Kevin Tucker

They thanked Kevin M. Tucker yesterday. Mayor Goode, Managing Director James S. White, the Police Department brass, and scores of dignitaries and city officials turned out to say goodbye and offer their appreciation to Tucker for his service as Philadelphia's police commissioner. "It is rare in the course of human events that we find a person who, through their work, makes a tremendous impact upon an entire community," Goode said. "Kevin Tucker, in a very, very short time, was able to make that kind of impact on this community and bring about basic, fundamental change in not only the Police Department but also in the entire city itself.

Pages of the dark blue scrapbook are filled with memories of the John F. Kennedy Jr. of 30 years ago. Black-and-white snapshots show the youngster getting a lesson in kicking a football. In another, he is building a snowman on a bitter winter's day. In still another, he is helped to climb a pole under a shed. Those pictures and many others, saved behind plastic and held in a well-worn album reinforced along its spine by clear tape, show the boy accompanied by a young man with Kennedy-like looks.

With the public craving change, the mayor appoints an outsider to head the Philadelphia Police Department. The new commissioner ushers in an era of shake-up and soul-searching. Exceeding expectations, he forges a new course, emphasizing community policing and sophisticated management approaches. No, not John F. Timoney. It was Kevin Tucker, the former Secret Service agent who took charge of the Philadelphia police in 1986 amid the wreckage of the MOVE disaster. His stay was brief - 2 1/2 years - but he managed to elevate the department's sorry image and leave behind a 195-page blueprint for the future.

I was helping my wife with spring cleaning a week or so ago when to my complete surprise, I found a picture of Kevin Tucker, the new police commissioner, on my desk. I had no idea that I had a picture of Kevin Tucker on my desk. I had never met him. I had never covered him. I had read about him when he was named police commissioner. I had seen him on television a couple of times, but I never really knew the man. But there he was in a picture I had found on my desk. "Oh, look," my wife said, pointing to the picture, "that's Kevin Tucker, the new police commissioner, with the Pope.

It seems safe to assume that Police Commissioner Kevin M. Tucker was appointed to his position because he has the knowledge and experience required to do the job. If Augusta Clark or John Street are so adept at managing a police department they should be police commissioners instead of City Council members I am unaware of either having experience in the field of law enforcement. Where are our priorities? Which is more important, Philadelphia politics or having an efficient, effective police department?

The Independent Charter Commission reviewed Philadelphia's residency requirement for city workers - and decided to leave it alone. We think the issue deserves another look - and some action. Of the 20 largest U.S. cities, Philadelphia has the strictest residency requirements, thanks to the rule that you can't even apply for a municipal civil service job until you've lived in the city for an entire year. Instead of having a two-tiered approach to residency, by which the drones must live in town to even apply for jobs, while appointees can sweep into top jobs from anywhere, we propose a simpler, more honest approach: Drop the 12-month residency rule for civil service applicants.

Kevin Tucker, one of only a few shining lights in the Goode administration (the rest go about 10 watts), is leaving office as police commissioner, citing family considerations. No doubt that's a big part of it, but it's hard to believe that the generally bad government of Philadelphia didn't have even more to do with it. Tucker came to work full of enthusiasm and ideas, ready to face the Augean Stable the police department was, despite the efforts of post-Rizzo reformers. He got a lot of the initial hard work done, then turned to even more important work, changing the assumptions of police management.

Each man, wildly different in style and personality, left his mark on the Philadelphia Police Department. Frank Rizzo, brash, forceful, charismatic, was the most colorful and controversial figure in the city's modern history. A cop's cop who ruled with an iron fist and shielded his men from brutality charges. He was followed by his protege, Joe O'Neill: steely, secretive, stern, the ramrod-straight cop who mistrusted anyone not in uniform. Then Morton Solomon, who once received a gift of brass balls from a unit of police he had commanded.

The NAACP-led coalition seeking to have Inspector Sylvester Johnson named deputy police commissioner is doing openly what interest groups and politicians historically have done behind the scenes. Under the city charter, only three jobs in the Police Department are exempt from Civil Service, the commissioner and two deputies. And since the charter was adopted in 1951, filling those jobs has been influenced by politics. "These are political jobs and anybody who doesn't know that is a moron," said a retired commander.

