Police lieutenant plans to file legal claim

A recently reclassified Petaluma police lieutenant plans to file a legal claim over the action, and says that it has posed major challenges for him and his family.

"It affects me greatly, but I'm mostly concerned with how it affects my family. During the past week and a half, we've been trying to figure out how to make ends meet," said Dave Sears, a husband and father of two children.

He has been consulting with an attorney about the reclassification, and said he plans to file a claim, but would not provide details.

Sears has been approached by other police agencies - mainly out of the area - about work, but is proceeding with caution.

"Mainly, I don't want to uproot my kids. I was a Navy &‘brat,' so I know what it's like to be uprooted," he said. "I'm keeping all my options open, but I'm not throwing my hat into the ring for every job I see."

In response to a request for cuts in the police department, Interim Chief Dan Fish proposed laying off two community service officers and a police records assistant, as well as abolishing the captain rank, resulting in a $35,000 reduction in Sears' annual pay. The City Council approved these changes - along with laying off an inspector and an office assistant in the public works department - at its July 11 meeting.

The elimination of the captain positions passed, 4-3, with Mayor David Glass and council members Teresa Barrett, Mike Healy and Gabe Kearney voting in favor and Tiffany Ren?, Mike Harris and Chris Albertson dissenting.

"Historically, the police department has had a captain position, if not two captain positions. I feel that it needs to have at least one captain to deal with day-to-day issues," Harris said on Monday.

At the council meeting, Albertson also expressed concern about losing the rank.

"I see the captain position as functional and needed. Removing the rank is a bad idea," he said.

Some critics contend that by reclassifying Sears, Fish places himself in a better position to become permanent chief. At the meeting, Ren? stated that Fish's recommendation of the reclassification "smacks of self-interest," apparently viewing the action as a deliberate attempt by Fish to eliminate Sears as a strong competitor with him for the permanent chief job.

"I don't want to discuss it any further because I don't know if there will be any legal action regarding the matter," she said on Monday.

Actually, although Fish is serving as the interim chief, the City Council's approval of his recommendation also reclassifies his permanent position from captain to lieutenant.

"So, losing the captain positions potentially affects me, too, if I'm not made the permanent chief. But I think it is the best thing for the department," he said.

Fish says that it was "painful" for him to propose laying off three employees and eliminating two captain positions.

"My goal in coming up with the cuts was to do what is best for the department and impact all our general employee groups so that no one group would take the burden of the hits," said Dan Fish. "What has been disappointing to me as chief is that all of the (public) focus on the cuts has been on abolishing the captain position.

"The community will be impacted much more by the jobs that are being lost."

City Manager John Brown laments that the public focus seems to primarily be on Sears being reclassified from captain to lieutenant.

"It's unfortunate that this is coming down to one individual, by name. The focus should be on the position, not the individual, and the reclassification needs to be viewed in the context of all the people who are losing their jobs," he said.

Fish said that it wasn't easy for him to recommend a reclassification that adversely affects Sears.

"Dave Sears is a valuable leader of our staff, and I care a great deal about him as a person," Fish said. "It kills me to have him take a pay cut, but some employees who were laid off are losing $50,000, and now are unemployed."

Fish feels that given the current economic situation, elimination of the captain rank makes sense, even though it breaks a precedent.

"None of the other recent police chiefs faced the situation we're in now," Fish said. "We are living in a time that requires great changes, and we need to reinvest ourselves. For a police department of this size, what we really need is four lieutenants, rather than the captain positions.

"This will result in cost savings, put all the command staff at the same rank so that there is no &‘middle man,' and create a better information flow."

Fish said that he will discuss how to structure his four lieutenants' responsibilities during the first week of August.

As a captain, Sears was serving as the commander of all three police department lieutenants, as well as overseeing administrative policies, budgets and training.

"In my new role, the lieutenants will be my peers, and we will answer to the chief," he said.

The reclassification sparked plenty of heated exchanges on a petaluma360.com forum and elsewhere, prompting Sears to post a request for them to stop.

"I was extremely uncomfortable with them, because the issues that people were raising need to be handled by us internally, as a management team," he said. "When I joined the department in the late 1990s, it was divided, and it was horrible. My worst fear is that it will again become divided, so I'm doing whatever I can to make sure it doesn't happen."

Sears felt that some of the comments on the forum made the police department look unprofessional.

"A lot of it was personal stuff being said about people, and considering what was being said, it must have been written by current or former employees of the department," he said.

Sears feels that the recent controversy is not affecting the work performance of other employees.

"Most employees are loyal to the department -?not just to one captain or the chief," Sears said. "And no matter what happens, the city of Petaluma has a very good police department.

"Our employees give 110 percent every day."

The reclassification raised questions about the working relationship between Fish and Sears, who was not involved in the discussions about the move.

"I first heard about it at the end of May," he said.

When Chief Steve Hood resigned, both men applied for the interim chief job, and Fish was hired. Fish was hired by the department over a decade before Sears, although Sears had served longer as a captain.

They both said that they have mutual respect for each other and no difficulty working together. When asked if Sears' reclassification was due to unsatisfactory work, Fish adamantly said, "God, no."

Sears has expressed interest in applying for the permanent chief job, and Brown said that his reclassification would not necessarily prohibit him from doing so.

"I will be determining the recruitment method for the chief position, and will want to find the most highly qualified candidate," Brown said, adding that he has more pressing hiring responsibilities to deal with before focusing on the chief position.

(Contact Dan Johnson at dan.johnson@arguscourier.com)

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