As Ashland's new police chief, Doug Goodman plans to continue proactive traffic enforcement, bear down on drug crimes and keep plans for more youth activities in motion.

"We want to make sure that we continue to keep a low crime rate and, more importantly, decrease the victimization," Goodman said Friday.

Town Manager Charles Hartgrove chose Goodman, who joined the department as a captain in August, to replace Tom Clark, who came out of retirement with the Henrico County Division of Police to serve as interim chief after Frederick Pleasants Jr. resigned in 2006.

Clark will return to retirement June 30. Goodman takes the reins the next day.

Goodman, 36, came to the department from the Hanover County Sheriff's Office, where he worked for 14 years.

He was a primary media spokesman for the sniper shooting in Ashland in 2002, when a man was wounded outside a Ponderosa restaurant. The sniper attacks terrified the public from the Washington suburbs to the Richmond area and drew international media attention.

Goodman was at the center of it. Friends he hadn't talked to in years called him up to say they had seen him on TV. He said it still amazes him how quickly members of the media "from oceans away" descended on Ashland.

"I'll never forget cabs dropping reporters off that appeared to be from Southeast Asia," he said.

Goodman said the experience taught him a lot about public relations at the local level and beyond.

Hartgrove said Goodman's communications skills are an important plus in a small town where department heads often deal directly with the public. The town's police department has 25 sworn officers, including Goodman and Clark.

"Hopefully, he'll be with us for a long time," Hartgrove said.

Goodman joined the Hanover Sheriff's Office as a patrol deputy in July 1993 after graduating from Virginia Tech. He then worked as a school resource officer at Liberty Middle School and Patrick Henry High School, and after that as a domestic-violence investigator.

Later, he served as media spokesman. He was promoted to lieutenant in 2002.

He said he enjoyed his time at the sheriff's office and that Sheriff V. Stuart Cook "treated me like a son." He said he left specifically to take the Ashland captain position.

"It was a wonderful opportunity to join a department that was really up and coming," Goodman said.

He said he is proud that the town police department this year became the 25th law-enforcement agency in Virginia to be internationally accredited by the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies Inc.

Goodman lives with his wife and two children in central Hanover. He enjoys running and bicycling. In December, he earned his master's degree in public administration at Virginia Commonwealth University.

"I'm excited about the future of the agency," Goodman said, "and I'm proud of the past."
Contact Reed Williams at (804) 649-6332 or rwilliams@timesdispatch.com.