Talking to Captain Tom Martin

Calabasas has no city police department. Instead, it contracts policing efforts to the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department and is served by the Lost Hills station, on Agoura Road in Agoura HIlls.

The station also covers the cities of Agoura Hills, Hidden Hills, Malibu, Westlake Village and much of the surrounding rural area.

Captain Tom Martin heads the station and is, in effect, the police chief for the entire area. We sat down with him and asked him about his job.
 
 
Calabasas 365: Has the budget crisis affected the Station?

Capt. Martin: Yes, but not as dramatically as it could. We have been told we have to cut overtime by 40%.

We’re being pulled in a couple of different directions. My job is to observe and analyze crime rates within our jurisdiction, take my resources and try to impact that.

I can’t tell a deputy, “Hey, we just made this great arrest of this burglary suspect, and what we should do is a rollback to his house, see if we can find more stolen property, but because of the budget, come back tomorrow night to fill out the report, and if he doesn’t get bailed out, we’ll try to do his house during the daytime when we’ve got a detective here.”

I have to say, “Wait a minute. We just got this guy. He’s an active burglar, there’s a good chance at his house, in his car or he’s got a storage locker with stolen property.”

Anytime you take a burglar off the street you’re probably solving 10 crimes. We could solve this other stuff and have evidence we can confront him with. But overtime is going tell me we can’t do that? It’s a balancing act.
 
 
Calabasas 365: On a typical day, how many officers do you have patrolling the streets?

Capt. Martin: It varies, by area and day of the week. On a typical Saturday night we have about 12-15 units out in different jurisdictions.

If there’s something going on, we’ll staff up for it. In the dead of winter, and we are not worried about landslides, we’ll downgrade. The important thing is we’re contacted by various cities and we’re obligated to provide them what their contract calls for.
 
 
Calabasas 365: Overall number of personnel?

Capt. Martin: We’re slated to have 184 personnel, sworn and civilian. We have 121 Deputy Sheriffs, 19 Sergeants and 6 Lieutenants. The rest are a variety of non-sworn; including law enforcement technicians who answer the phones, clerks and jailers.
 
 
Calabasas365: Officers routinely deal with the dark side of human nature. How do you not see the whole world like that?

Capt. Martin: For myself, I try not to just immerse myself completely in my job. I try to have outside activities with people who aren’t cops. Go to church with people, golf with guys who aren’t cops. My wife keeps me grounded. I have good kids, they call and we talk about real world issues.
 
 
Calabasas365: What about your employees?

Capt. Martin: Our supervisors are in tune with the deputies they supervise. We have a unit in our department, Employee Support Services (ESS), who are psychologists and they can go to them anytime. If we’re having issues, dialog with the guys and they talk with them at briefing, follow-up on an issue.

Remember when the guy drove through the crowd in Santa Monica? One of my guys was there when that happened. I asked him if he was ok, and he said “no, it was awful. There was somebody under the guy’s car, the windshield…” and I was able to get him hooked up with the docs down there. He was able to talk it through.

If we have a shooting, it’s mandatory that they talk with the psychologists. We have people trained with dealing with situations themselves, divorce, child custody, we deal with pretty horrific stuff. The most important person to us is our employee. If they can’t do their job objectively.

The public is our responsibility. We’re sending a guy with a gun and a badge out there to do his job. If they’re not doing it right, we can endanger the public.
 
 
Calabasas365: Finally, since you’ve been here, what’s the largest crisis you’ve faced as Captain?

Capt. Martin: Probably the most significant crisis has been is the wildlife fires of 2007. In January we had the fire that started at PCH and Las Virgenes. In that October we had the Canyon event that burned several houses with the Santa Ana Conditions. In November we had the Corral Fire when people recklessly started bonfires in high wind conditions that burned several houses before we could even get to it.
 
 
For more information about the Sheriff’s Department, here are some frequently asked questions and answers.