GILROY
– Just fewer than half of this city’s police officers and
firefighters have Gilroy addresses. Does that matter?
No public officials have made a big deal out of the issue, at
least not recently, and to people like City Councilman Bob Dillon,
it doesn’t make a bit of difference.
GILROY – Just fewer than half of this city’s police officers and firefighters have Gilroy addresses. Does that matter?
No public officials have made a big deal out of the issue, at least not recently, and to people like City Councilman Bob Dillon, it doesn’t make a bit of difference.
“I suppose if they show up for their shift, that’s fine with me,” Dillon said. “I’m sure they’d all come running if something happened. … There are people who commute from Los Banos to San Jose every day.”
But to two other City Council members, and to Gilroy’s mayor, fire chief and assistant police chief, it would be desirable for more public safety personnel to live in town.
“I’d rather see all (city) employees live in Gilroy,” Mayor Al Pinheiro said. Nevertheless, he added, “economics and family decisions” don’t always make that possible.
“I would certainly like to see our public safety officers live in Gilroy,” Councilman Roland Velasco said. “I understand, though, why they may choose not to or may simply not be able to afford to.”
Consider these facts:
• Of 60 sworn city police officers, 24 (40 percent) have Gilroy addresses.
• Of 40 city firefighters, 25 (63 percent) have Gilroy addresses.
• Combined, that means 49 of 100 Gilroy public safety personnel live in the city – if not inside city limits, at least close enough for postal purposes.
This is about average for city employees in general. Of the city’s 261 total employees, 140 (54 percent) live inside the city limits.
The public officials The Dispatch polled don’t all agree on whether the issue of residency for Gilroy police and firefighters is worth doing something about – and if so, what?
None thought it would be a good idea to require local residency, as has been done in some cities – often with vitriolic opposition from the officers affected.
“I used to live in the city of Cincinnati, and they required that there,” Dillon said. “Boy, it caused a lot of problems.”
Some Gilroy officials, however, thought incentives to balance the higher cost of living here would be worth looking at. Assistant Police Chief Lanny Brown said he would support monetary incentives for officers who stay local, and both he and Fire Chief Jeff Clet said they’d back partially subsidized, affordable housing for police and fire personnel, as is being built currently for Gilroy teachers.
“That idea has been talked about,” Pinheiro said of affordable housing, “but then what about other city employees? Where do you draw the line?”
Councilman Russ Valiquette concurred with the mayor. Just as Council members are pushing to attract new, well-paying jobs to town, Valiquette said they should focus on making it so all city employees can live in town.
Velasco, however, said that until the city is “flush with money,” such incentives are “not something really for us to even think about.”
The Gilroy Unified School District and South County Housing are close to completing the 12-unit La Maestra subsidized housing development for GUSD teachers. City officials are mulling whether to add their support by providing $30,000 low-interest loans to these teachers from a $2 million city housing trust fund.
GUSD teachers start at a salary of $36,000, about $24,000 lower than an entry-level Gilroy police and fire salary.
So why would it be desirable, to some, for more Gilroy public safety personnel to live here?
First, Pinheiro and Velasco mentioned that city police and firefighters need to be readily available in emergency situations. A Gilroy resident could respond in minutes to a major fire, crime, earthquake or other catastrophe requiring reinforcements, while a resident of Los Banos couldn’t make it in much less than an hour.
The Fire Department has an advantage over police in this regard since it has a backup force – a pool of part-time, paid-by-the-call firefighters required to live in the city.
Second, as Brown said, police officers who live, shop and recreate in the city where they work can keep their eyes and ears peeled while off duty. If they see disturbances, Brown said, they can report them with a cell phone or, if the disturbance is minor, handle it right then and there. In addition, officers who live in town hear more feedback from the public than non-residents.
“At the supermarket, … people can regularly grab me and … ask us to check out a particular area,” Brown said.
Third, Pinheiro noted that public safety personnel who live in town have the opportunity to get involved in community goings-on, giving them a “different perspective” on their work. Brown said he sees this difference when he interviews potential new officers.
“If I had two otherwise equally qualified applicants, … the (police) chief (Gregg Giusiana) and I would typically use as the tiebreaker someone who had roots in Gilroy,” Brown said. “We just feel that their sense of commitment could be a little bit higher. … They don’t just want a job in law enforcement; they want a job in law enforcement in their community.”
Why do Gilroy police officers and firefighters choose to live out of town anyway?
The most common answer: high housing costs. Even in departments that pay new hires in excess of $60,000 a year, the price of an average home in Gilroy is daunting – between $450,000 and $500,000, according to Realtors.
Except for five or so who live in Morgan Hill, all of the 36 GPD officers who commute to work do so from places where the cost of living is noticeably lower than in Gilroy. According to Brown, “lots” live in Hollister, four in the Los Banos area, three in the Watsonville area and two in Salinas.
The GPD requires its officers to live within a 45-minute drive of Gilroy, although Brown noted that “through negotiations, we’ve allowed people to live as far away as Los Banos, which is … about 50 minutes (away).”
The Fire Department allows firefighters to live twice as far away – 90 minutes by car. Of the 15 firefighters who commute, most live in Morgan Hill or Hollister, although one lives as far away as San Francisco, according to Clet.
“They started here when they were young,” Clet said, “and they migrated to where the housing was more affordable.”
Cost of living is not the only reason for living out of town, however. Police officers, by nature of the force they are required to use, can develop enemies. Because of this, they are often protective of their residences’ confidentiality, and it is common for them to feel unsafe living in the town where they work.
“It is kind of hard to be putting someone in the back of the car one day and bumping into them in the supermarket the next,” Velasco said.
Brown said this sentiment holds true for some officers, but not all.
“It’s almost like two schools, two camps, two views,” he said. “Personally, I just love living in Gilroy. I just wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Incidentally, 113 San Jose police officers live in Gilroy, according to their union. That’s more than 8 percent of San Jose’s 1,376-officer force and nearly five times the number of Gilroy cops who live here. There are also California Highway Patrol officers, San Jose firefighters, sheriff’s deputies and state and county firefighters.
For CHP officers, whose salaries begin at $48,000 and top out at $66,000, a Gilroy address is not always feasible. Eight of the 44 officers who serve the Hollister-Gilroy area live in this city, but according to CHP Officer Terry Mayes, these are the ones “who bought (their houses) in 1987.”
