Ken Clary was sworn in as the police chief in Bellevue, Nebraska, (the third largest city in the state) on September 1, 2020. As chief he oversees a department of approximately 111 sworn and 15 civilian personnel. Prior to that Ken worked for the Iowa State Patrol from 1994 to 2020. Throughout his career with the state patrol, he served in a variety of roles including district commander, statewide tactical commander, assistant operations commander, professional standards bureau, and Commission Accreditation of Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA) accreditation coordinator.

Chief Clary received his Master in Public Administration from Upper Iowa University, and is currently a PhD candidate in Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Nebraska, Omaha. He was selected by the National Institute of Justice as a Law Enforcement Advancing Data and Science (LEADS) Scholar (where he served from 2016 to 2019). He also graduated the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) National Academy (Session 269) and the FBI Law Enforcement Executive Development Seminar (LEEDS) (Session 80) and completed the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) Leadership in Police Organizations and Northwestern University’s School of Police Staff and Command.

Chief Clary has played key roles in developing national programs and initiatives; including working with the International Association of Directors of Law Enforcement Standards and Training (IADLEST) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) on updating Data-Driven Approaches to Crime and Traffic Safety (DDACTS), working with the National Policing Institute to help create the National Law Enforcement Roadway Safety Program (NLERSP), and working with the Policing Project at New York University on the 30×30 Initiative. He was inducted into the Center for Evidence-Based Policing Hall of Fame in 2019 and received the IACP J. Stannard Baker Lifetime Achievement Award for Highway Safety.

Chief Clary has also served his community as a Special Olympics Torch Run volunteer for several years. He currently serves as the Board Chair for the Food Bank of Iowa. Chief Clary has been awarded the Iowa Governor’s Volunteer Award on two occasions for his philanthropic efforts (2014 and 2016).