Captain Monica J. McGrath

Depending on what you are doing, three months can be a long time, or it can go by so fast that just saying it amazes you that it has really been that long! It was the latter response that I got from Fillmore's newest sitting police chief as I sat down in her office to welcome her to Fillmore and to interview her on her newest assignment in the twenty-four years she has been a deputy with the Ventura County Sheriff's Department. The first impression you get from Captain McGrath is the ease of her smile and warm relaxed presence she has. Her people skills are nice to see and will be of value as she manages law enforcement services for the Santa Clara Valley Area Station.

Captain Monica McGrath is not a California native and until 1986 she called her home Glen Gardner, a Borough located in Hunterdon County, New Jersey. The size of Glen Gardner, approximately 2,000 residents, helps Captain McGrath in understanding the personality of a small town and what makes small towns like Fillmore unique. Although her home town is only about fifty miles from New York City Captain McGrath tells me she lived in a very rural area, with a small police department and very little crime. Captain McGrath moved to California in 1986 while working for New York Life Insurance and worked out of offices located at Hill Street and Telephone Road across from the County Government Center and the Headquarters of the Ventura County Sheriff's Department. While working there she told me she always wondered what the large brown buildings were across the street and in August of 1987 she intimately learned what they were when she entered the Ventura County Sheriff's Academy as a new Deputy Sheriff's Trainee.

Since her career began Captain McGrath has had many assignments; with Detention Services at the former Branch Jail Honor Farm in Ojai, patrol deputy/special enforcement detail with the Camarillo Police Department, Academy Instructor teaching Juvenile Law and Vehicle Operations, Youth Officer with the Camarillo Police Department, Academy Recruit Training Officer, Human Resources Background Investigator, Sexual Assault Investigator for East Valley Police Services, Sergeant within Detention Services, Sergeant with West County Patrol Services in the City of Ojai, Internal Affairs Investigator, Supervisor Sheriff's Personnel and Human Resources, Detective Sergeant for the City of Camarillo, Patrol Watch Commander, Administrative Captain with the Camarillo Police Department and the surrounding unincorporated area and now her current assignment as Captain/Chief of Police for the Santa Clara Valley Area Station.

The Santa Clara Valley Area Station is one of the largest of the Sheriff's Stations in area size and includes the incorporated City of Fillmore where Captain McGrath serves as the City of Fillmore's contract Chief of Police. As the Chief she is responsible for directing and overseeing the twelve deputies assigned to the contract and the day-to-day operations of the Fillmore Police Department. As a Sheriff's Captain she has law enforcement responsibilities for the unincorporated community of Piru and the unincorporated areas surrounding both the City of Fillmore and the community of Piru as well as the unincorporated areas surrounding the City of Santa Paula. The Santa Clara Valley Area Station boundaries are roughly from the Los Angeles County line on the east to nearly the City limits of Ventura on the west, south on Highway 23 to the top of Grimes Canyon and north up Highway 150 to the Upper Ojai. There are an additional twenty deputies serving the unincorporated area bringing the total number of deputies assigned to the Santa Clara Valley Area Station to 32.

Some readers may be surprised by the enormity of Captain McGrath's responsibilities! This may be because Captain McGrath is the primary face of the Fillmore Police Department as their Chief of Police, a job that takes nearly 98 percent of her time for about 1/2 the cost to the City of Fillmore! Yes I said 1/2 the cost because of the concept of “Contracting” the City of Fillmore is only billed for 1/2 of Captain McGrath's salary and benefits and the other 1/2 is billed to the Sheriff for her other responsibilities outside of the City of Fillmore. For this Captain McGrath prepared and manages the $3,060,117 adopted 2011-12 law enforcement budget, that is a budget 2 1/2 times the amount budgeted to operate her home town of the Borough of Glen Gardner! In addition to managing the police officers patrolling the streets of Fillmore and the unincorporated areas, the Chief attends city staff meetings, city council meetings and community meetings such as Rotary where the Chief is a member of the Fillmore Noontime Rotary Club. The Chief is also on the Board of Directors for Interface and on the Executive Board for the Juvenile Detention Alternative Initiative (JDAI). Her other responsibilities also include attending the Piru Neighborhood Council Meetings where she interacts in the same manner with the Piru Neighborhood Council as she does with the Fillmore City Council. With that interaction she frequently communicates with District 3-Supervisor Kathy Long, or her aide. Both are known to attend the Piru Neighborhood Council Meetings on issues affecting the community of Piru.

Now the name McGrath should be a familiar name to many of the farming families who read this newspaper. The McGrath name is a prominent name in the Ventura County Agricultural Community. The McGrath Family has been farming on the Ventura County Coast in the Oxnard Plains for five generations beginning in 1868! Chief McGrath did not bring the McGrath name to California from New Jersey, however, she is married to Jack McGrath the son of retired Superior Court Judge Charles McGrath. Jack is also a deputy with the Ventura County Sheriff's Department and is assigned as a detective in the City of Camarillo. Monica and Jack do not have children and reside in the City of Ventura. There is also another connection to the Fillmore area besides the agriculture one; as a McGrath, Captain McGrath is also related, by marriage, to the William L. Morris family! She told me she they are related to the McGrath family as cousins. This family background gives Captain McGrath, I believe, some very interesting and historically valuable connections to the people of the Santa Clara Valley.

