Greenfield's top cop hired as Salinas' first female police chief.

The city of Salinas made history Wednesday after announcing Adele Fresé, Greenfield’s police chief, will become the first female police chief to lead its police department. Fresé will be taking over the legacy of Kelly McMillin, who retires Oct. 1.

At the moment, Fresé continues to serve the South Monterey County community of Greenfield. She has been the top cop there for two and half years. Prior to that, she worked with the Corpus Christi, Texas police department for 20 years and oversaw a $35 million budget. Her assignments there included narcotics, vice, special operations, administration, training, patrol and crime prevention.

But perhaps the quality that Salinas City Manager Ray Corpuz was most impressed with was her focus on community policing policies—a plus, in a city where community members have expressed mistrust in its police department. Corpuz says Fresé is also known for focusing on youth programs and having an ethical leadership style.

Fresé was a candidate in a pool of more than 40 that came about from a nationwide search, Corpuz told the public in a press conference on Wednesday.

“We have high standards here,” Corpuz added. “It’s very important we get a good match here.”

Corpuz described Fresé as a “neighbor to the south.” Another qualification Frese has is her experience with gang-related crime. In Greenfield, shootings and criminal activity are usually gang-related.

Fresé is expected to start her new position in Salinas the third week in October. McMillin said she is expected to hit the ground running as she already knows the key players in the community having worked in a police department within Monterey County.

Corpuz boasted Fresé comes from a multi-racial family, but then added that she is not fluent in Spanish. “She speaks a little bit of Spanish,” he told the Weekly. “But there are other factors that were taken into account other than her being bilingual.”

Fresé’s first order of business though is getting to know the members of the police force and the community. She says she does not have a specific strategy yet to quell the soaring homicide rate of the city. So far this year, there have been 30 homicides, most of which have been gang-related.

“It’s too early for me to speculate,” Fresé says. “It will take some time for me to deal with it.”