Former Philadelphia Police Commissioner Kevin M. Tucker, who took the reins of a troubled Police Department at a low ebb in the 1980s and initiated reforms that still resonate today, died Tuesday after a 22-year battle against a brain tumor. He was two days shy of his 72d birthday. Mr. Tucker grew up in Brooklyn, N.Y., and came to Philadelphia in the 1970s to head the regional field office of the U.S. Secret Service. He had retired from the Secret Service after a 20-year career - including a stint protecting Jacqueline Kennedy and her two children in the 1960s - when Philadelphia Mayor W. Wilson Goode asked Tucker in 1986 to take the toughest job in the city - commissioner of the Police Department, which was reeling from the 1985 MOVE debacle and a corruption scandal that had reached the highest ranks.

Imagine if Mayor-elect Michael Nutter could appoint only two deputies and a secretary to help run the city. The remaining top- and mid-level managers would come from existing city employees who scored well on a civics exam. The managers would be in the same union as entry-level administrators and, in effect, not have to answer directly to the mayor. Well, that's the way it works at the Philadelphia Police Department. Or doesn't work. Every boss wants to surround himself with trusted lieutenants.

Pages of the dark blue scrapbook are filled with memories of the John F. Kennedy Jr. of 30 years ago. Black-and-white snapshots show the youngster getting a lesson in kicking a football. In another, he is building a snowman on a bitter winter's day. In still another, he is helped to climb a pole under a shed. Those pictures and many others, saved behind plastic and held in a well-worn album reinforced along its spine by clear tape, show the boy accompanied by a young man with Kennedy-like looks.

With the public craving change, the mayor appoints an outsider to head the Philadelphia Police Department. The new commissioner ushers in an era of shake-up and soul-searching. Exceeding expectations, he forges a new course, emphasizing community policing and sophisticated management approaches. No, not John F. Timoney. It was Kevin Tucker, the former Secret Service agent who took charge of the Philadelphia police in 1986 amid the wreckage of the MOVE disaster. His stay was brief - 2 1/2 years - but he managed to elevate the department's sorry image and leave behind a 195-page blueprint for the future.

Fraternal Order of Police President Richard Costello had this advice for John Timoney, the third outsider to head Philadelphia's police: "I told him, 'Watch your back,' " the police union boss said yesterday. "Until he learns his way around, he's under potential danger from everyone. " Kevin Tucker was the second outsider to head the Philadelphia police. The former head of Philadelphia's Secret Service branch was hired in late 1985 to repair the Police Department's image after it bombed MOVE and burned down a West Philadelphia block.

Richard Neal was just the right police commissioner for Ed Rendell. Now it's time to find one who's right for Philadelphia's future. Mr. Neal, who yesterday announced that he will leave March 6, was an honest, quiet team player in an administration in which Mayor Rendell and former top aide David L. Cohen did much of the talking. What Philadelphians want now is a top cop who is more proactive and creative in devising solutions to the serious crimes plaguing neighborhoods and in improving and reforming department operations.

The NAACP-led coalition seeking to have Inspector Sylvester Johnson named deputy police commissioner is doing openly what interest groups and politicians historically have done behind the scenes. Under the city charter, only three jobs in the Police Department are exempt from Civil Service, the commissioner and two deputies. And since the charter was adopted in 1951, filling those jobs has been influenced by politics. "These are political jobs and anybody who doesn't know that is a moron," said a retired commander.

By most accounts, Kevin M. Tucker was on the cutting edge during his years as head of the Philadelphia police. Yesterday, the former top cop again showed his mettle by becoming only the second former police commissioner to have a Police Athletic League Center named in his honor. Former Mayor Frank L. Rizzo was the first. The new headquarters - PAL's 23d across the city - is in the Alexander Wilson Elementary School at 46th Street and Woodland Avenue in Southwest Philadelphia.

The Independent Charter Commission reviewed Philadelphia's residency requirement for city workers - and decided to leave it alone. We think the issue deserves another look - and some action. Of the 20 largest U.S. cities, Philadelphia has the strictest residency requirements, thanks to the rule that you can't even apply for a municipal civil service job until you've lived in the city for an entire year. Instead of having a two-tiered approach to residency, by which the drones must live in town to even apply for jobs, while appointees can sweep into top jobs from anywhere, we propose a simpler, more honest approach: Drop the 12-month residency rule for civil service applicants.