Nov. 11, 2025

It was a thank-you to a police chief as his service nears its end. It was a discussion about mental health, among the residents that police protect and among the police themselves. It was a hats-off from the chief to the dedication and valor of Charlotte’s police officers.

And the onetime App State footballer made it into a celebration of America’s military personnel on Veterans’ Day.

That young college footballer left behind a 3% Black town in Tennessee once called Mossy Creek. After reality crushed his dream of being a postal inspector, a friend suggested he apply to be a police officer. Months later, he was at Charlotte’s Police Academy. And now, after 33.5 years of service, Johnny Jennings is ready for his one-time deputy chief, Stella Patterson, to begin her term as Chief on Dec. 1

To hear Jennings tell it, his time as chief had barely begun before the civil unrest following the death of George Floyd “erased” years of police agency efforts to build community trust and support across the country.  Jennings realized that maintaining what his predecessors had created would not be enough. This is something different, he mused. “This is on me now.”

Jennings plans to remain in Charlotte, the city he came to love. There was some talk about how, in retiirement, he would just go fishing. But it is even easier to imagine that he will be snapped up some towering corporation intent on finding leaders who, like the man from small-town Tennessee, just wanted to be the best he could be at the task he was entrusted to accomplish.

QCityMetro included in its Nov.12 newsletter a quote from Chief Rodney Monroe made at Tuesday’s Forum.

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