Fairfax County Police Chief Taking New Job
Chief Rohrer
Fairfax County Police Chief David Rohrer is stepping down — or stepping over, to be more precise. He’s becoming a deputy county executive for public safety, a job that was created just for him.
Rohrer has held the job for eight years and is credited with getting the badly-needed new public safety communications center built on West Ox Road.
More recently, he has been working to build a new police and fire headquarters. That would replace the crumbling Massey Building in Fairfax City, the mid-rise office tower that originally housed county administrative offices. Though financing has not been finalized, it’s hoped the new center will be open by 2016.
Presumably, the new police and fire headquarters would be built in the Fair Oaks area near the county’s new administration building. Rohrer’s new job title seems to make him the point man for that project.
Rohrer has been a low profile chief. Even though his department, with 1,400 officers, is by far the largest in Virginia, he avoids the showboating so common among top cops elsewhere. Interestingly, crime has fallen sharply as Fairfax County’s population has grown.
The Board of Supervisors seldom goes outside the department for its chiefs and is expected to select Rohrer’s successor from among the current three deputy chiefs — James Morris, Edwin Roessler and Tom Ryan.
