Reuben Meeks Named City of Rancho Cordova Police Director
Ted Gaebler, City Manager of Rancho Cordova, is pleased to announce that the City is transitioning Reuben Meeks, Chief of the Rancho Cordova Police Department, from the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department contract to work directly with the City in leading the Rancho Cordova Police Department and workforce. He will continue to direct the highly successful public safety and law enforcement activities that protect the Rancho Cordova community. He has been serving as Police Chief under the County contract since 2006.
“We are extremely happy to be finalizing an arrangement to bring Reuben directly into the City to continue to manage the work of the Police Department,” said Gaebler. “He is a creative, forward-thinking law enforcement leader. It will benefit our community to build upon his many successes,” he said. “Chief Meeks and his officers have done an outstanding job creating an extremely effective police department for Rancho Cordova. Crime is down, people feel and are safer as a result of many programs that he and his officers have implemented,” continued Gaebler. There have been double-digit decreases in several crime categories over the past few years. “RCPD has created positive, proactive relationships with our community in crime prevention and response through the implementation of creative and cost-effective programs,” cited Gaebler.
Officers who work in Rancho Cordova receive special training in the City’s culture and specific needs in order to communicate and respond effectively. “Our police officers take as much pride in initiating and realizing improvements in our City as those of us who live here,” explained Gaebler. “That is a very different concept from relatively anonymous law enforcement in other areas.”
Rancho Cordova Mayor Dan Skoglund echoes Gaebler’s sentiments. “Residents have developed excellent relationships with our officers, some of whom have served our community for many years,” the Mayor said. “Many RCPD officers contribute countless hours of volunteer service to make Rancho Cordova a better place, truly a testament to their dedication.”
Meeks will be retiring from the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department as a Captain after 25 years of service and immediately assume his position with the City as Police Director.
Similar Posts:
- June 24, 2010 – Former Rancho Cordova Police Chief Reuben Meeks Could Face Criminal Charges For Impersonating a Police Officer
- July 27, 2010 – CRPD Expands and Relocates Preschool Program
- June 28, 2010 – CRPD Hosts Free Movies in the Park
- May 13, 2010 – Bringing Home Your Adopted Dog: Lead the Way With Your Head, Not Your Heart
- May 20, 2010 – Sacramento County Sheriff Candidates Sound Off on Future of Department
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Posted by Helen Brewer
on Nov 24 2009. Filed under Viewpoints.
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Congrats to Reuben! This should be a good thing for Rancho Cordova.
I agree – congratulations to Reuben – his commitment to Rancho Cordova is astounding!
Congratulations, “Director” Meeks. This is good news for Rancho!
Realize that Rancho Cordova Police Department officers are nothing more than contracted Sacramento Sheriff Department employees–wearing Rancho Cordova Police Department costumes. Now, Rancho Cordova can have a police department director who can get a retirement pension/package from the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department (with the taxpayers footing the tab)–yet keep his old job under a whole new employment package (with taxpayers having to foot this new tab too). Talk about double-dipping with no benefit to the public. Sweet deal for Chief Meeks. Sour deal for us who have to pay the taxes.
Notice how this announcement comes 2 days following a murder in Rancho Cordova. Gotta love the timing of politics!
The men and women who wear the THE uniform are the very ones who protect the streets of our community everyday. They do so, without any reservation of the politics of the sheriff’s department and the city. The officer’s cannot do this whithout having the needed tools and resources to do so. And they certainly cannot do it without a GREAT leader. In this situation the city really and truly needs a leader that has the City of Rancho Cordova first. This transistion with Chief Reuben Meeks is a very great step forward for the city and the community as a whole. Reuben Meeks is a person that will do his job well as he has with the leadership he has had as the sitting Chief. Congratulations to the city and the management of the City of Rancho Cordova for once again managing the city with forward thinking and putting the safety and security of the community FIRST.
Whoever thinks that the employees and leadership of the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department do not play a political stake into the going-ons of Rancho Cordova government must not look at the money trails that have fed the leadership of our city– even before cityhood. In every political election for the city of Rancho Cordova, candidates have sought and received funding from law enforcement political action committees (PACs), and endorsements from various law enforcement leaders, unions, and organizations.
And whoever thinks that law enforcement is not getting paid enough for the dangers they face every day, they ought to go research the dangers of other modern-day American occupations. Being a construction worker or truck driver or garbage collector is a more dangerous occupation for death on the job than law enforcement.
This transfer of Chief Meek’s position to the payroll of Rancho Cordova is nothing more than a sweetheart deal and another under-the-table way how government continues to return favors. Will the people of Rancho Cordova be any safer today than they would have been had Reuben Meeks been still getting his paychecks cut from the Sheriff’s Department?
No.
And worse, now we have a lone and isolated police department “director” having no direct line authority to the people he is supposed to lead.
With the new arrangement, if there is a personnel or internal affairs problem with a deputy or other Sacramento County Sheriff Department employee working under contract for the city of Rancho, the only recourse Meeks has is to register a complaint with the Sheriff’s Department, or go about requesting that the city of Rancho transfer the problem employee back to work somewhere else in the county.
This new leadership arrangement gives corrupt and less-than-acceptable Sacramento County Sheriff Department officers and employees another escape door to get out without real consequences–and leaves our community with an even less-accountable law enforcement arrangement.
While it has always been that the city of Rancho Cordova has been directed by Sacramento Sheriff John McGinniss (with Meeks just the puppet), now we will have a puppet without even strings.
Its a politically and strategically whacko arrangement. The Rancho Cordova community will one day learn why history teaches that you don’t put a general (Meeks in this case) from one country (our city) to lead the troops of another (the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department).