CLEARLAKE, Calif. – The Clearlake City Council on Thursday night reached consensus to appoint the city’s interim police chief to the job permanently, a decision that came after a sometimes heated session in which some council members clashed.
Craig Clausen, a 16-year veteran of the department who has held the job since the start of 2011 following the retirement of Chief Allan McClain, received the support of a majority of the council, as well as a large segment of those who came to witness the hour-and-a-half-long discussion.
The council also directed interim City Administrator Joan Phillipe to begin the process of negotiating a contract with Clausen.
But the decision was far from easy, and the council was not united.
Mayor Joey Luiz, Council member Judy Thein and Councilman Curt Giambruno were firmly supportive of giving Clausen the job, while Council member Joyce Overton and Vice Mayor Jeri Spittler preferred an open recruitment.
Spittler, in particular, disagreed with giving Clausen the job permanently, and at various points in the meeting she argued both with Clausen and Luiz.
Community members who supported Clausen lauded him for weathering a difficult year, but still managing to raise morale, expanding programs with creativity and not cash, suffeing through “political throw downs” and traumatic events – such as the mass shooting last summer that killed toddler Skyler Rapp – and gaining the full support of his staff.
Opponents found flaws in the department, wanting an outside choice to bring the kind of change that they didn’t feel Clausen had accomplished.
Longtime Clearlake resident and retired sheriff’s lieutenant Carl Webb told the council, “Peace officers rarely take this on as a job. It's a career for them.”
He supported Clausen’s selection, explaining that if the council wasn’t willing to look within, it would send the wrong message to young officers now working their way up through the ranks.
Shirley Howland wanted the council to go out to recruitment, which she said had been used previously. She said Clausen could still apply for the job “just like everybody else.”
Chuck Leonard, a former councilman, questioned why they should go outside of the city if they were happy with what they had. “I think the only ones I hear complaining about the police department have been arrested or their family and friends have been arrested.”
Bob Malley, another former councilman, three time mayor and former deputy sheriff, said Clausen’s efforts – including opening up more community conversations through social media and beginning a community patrol – is bringing to fruition things the council had requested of the agency.
If the council wanted to recruit, Malley said, then it should have started six months ago.
Officer Ryan Peterson read a letter from the Clearlake Police Officers Association asking the council to give Clausen the job permanently.
The association pointed out that Clausen has maintained the department in the face of budgetary challenges and personnel shortages, worked to get a school resource officer for Konocti Unified and started a community policing program.
Overton, who called the matter “a very stressful thing,” said, “This is one of the best police departments we’ve had ever since I’ve been here.”
She said she felt it was important that officers respected their boss, and that Clausen had done a good job as interim chief.
Thein said Clausen was “homegrown,” having been raised in the county and staying to make his life and career here. “This is not a stepping stone for him. His whole life is Lake County.”
Thein, who has been through previous open recruitments, said they haven’t always been successful. When it came to hiring McClain the city spent well over $80,000 to hire, and had to end up raising its pay scale in order to attract applicants with appropriate experience and skills.
She pointed out that the city of Lakeport hired its new chief, Brad Rasmussen, last year from within, and that Konocti Unified Superintendent Dr. Bill MacDougall also worked his way up in the district.
“We can do the same thing here with Craig,” said Thein, who noted that he best embodied what she was looking for in a police chief.
Spittler said she supported the police department, and insisted that she had no personal agenda in her desire for an open recruitment.
“I don’t understand the blinders,” she said, referring to the choice to appoint Clausen, who she said could apply for the job.
Referring to recent performance evaluations of Clausen – which had been mentioned earlier in the meeting – Spittler said, “I wish the walls had eyes,” adding she wished sometimes that such discussions weren’t in closed session.
At that point Clausen said something quietly that wasn’t audible to the audience, causing Spittler to accuse him of threatening her. Clausen, in turn, referenced government code about disclosure of closed session matters. Luiz banged the gavel and to the two not to interact.
Giambruno recalled that when interim Police Chief Larry Todd helped the city recruit McClain, he had told the council that in four or five years, when they needed another chief, they needed only to look within the department, as Clausen would be the most qualified to take over.
In Giambruno’s assessment, Todd was right on target, and he wanted to appoint Clausen immediately.
A divisive process
Luiz spoke at length about his support of Clausen, and his concerns over the divisiveness of the process, bullying communications he received from opponents of the appointment, and the heightened rhetoric and emotion around the police chief’s selection.
He said the decision, for him, was mainly about public safety. “It can’t be guided by a personal opinion and it’s beyond even the evaluation of one man. It’s a decision that need s lot of reason, consideration and examination.”
Over the past year Luiz has spent more than 100 hours riding with Clearlake Police officers as they make their rounds of the city. With the majority of the city’s funds going toward the police department, Luiz said he wanted to better understand how the agency worked.
As he had at a recent meeting, Luiz lauded the department for being accepting, and said he didn’t want to harm the morale of the department’s officers.
“My decision here is going to be based on fact,” he said, detailing Clausen’s long history of service, his proactive work on community oriented policing, hiring of new officers, improving of morale, and how his department hunted and apprehended all suspects in “one of the most brutal and heartbreaking crimes in the city’s history,” referring to the Skyler Rapp murder.
When the sheriff’s office drug its feet on a school resource officer, Clausen stepped in, said Luiz. He raised concerns about hundreds of felons coming back onto the streets due to correctional realignment, noting that in the face of those circumstances the city needed experience and stability.
Luiz said he didn’t want to see the city go backwards, and that for the first time he saw a light on the horizon for the city, a chance to have a steady course and no longer be in transition.
“I will not support going out, and I will not support approving any other contract but that of Craig Clausen,” said Luiz, receiving a round of applause.
Spittler maintained that they should look outside the city. “I am asking for an open recruitment. I think it would serve my city the best.”
Overton asked about doing a new background on Clausen, which Phillipe said the council could direct her to do. Luiz didn’t support such a step, which was done when Clausen was hired.
Thein also didn’t want to prolong the matter. “We’ve beat this to death.”
Luiz agreed, saying that he wasn’t willing to put Clausen or the council through that process. “For me that’s not intelligent government,” he said, adding, “I do not want to play the game anymore.”
Spittler wanted to continue questioning Clausen about what she said was a threat against her earlier in the meeting, which angered members of the audience.
“Really, Vice Mayor Spittler,” said Luiz, telling Spittler that she had been warned both by Clausen and himself because she went off topic.
Phillipe said she will sit down with Clausen and begin discussing points of a proposed contract, which she will bring to the council in a future closed session for fine tuning. The final contract, Phillipe said, must eventually be approved in an open council meeting.
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