Butler Township welcomes new police chief
BUTLER TWP — Butler Township’s new police chief was sworn in at a meeting of township commissioners Monday, Nov. 4, at the township building.
Brian L. Barnhart, of Gibsonia, replaces John Hays, who submitted his retirement notice in May.
Barnhart was sworn in by Butler County Common Pleas Judge S. Michael Yeager.
“We’re very excited to have a new chief on board,” Commissioner Edward Natali said.
Barnhart is a veteran of the U.S. Navy, serving from January 1988 through February 1993. After joining the state police in 1996, he worked as a criminal investigation section supervisor, officer-in-charge of the Butler Patrol Unit and station commander in Beaver County, among other positions.
Most recently, he was state police station commander in Butler County.
Barnhart was selected after a careful search with a “good, robust” pool of candidates, township manager Tom Knights said.
With the state police, Barnhart supervised investigations and acted as an on-scene supervisor for homicides, missing persons, home invasions and other crimes.
The new chief said he is looking forward to making a positive impact.
“We’re going to work on automation, try to make the paperwork side less cumbersome,” he said. “We’ll streamline so the officers can be out on the road enforcing the laws and responding to calls quicker.”
According to the job advertisement, the police chief in Butler Township oversees 20 officers, two administrative clerks and an annual department budget of about $2.7 million.
Barnhart commended Lt. Matthew Pearson, who served as acting chief of the department.
“There was a lot going on,” he said. “He had to work on the budget as well as the day-to-day operations of the department and did an admirable job.”
