as your next chief, I will infuse that hope, that healing and that joy back into the agency,” he said. “If I am your next chief, you have to know that you’re getting someone that’s highly relational, communicative and community oriented.”

He said his office would be a community solutions office.

“We will build this department back, together,” he said.

Plessas said he never considered becoming chief until thrown into the position.

“It wasn’t something that I wanted, by any means, but I feel a huge responsibility to my agency, my city, to my citizens, to do what’s needed for the community and for the department,” he said. Having seen the department come through tragedies, such as loss of officers to suicide, he is optimistic.

“I can say without a shadow of a doubt that there is hope in the Minot Police Department,” he said. “We are a strong agency. Our officers are moving forward every day.”