Director of Research and Project Development, ICMA Center for Public Safety Management
Email: lmatarese@cpsm.us
Phone: 716-969-1360
Mr. Matarese is a specialist in public sector administration with particular expertise in public safety issues. He has 44 years’ experience as a law enforcement officer, police chief, public safety director, city manager and major city Human Resources Commissioner. He was one of the original advisory board members and trainer for the first NIJ/ICMA Community Oriented Policing Project which has subsequently trained thousands of municipal practitioners on the techniques of the community policing philosophy over the past 18 years. He has managed several hundred studies of emergency services agencies with attention to matching staffing issues with calls for service workload.
Recognized as an innovator by his law enforcement colleagues he served as the Chairman of the SE Quadrant, Florida, Blue Lighting Strike Force, a 71agency, U.S. Customs Service anti-terrorist and narcotics task force and as president of the Miami-Dade County Police Chief’s Association – one of America’s largest regional police associations. He represents ICMA on national projects involving the United States Department of Homeland Security, The Department of Justice, Office of Community Policing and the Department of Justice, Office Bureau of Justice Assistance. He has also served as a project reviewer for the National Institute of Justice and is the subject matter expert on several ICMA / USAID police projects in Central America. As a public safety director, he has managed fire / EMS systems including ALS transport. He was an early proponent of public access and police response with AEDs.
Mr. Matarese has presented before most major public administration organizations annual conferences on numerous occasions and was a keynote speaker at the 2011 annual PERF conference. He was a plenary speaker at the 2011 TAMSEC Homeland security conference in Linköping, Sweden and at the 2010 UN Habitat PPUD Conference in Barcelona, Spain.
He has a Master’s degree in Public Administration and a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science. He is a member of two national honor societies and has served as an adjunct faculty member for several universities. He holds the ICMA Credentialed Manager designation, as well as Certified Professional designation from the International Public Management Association- Human Resources. He also has extensive experience in labor management issues, particularly in police and fire departments. Mr. Matarese is a life member of the International Association of Chiefs of Police and of ICMA.