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San Clemente : After Eight Years, New Chief Fulfills Dream

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Displaying his new badge and calling it “beautiful,” Kelson McDaniel was sworn in Thursday as the city’s new police chief, filling a job that had been vacant since March and fulfilling a dream he had cherished for eight years.

McDaniel made an unsuccessful bid for the job in 1977. A year later, he became police chief in Los Alamitos, a post he held until this week.

A 24-year law enforcement veteran who for 17 years was a Newport Beach police officer, McDaniel bested 112 candidates from as far away as Indiana and Illinois for the $54,300-a-year San Clemente job, City Manager Jim Hendrickson said.

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McDaniel, 48, said Thursday that he is “excited” about assuming command of the 63-member San Clemente police force because “it is a time of great transition, from a small department to a medium-sized department.”

McDaniel cited the city’s projected growth--its 30,000 population is expected to double by the turn of the century--and said he feels as if he is “getting in on the ground floor. It’s a good time to jump in here. There will be so many changes.”

McDaniel had run the 25-member Los Alamitos police force since 1978 and was being paid $43,000 a year. For 17 years before that, he was a patrol sergeant, reserve coordinator, adjutant to the chief and management services supervisor in the Newport Beach Police Department.

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An Indiana native, McDaniel replaces Gary Brown, who retired seven months ago to work for a Sacramento executive-search firm. Police Lt. Bob McDonell had been acting chief.

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