Josh Ewing has filled just about every position in his 22 years with the Orono Police Department, including chief for the past eight years.
But, a year-and-a-half ago, he started questioning his future in that role.
COVID-19 had changed the job, police departments were coming under intense scrutiny following the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer, and he was feeling an urge to get out from behind a desk.
Ewing said he welcomes the scrutiny and that citizens are entitled to know what police are doing. It’s just that he wants to leave behind the responsibility of leading a police department, especially as law enforcement has come under the microscope.
“It has worn on me enough that I’ve realized I don’t know if this is what I’m best suited for anymore,” he said.
After Friday, Ewing will make a decidedly unconventional career move, as he leaves the chief position in Orono to become a patrol officer in Hampden. Hampden’s will be only the second police department where Ewing has worked.
He’ll join that force after leading Orono police through a number of changes, including closer tracking of the number of speeding tickets and warnings the department issues, the introduction of body cameras in 2016 and the more recent creation of a community policing division that focuses on connecting residents in need with resources and solving problems that fall outside the criminal justice system.
Ewing said in an interview in his office this week that he hopes his tenure leaves the town with a policing model driven by education rather than the punitive acts of writing tickets and hauling people to jail.
“No matter what it is, if somebody needs something, let’s figure out how to help them, whether it’s related to law enforcement or not,” he said. “If there is something we can do to serve somebody and help them and isn’t unreasonable, why wouldn’t we do it?”
Orono Town Manager Sophie Wilson, who has worked alongside Ewing for a decade, praised the chief’s “sharp technical skill” and “innate leadership ability.”
“He is a humble public servant who gives his all each and every day to make a positive difference,” she said. “He will be greatly missed, but has left a strong foundation upon which we will continue to build Orono’s high-quality, community-oriented public safety services.”
When Wilson announced last month that Ewing was leaving, she also expressed frustration that a national climate dominated by calls for policing reform had translated into calls for undefined reforms at the local level.
Hampden’s police chief, Christian Bailey, said his department is eager to welcome Ewing.
“Having 22 years of experience as a patrol officer, in a supervisory capacity, as a sergeant, captain and chief — it is a unique perspective you don’t see on a regular basis,” he said. “I really feel that he can help us advance a lot of initiatives.”
Despite the praise he’s received in Orono for his leadership and the department’s approach to policing, Ewing said he doesn’t like the attention. He said he feels as if he’s just done his job.
“I think that we have great people. But when I talk to people at other agencies, they have awesome people, too. I think they just police their town the way it wants to be policed,” Ewing said. “This town is extremely progressive. It only makes sense for the police department to be just as progressive, if not even more so than the town.”
Over 22 years, Ewing has seen Orono change from a rambunctious college town with parties to break up every weekend to the more progressive place it is today.
For most of that time, Ewing has lived in Hampden, and Hampden was the first police department where Ewing applied to work, back in 1990. The department didn’t hire him then, and he worked for beverage distributors until he was hired as a part-time officer in Orono in 1999. He quickly moved to full-time after that, then ascended through the ranks.
Ewing said he and his wife have discussed his upcoming move to a patrol position for the past year-and-a-half. He said he’s looking forward to having more face-to-face interactions with the public than he does as chief. He also wants to leave behind the stress that has characterized his job before it hurts his job performance.
“I may be good at this,” he said of serving as chief. “I may be really good at it. But it also doesn’t suit my personality. I’m a worker. I want to do stuff. I want to deal with the public.”
While Ewing acknowledges the career move is unusual, he said it will probably be stranger for others.
“I will do whatever task is given to me. That’s the kind of person I am. That’s why I’m so excited about this,” he said. “I think I’m ready to go back to being a worker, the person on the street, being the backbone of policing — patrol.”