Captain McGrath was an athlete in high school lettering in softball, tennis, cross country, and basketball. She then played college tennis with NCAA Division III Trenton State College, where they were always ranked in the top five in the nation. Although she no longer plays tennis she enjoys snow skiing, competitive and recreational running and is a two-time medalist in the Ragnar Team Relays! The Ragnar Team Relays is a 24-hour running relay where team members run around the clock for usually a total team distance of about 200 miles. The Chief also runs in the annual Challenge Cup Baker to Vegas Relay. This relay generally has about 250 law enforcement teams comprised of 6,000 plus runners, from all over the world running this relay from the California city of Baker to the Nevada city of Las Vegas. Captain McGrath and her husband Jack also enjoy wine tasting at the many wineries located within California.

Captain McGrath earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Administrative Management from Trenton State College in Trenton, New Jersey and she is currently enrolled at California Coast University in the Psychology Master's Program. Captain McGrath has completed specialized training in Urban Area Security Initiative, is a 2006 graduate of the Sherman Block Supervisory Leadership Institute and has served as an auditor for that same program. Other training she has completed are the Ventura County Leadership Course, Institute of Criminal Investigations, emphasis in Child Abuse and she possesses her California Commission on Peace Officers Standards and Training, Basic, Advanced, Supervisor and Management Certificates.

I asked Captain/Chief McGrath what she sees as her challenges as the leader of the Fillmore Police Department? One of her answers I was not surprised by, but the other I was glad to hear she felt was important enough to publicly mention as one of her challenges!

The first challenge: The declining financial health of local and California state government she felt is one of the great challenges she faces with some very limited options directly available to her to obtain additional funding. Chief McGrath believes in Community Policing as a key component in preventing crime and would like to partially fund (through State and School District funds) a combination of the School Resource Officer and the second Gang Officer recently removed from her budget through needed cuts by the City of Fillmore. She recently learned that the State of California will be re-authorizing a 1996 law establishing the Citizens Option for Public Safety Funding (COPS) and awarding $100,000 grants to each city and unincorporated areas of Counties within the State of California. This funding can only be used to “supplement front line municipal police services and not supplant existing funding.” Front line law enforcement services include anti-gang, juvenile justice and community crime prevention programs. Since this funding is designated for “municipal police services” that would be monies utilized only within the City of Fillmore!

The second challenge: The Chief told me she is committed to maintaining the Sheriff's Contract for Police Services for the City of Fillmore. The Ventura County Sheriff's Office has provided police services to the City of Fillmore since July of 1987 when the City of Fillmore entered into the current Police Services Contract after disbanding their police department. The Sheriff's Department currently has police services contracts with five of the ten incorporated cities within Ventura County; Cities of Fillmore, Ojai, Camarillo, Thousand Oaks and the City of Moorpark.

Police Services Contracting has a unique, open and defensible methodology to establish costs for its services. The Ventura County Sheriff's Department's methodology is based, in a large part, on that created by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD). The LASD is the second largest municipal law enforcement agency in the nation and holds the longest history of police services contracting in the State of California beginning in 1954 with the City of Lakewood. Local identity and control are two of the key components provided with the Police Services Contract for the City of Fillmore. For over twenty years the City of Fillmore has enjoyed tailored law enforcement services specific to the needs of the City of Fillmore. Although some of those tailored services have been cut the basic level of service will not be reduced below that level which the Sheriff believes is critical to provide safe and effective law enforcement! Short of being in a position of being able to adequately fund a cities own police department contracting has been a successful relationship for the community and its contract police department.

Besides challenges the Chief told me she has two immediate goals; one being to have more involvement by the community in the law enforcement needs of the community. This would mean the community having input in solving the public safety issues facing the community. The other is to re-institute the Brown Bag Program within the schools.

First Goal: The Chief told me she, along with the Probation Department, City Impact, and other Sheriff’s Captains in the West County area are in the process of seeking a Federal grant named “Operation Safe Neighborhood” or OSN Grant. This grant would assist the police department in empowering the community to interact with their police department in areas of crime prevention and intervention. They won’t be notified of the approval of the grant until September at the earliest. The goal is a multi-faceted and multi agency collaboration in an effort to take weapons off the street and to make our neighborhoods truly a safe haven for youth.

Second Goal: The Chief would like to re-introduce The Brown Bag Program. The Brown Bag Program is unique in that it brings into the schools a police officer in a “non-enforcement” capacity. This allows for not only the students to view their local law enforcement officer in their community outside of their traditional enforcement roles, but gives individual law enforcement officers an opportunity to see the youth of the community in a different light. The concept is to, as time allows, have the beat officer drop by a school campus and sit with students while they eat their lunches. This is a non-scheduled, non-threatening contact that allows for a different form of interaction between the law enforcement officer and the youth other than what may be the case outside of the school environment and in the community.

As I wound down the interview I noted in the air of a happy and relaxed support staff working with Captain/Chief McGrath. The front desk is staffed by Jane David who has been the first person you meet when inside the police department since 1987 and a wealth of local knowledge to Captain McGrath. Then there is Sergeant Pete O'Sullivan who works closely with Captain McGrath on community and law enforcement issues and the person who makes sure the Santa Clara Valley Area Station continues to run smoothly when the Captain/Chief is unavailable. I am confident Captain McGrath will be an asset to the City of Fillmore and I wish her success in her new assignment during these trying times. The trick will be in how do we keep her when it is clear she has the knowledge and skills that will continue to propel her within the Ventura County Sheriff's Department.