With Loss of Two Captain Positions, a Police Department in Flux

The elimination of two captain positions at the Petaluma Police Department has renewed talk of who will take over as chief of the police department, a position that has been vacant for two years. It has also raised questions about whether the city is doing all it can to retain talented professionals in light of one of the worst budget crises in years.

Last Monday, the city council voted to cut seven positions, including two captain jobs in the police department. One of the positions is vacant and was formerly held by current Interim Chief Dan Fish, a 22-year veteran of the department.  

The other is Captain David Sears, who was been on the police department for 12 years and is deeply respected by the community for his involvement in various groups such as the Healthy Community Consortium and Sonoma County Prevention Partnership, both organizations that work with youth, along with the Kiwanis Service Club.

With the elimination of the captain position, Sears will be demoted, effective July 27, to lieutenant, taking a $35,000 pay cut in the process. He has indicated that he is interested in becoming the next police chief and may leave if he doesn’t get the job.

“Recruiters have asked me to submit my name to various departments…such as Sacramento and around the Bay Area,” Capt. Sears said Monday. “I have not ruled out going to a different department.”

The police chief position has been vacant since Chief Steve Hood retired in March 2009 to take a job with the Army’s counterterrorism unit. Since then Captain Dan Fish has been Interim Chief and has also expressed interest in becoming the next leader of the department. In 2009, Interim Chief Fish earned $183,000, according to the State Controller’s Office. Meanwhile, the typical captain salary in the Petaluma Police Department is $143,000.

But City Manager John Brown on Monday said the city had no current plans to initiate police chief recruitment. 

“As I’ve said before, we have other, more pressing department head needs to be addressed at the present time,” Brown said in an email to Petaluma Patch. These include directors of Finance and Public Works, which have both been vacant about six months. 

In the past, the city has said it did not have enough money to conduct a search for a permanent chief and that the current Interim Chief was qualified to handle the day-to-day responsibilities of the job.

What made the latest move awkward was that last week Interim Chief stood before the council and recommended that the captain positions be eliminated, a move that some have called "self-serving" because it would eliminate internal competition for the department's top position.

Paul Gilman, president of the Peace Officers’ Association of Petaluma, said both men have strong leadership skills and that the decision was up to the city manager to decide.

“Fish and Sears are very different people,” Gilman said. “Both have their strengths and weakness and it’s unfortunate that it has to be one way or the other. If someone told me ‘We’re going to cut your pay $20,000 a year and that will alleviate the responsibility of everyone else in the department,’ that’s not fair. That’s not really the right way to go about doing business.”

According to others in the police department, part of Captain Sears’ role in the department has been handling budget issues, something he has handled “remarkably well,” said the source who did not want to be quoted due to the sensitive nature of the topic. “The department saved $500,000 in the budget because of Sears’ management.”

But Fish, too, is respected by many, as someone who has come up through the organization working investigations, SWAT, narcotics and street crimes.

“He’s been very approachable and easy to work with,” said the source. “When the money is coming and the budget is good, it’s easy to be chief, but when things start getting tight and you lose that ability to bring people the things they are accustomed to, it creates some abrasive feelings. “

Petaluma resident Zen Destiny said the city was "disrespecting" both Interim Chief Dan Fish by keeping him as interim for so long and cutting Captain Sears' position.

"It sucks that our people stay years and years at the department and the way they get rewarded is a demotion," Destiny said during last week's council meeting. 

Whoever becomes the next chief—if and when the city decides to pursue a permanent hire—Gilman says the ongoing budget woes have impacted morale in the department.

“Even if the process opens up, I’m not sure that people would be knocking down our door to come into this environment," he said. "We don’t have revenue streams, we’re talking cut, cut, cut across the board, I don’t know if chiefs would line up to jump into that… Nobody wants to spend the last few years of their career in a department where you don’t know what the future is.”

Meanwhile, Captain Sears is exploring his options. He says he loves Petaluma and is hesitant to relocate his family, including daughters age 9 and 11, elsewhere. 

"It's a tough time, but I still have a job to do and every day I will turn up and do the best job I can," he said.