Artesia Inquires Into Police Services

In what would be one of the first ventures of its kind, the city of Artesia is inquiring about contracting for protection from the La Palma Police Department.

Artesia, a Los Angeles County city that borders La Palma on the northwest, now has police protection from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. La Palma officials confirmed Friday that Artesia has asked about a possible shift to the La Palma Police Department.

“They contacted us; we did not contact them,” La Palma Chief David S. Barr said. “We were not seeking to compete with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.” Barr said the first step is to commission a study of the feasibility from La Palma’s perspective.

“We need to know if can it be done and what kind of costs we are talking about,” Barr said. “An important thing we must determine is that there be no degradation of our existing service to the city of La Palma.”

The City Council has scheduled a discussion of the issue at its meeting Tuesday.

Councilwoman Charlene Hatakeyama described the situation as “very exciting and a great morale boost for our Police Department. . . . The council is going to be looking into this.”

Barr said the council will focus first on a feasibility study, which he estimated could be completed within three months.

If the study recommends a police expansion into Artesia, Barr said, it would probably take effect a year from now at the start of fiscal 1997-98.

No Orange County city now has a police department serving a community in another county. Barr said he thinks the proposal for La Palma would be the first.

Artesia and La Palma are about the same size in area and population. Artesia has about 17,000 residents, and La Palma has about 16,000. Barr said that the La Palma Police Department would have to add personnel if it contracted to serve Artesia.