Atlantic City welcomes new public safety director

Atlantic City officially welcomed a new public safety director Wednesday.

Sean Riggin, who has been serving as Department of Community Affairs monitor for the past few months, will now oversee public safety, including the Police and Fire departments.

Riggin already has had a long working relationship with Atlantic City police, serving 20 years as a police officer in neighboring Pleasantville.

When he became chief May of 2015, the cities already were used to joining together as many cases connected the two towns.

"We're getting a skilled leader," Mayor Marty Small told a room full of reporters as he made the announcement in his seventh-floor office.

It's also a coming home of sorts for the longtime public servant, who referred to himself as "a former Brighton Avenue School kid" who also attended Our Lady Star of the Sea.

"I'd like to see Atlantic City be a place where public safety is not the centerpiece of what we're talking about," Riggin said, acknowledging that when public safety is the hot topic, that means things are not going well.

"I'd like for our firefighters, our police officers, our beach patrol, emergency management and all of the professional first-responders not have to worry about what the public safety director is doing," he said. "That everybody wakes up in the morning and feels safe in their homes, in their jobs and the duties they have to protect the city."

The public safety director position has long been on the table, Small said. 

But the position has not been active for more than a decade, since Willie Glass — an Atlantic City Police Department veteran — served in the position for about two years.

Before that, Christine Petersen served in the position, but had to resign after it was found she had not been retired long enough from her previous position as a lieutenant in the Jersey City Police Department before taking the Atlantic City job.

Small said he did not want to focus on the position's past, but instead what the addition of Riggin means to the city, which has seen a drop an 8.6 percent drop in crime and a 16 percent drop in calls for service.

He pointed out that last year, the city was reeling after starting 2024 with five homicides in the first five weeks.

There were three more homicides throughout the rest of the year, with 2025 beginning without one.

Riggin's position comes with a raise from his $85,000 annual DCA commissioner salary to $110,000 per year, the starting rate for all city directors.

"This is a joint effort," Small said. "We are unified now more than ever and the goal is to keep the residents of Atlantic City safe."

Small and Riggin were joined by Police Chief James Sarkos and Fire Chief Scott Evans, who also heads emergency management.

Evans called it a game-changer. He pointed to the fact that the city's public safety also has to interact with other agencies, including the county and state.

"Bringing a public safety director on just elevates our ability to do a lot of different things," he said.

Sarkos has worked with Riggin during his previous positions as Pleasantville police chief and in the past few months as DCA monitor.

"We have a very good relationship, and I look forward to continuing that relationship well into the future," the police chief said.

Riggin has more than 30 years of public safety and security experience, beginning his career as a Civil Affairs soldier under the U.S. Army Special Operations Command, learning crisis management in Sarajevo during the Balkan conflict of the mid-1990s. 

In Pleasantville, he also previously served as fire director and emergency management coordinator.

Riggin earned his master’s degree in disaster science and emergency management from the University of Delaware and his bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from Aspen University.

“Sean is a dynamic public safety professional with more than 25 years of experience in law enforcement, emergency management, and community engagement," DCA Commissioner Jacquelyn Suarez said in a news release following the announcement. "This tremendous amount of expertise combined with his knowledge of Atlantic City make Sean an excellent appointment as the City’s public safety director. He is ready and eager to strengthen Atlantic City’s already robust clean and safe initiatives. DCA looks forward to continuing to work with Sean in his new role and is confident the city community will find him to be a skilled public servant and communicator.”