Update: 6:20 p.m. Several city leaders have expressed support to make Brian Manley the permanent Austin Chief of Police. , including Mayor Steve Adler. 

Update: 1:07 p.m. – Austin mayor Steve Adler and District 7 council member Leslie Pool support making Brian Manley the city's permanent police chief.

"I've always been a big fan of his," Adler said.

Pool wrote on the council message board that Manley "is eminently qualified and has done a superb job" since taking over as interim chief.

Art Acevedo, the man Manley replaced as chief, tweeted Wednesday morning asking the city to remove the interim tag.



Original post – After Austin Police and federal law enforcement closed the investigation into a series of bombings Wednesday morning, District 2 City Council member Delia Garza has asked the city to consider lifting Police Chief Brian Manley’s interim tag to make him the permanent chief of police.

Manley was named the interim chief of police in November 2016 after Art Acevedo left the department to serve as police chief in Houston.

“While many watched the news safely from home, but on edge, the men and women of law enforcement ran to the bombs and explosions,” Garza wrote on the city council’s official message board.

Manley, an Austin native, started his career as a patrol officer in 1991. He rose through the ranks, and in 2012 was named Acevedo’s assistant chief.

In her message to council, Garza also called for the negotiation and approval of a new contract with the Austin Police Association as quickly as possible. Police have been working without a contract since Dec. 29, and APA negotiator Ron DeLord said recently that discussions a new contract could take months.

Garza said the city has been “slow playing” the negotiation process and inserting unnecessary obstacles.

“We have made it entirely impossible to negotiate a contract efficiently,” she wrote. “It is our City Manager’s job to negotiate the best contract for the city and then have council approve or reject it. I am ready now to approve the next contract our City Manager presents us with.”