Seymour’s next police chief won’t come from within the city department’s ranks.

On Friday, Mayor-elect Matt Nicholson appointed retired Indiana Conservation Officer Bryant Lucas of Brownstown to lead the city’s police force after the retirement of acting chief Craig Hayes.

Lucas will begin his duties Jan. 1 and be responsible for selecting an assistant chief.

Also appointed Friday were Brad Lucas as Seymour fire chief and Jeremy Gray as the city’s building commissioner. Both are retaining their jobs. This will be Lucas’ ninth year as fire chief and Gray’s 20th year as building commissioner.

Nicholson said he received 13 résumés from people interested in the job of police chief and ended up interviewing six candidates. Of those six, four were internal applicants, Nicholson said.

“Every applicant contributed something that made the decision harder to choose,” Nicholson said. “Luckily, I have a very diverse transition team that has been sitting in on interviews and giving me their feedback on each candidate.”

Lucas came into the interview process with ideas and a vision for the future, Nicholson said.

“For me, this was important because I believe it was one of the reasons voters chose me back in November,” Nicholson said.

Lucas, 54, currently holds the rank of captain and is the public safety director of the Indiana University-Purdue University Columbus campus, a position he has had for the last four years.

In his job at IUPUC, he provides strategic and operational leadership in a variety of areas, including developing a budget, cadet programs and relationships with other law enforcement agencies. He’s also an adjunct instructor of criminal justice at the college.

His law enforcement career includes 27 years as a conservation officer with the Indiana Department of Natural Resources Law Enforcement Division. During that time, he spent six years as assistant executive director of the Indiana Intelligence Fusion Center, a division of the Indiana Department of Homeland Security.

In 2001, he was promoted to lieutenant and supervised investigations and communications for the DNR Law Enforcement Division. He retired from the agency in 2015.

Lucas holds a Bachelor of Science degree in public administration from Indiana University and a Master of Arts degree in security studies from the Naval Postgraduate School in California. He’s also a graduate of the basic officer’s course at the Indiana Law Enforcement Academy and the FBI National Academy in Quantico, Virginia.

He also has memberships in the FBI National Academy Association and the Golden Key International Honor Society.

Lucas said he wants to be police chief as a way of giving back to the community.

“I have been lucky over my years of service to have a lot of opportunities and to partake in a lot of training and exercises in learning,” he said. “So I see this as an opportunity to pay that forward to the law enforcement community and the community where I work and where I live for the chances I’ve had and the positive things I’ve been able to do.”

He’s hoping to be able to share his experiences with the Seymour Police Department and give officers opportunities to do some of the things he has been able to do in his career, he said.

Lucas wants to get the department as involved in the community as possible.

“Community policing is a cornerstone to a positive relationship between the community and the police that work for that community,” he said. “The police are granted authority by the people of the community, so we have to show that respect back.”

Although Nicholson said he believes in promoting from within, sometimes, an outside perspective is needed, he said.

“The choice to hire an outside chief was not taken lightly,” he said. “One of the biggest factors for me going outside was trying to make sure the public has as much faith in our department as possible.”

Nicholson said he hopes current officers see Lucas as an experienced leader and positive influence on the department and the community.

“We have many good officers currently that I hope will see this as a chance to grow and learn with someone new,” Nicholson said. “This will make them even better prepared to fill the role the next time it comes open.”

Lucas said Seymour is a great community and has an outstanding police department.

“I just hope to continue to progress forward with the things they’ve started and really work with the officers and the community,” he said.