GREENFIELD — Randy Ratliff has been associated with the Greenfield Police Department since 1990.
That all changes in a few days when the longtime detective retires from the department to take a security management position with Community Hospital North next week. He plans to take a week off for vacation and start his new job on Monday, Aug. 12.
“I’m just ready for a change,” Ratliff said. “I came across something that really interested me, so I took it.”
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Ratliff always told himself that once he had been at GPD for 20 years, he’d start looking for a new challenge. This year marked his 24th year with the department.
Ratliff, a 1976 graduate of Eastern Hancock High School, is not ready to retire and is looking forward to helping Community North develop a law enforcement unit. His former boss, ex-GPD chief John Jester, did the same thing at Community Hospital East.
The longtime Greenfield resident knew decades ago he wanted to serve the community and felt he could do that best by joining the local police department. Ratliff signed on as a reserve in 1990 and then became full time in 1995. It didn’t take him long to make his way through the ranks. Ratliff has been a detective since 2000, after starting as a patrolman.
“It’s going be tough to leave,” Ratliff said. “It’s going to be emotional.”
Ratliff’s decision hit GPD chief Jeff Rasche hard, he said, noting he wasn’t ready for Ratliff to step down just yet.
“He’s going to leave a hole in our department that will be hard to fill,” the chief said. “We’re going to really miss him.”
When Ratliff leaves next week, he’ll be taking years of police experience with him, something Rasche knows is invaluable in a young police department.
“He’s everything our younger officers should be looking up to,” Rasche said.
Rasche has known Ratliff since the 1980s when they both were working in a grocery store. Rashe appreciated Ratliff’s work ethic.
“You can just tell when a person is there to help out, and Randy has not changed one bit over the years,” Rasche said.
Ratliff is proud of the work he’s done as part of the department and said through the good and bad, he’s really enjoyed the job. The best part about being a police officer for the city was being able to help people during their most difficult times. Ratliff has been involved in the investigations of most of the major cases in the city over the past quarter century, from burglaries to homicides and credit card scams to elder abuse.
“You have to be able to be compassionate while still doing the job and gathering the information you need to do the job,” Ratliff said.
One of the highlights of his career with the department was helping develop information sharing among county departments and dealing with an elder abuse case that had a positive outcome, he said. Ratliff also smiled when he talked about the teamwork and camaraderie that develops between officers over the years.
“You don’t do this job by yourself,” Ratliff said. “You have to have a great team from patrol through commanders.”
About the only thing Ratliff wasn’t good at with the department was being part of the first ever bike patrol, 1997. While out on a training run, he fell and broke his arm.
“No bike patrols for Randy,” Rasche said with a laugh. “We don’t let him ride bikes.”
Ratliff laughed too when recalling the story and noted it was the second time he broke his arm riding a bike. The same thing happened when he was a child.
The department is holding a community open house for Ratliff from 1 to 3 p.m. Friday, Aug. 2, for his co-workers and community to stop by and say so long.
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Greenfield Police Department Randy Ratliff, detective lieutenant going away party
When: Friday, Aug. 2
Where: Greenfield Police Department
Time: 1 to 3 p.m.
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