I hope you and your families have been enjoying summer and staying cool amid the record-high temperatures and heat waves. This time of year is traditionally when many of our members take time off to rest, rejuvenate and spend time with their loved ones. Remember, it’s just as important to take care of yourself physically and mentally off the job as it is on the job, so I hope you have been prioritizing time to relax and have fun.

CCSO is very excited to announce that we were able to provide our sergeants and lieutenants with a 6.25% salary increase as a result of the pre- and post-work activity settlement. As many of you are aware, this is the culmination of a long legal battle that we have been fighting since 2005. At that time, officers received a salary increase, but our sergeants and lieutenants did not. CCSO intervened on behalf of our members to secure the same wage increase, as we believe that supervisors should be entitled to the same benefits as the officers. Now, in 2023, this issue is finally coming to a resolution where our sergeants and lieutenants will be compensated for the many years they did not receive the wages they were entitled to, as well as a future 6.25% increase moving forward to rectify this issue.

Additionally, there is a compaction issue between our lieutenants and captains, and we are working aggressively with CalHR to give members in those classifications increased benefits and salaries to make it desirable for them to want to go to the next level in their careers. We anticipate that this issue will be addressed soon, and we’re hoping for a positive resolution that will encourage our members to want to promote and will ensure they are compensated appropriately when they do.

As for the “walk time” case, CCSO will be compensated for the legal fees that we provided for that case over many years, and we anticipate that these fees will be returned to our budget. This case represented another fight for fairness for our members. We walk the same walk, pick up the same equipment and prepare for duty just as the officers do, so we should be compensated just the same for everything we do prior to getting to our posts. The bottom line: We should be treated equally. We’re happy that a decision has been made correcting this issue and that our supervisors will be receiving the compensation they deserve for their activities prior to and following their shift.

In addition to ensuring that our members are treated equally and fairly, CCSO continues to make great strides on the operational level, vastly improving our internal processes and focusing on further strengthening our financial position so that we can concentrate on providing our members with the best service and legal representation possible. This is probably the best we’ve ever been financially as an organization, and it’s because of some of the tough decisions we’ve had to make to improve our operations, our infrastructure and more — all things that’ll end up being cost effective down the road.

Lastly, we are very much looking forward to the CCSO Conference in Monterey on October 19–21. I know it’s been a while since we’ve all been able to gather. I want to thank our members for their patience and understanding, as we weren’t able to hold Conference during our usual time in the spring. But we are happy to be back on track this fall, and I anticipate a productive Conference where we will discuss the future of CCSO and how we’re going to move forward.
I hope to see you all there.