said he would retire<\/a> from the department on Sept. 30, but announced an accelerated retirement on July 10 earlier this month.<\/p>\nIn one of his final interviews as the department\u2019s chief, McManus sat down with KSAT\u2019s Myra Arthur to discuss his legacy, his successor and rumors of a political future.<\/p>\n
Myra: What\u2019s this last week like, knowing your time as chief is almost over?<\/p>\n
McManus: It actually feels good. I want nothing. I want to go out Tim Duncan-style, under the radar, no fanfare.<\/p>\n
McManus: I never expected to say 20 years, ever. That\u2019s unheard of in a major city. But I made a promise to myself a long time ago that I would retire when my kids were finished with their education.<\/p>\n
While he is retiring from SAPD, McManus is moving on to become Vice President of Security for Silver Ventures, which manages The Pearl.<\/p>\n
McManus: I\u2019ve got 50 years \u2026 51 years of experience in law enforcement altogether. I\u2019ve been a chief for 24 years, and what am I going to do with that? Just go to sleep with it?<\/p>\n
Myra: What\u2019s been the greatest challenge of leading SAPD?<\/p>\n
McManus: The greatest challenge is coming in from the outside and running a big police department \u2014 establishing credibility, establishing trust both internally and externally.<\/p>\n
Myra: Is that why you\u2019ve endorsed your successor as someone from inside SAPD \u2014 Assistant Chief Jesse Salame?<\/p>\n
McManus: I met him when he was a detective. I promoted him up to sergeant, lieutenant, captain, deputy. He was my chief of staff; he was my PIO (public information officer). Jesse\u2019s done a great job. He knows the community, and he knows what path we\u2019ve taken for the last 20 years.<\/p>\n
Myra: What do you want to see in your successor, whoever that may be?<\/p>\n
McManus: Somebody who\u2019s humble. Somebody who can work with the community. Someone who knows the department \u2014 someone who\u2019s had to work within the department.<\/p>\n
Myra: There are rumors about a political future for you. How do you react to that talk?<\/p>\n
McManus: I\u2019ve had people \u2014 I won\u2019t tell you from where, but all over the place \u2014 but I won\u2019t be specific about it, encouraging me to run for office. But my focus right now is on Silver Ventures.<\/p>\n
Myra: \u201cMayor McManus?\u201d<\/p>\n
McManus: Could be. Who knows.<\/p>\n
Myra: \u201cSenator McManus?\u201d<\/p>\n
McManus: I don\u2019t know about that … You know, there\u2019s mayors all over the country who have been former police chiefs. So it\u2019s not unusual.<\/p>\n
Myra: Well, speaking of elections, there will be a new Bexar County District Attorney at the same time there is a new SAPD chief. There\u2019s been public tension between the DA\u2019s office and SAPD. What needs to happen for that relationship to work?<\/p>\n
McManus: The public picture of those disagreements was probably more played up than behind the scenes, because (District Attorney Joe Gonzales) and I have always talked … The issue between the DA\u2019s office and the police department was the fact that we had a left-leaning DA who changed a lot of policies, where people weren\u2019t being prosecuted for certain crimes. There were a lot of cases being dropped, a lot of charges being dismissed … It absolutely needs to change, or the next DA is going to have the same problem.<\/p>\n
McManus said an acting chief will be named the same week he retires, and the search for his permanent replacement is underway. <\/p>\n
After a few more weeks off, McManus will return to work, but in a new role. <\/p>\n
McManus: I\u2019m almost bored now, and I\u2019ve only been on leave for three days.<\/p>\n
Read also: <\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by KSAT – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN ANTONIO \u2013 San Antonio Police Department Chief William McManus is retiring after two decades on the job.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":364837,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[82,84,83,632,26126],"class_list":["post-364836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news","tag-sapd","tag-william-mcmanus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=364836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/364837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=364836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=364836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=364836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}