Thousand Oaks OKs Budget That Adds Police Positions

The Thousand Oaks City Council has approved a two-year, $126-million budget that provides for seven new law enforcement positions and retains a $2-million surplus held over from the last fiscal year.

But some council members were chagrined that the city was not boosting police spending even more.

Although the city has grown by more than 15,000 residents in the last five years, council members said they were dismayed to learn there have been no new positions added to the city’s 79-member force during that time.

“In my mind, public safety is the No. 1 issue,” said Mayor Elois Zeanah, who with Councilwoman Jaime Zukowski asked city officials to try to find more money for law enforcement. “We have to make sure . . . we stop this slow decline in the safety of our city.”

Thousand Oaks dropped this year from first to second place in the FBI’s ranking of the nation’s safest cities with a population greater than 100,000.

Thousand Oaks paid the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department about $10 million this year for 79 sheriff’s deputies to patrol its streets, nine supervisors to direct the patrol deputies, and at least 13 civilian employees to answer non-emergency calls, give parking tickets and perform administrative functions.

Under the new budget, Thousand Oaks will pay an additional $156,000 from January to June, 1994, and then $600,000 for the 1994-95 fiscal year, to pay for four new officers, three civilian employees and two additional patrol cars, City Manager Grant Brimhall said.

The city currently has 0.8 deputies per 1,000 residents, Sheriff’s Cmdr. Kathy Kemp said.

Zukowski compared that figure to other cities around the country, including New York City, where residents enjoy a ratio of 3.8 officers for every 1,000 residents. Obviously, she said, “we have not kept pace with our population growth.”

But Councilman Alex Fiore dismissed her comparison. “Maybe they need three officers per 1,000 in New York,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean they need that in Ojai.”

Fiore said he was happy to give the Sheriff’s Department whatever it asked, but expressed satisfaction with the police services the city receives.

Figures compiled by The Times in June show that Camarillo had .64 officers per 1,000 residents, Simi Valley had 1.10, and the cities of Ventura and Oxnard each had 1.27. The county average was 1.09 officers per 1,000 residents.