Contra Costa County Sheriff questions

[not-a-deputy-yet]

Hello everyone,
I have some questions about this department. Anyone with any info on it? Would you reccomend working for it? I am interested in applying, I am not a latteral, will be a new recruit. Currently they are contributing 14% towards retirement, meaning the employees are, that's kind of too much, but they pay around $5,400 to new deputy. What is Contra Costa County like? Crime rate and so on.

[LeeRoy]

With respect to crime you name it and the county patrols it. From Blackhawk an exlcusive country club in the south end of the county to North Richmond which rivals the ghettos of Watts to Bethel Island which is a little bit of Appalachia on the banks of the Delta. They have three jails, courts, and quite a few special assignments. Like many SO's there's always a bit of turnover due to the jail committment and the rising retirement contribution over the past 10 years has created more personnel loss than comparable agencies. I would say morale overall is comparable to most big agencies.

You'll have to go to the FBI website and pull up the uniform crime report and compare CCC to other counties if you want to look at actual crime rate statistics. West CCC (Richmond/San Pablo/North Richmond) has a lot of homicides. Central and East CCC have fewer violent crimes but are certainly not quiet places to work.

I'm a former CCC reserve and worked for a local agency in CCC for 14 years for bailing to the greater Sac area. Lots of good people at CCC but due to past financial decisions of the board of supervisors CCCSO will always have money problems for a long time to come. If they are only paying 14% that's better than before. When I applied for the CCC DA's office a couple of years ago they were paying 19%.

The agency has four contract cities now and depending on how well San Ramon PD does on it's own you may see some of the other contract cities look at leaving in years to come (reducing the amount of patrol positions). Time will tell.

Would I recommend working for it? That's an awfully subjective question. From my perspective it depends. CCCSO offers things you won't find at any other CCC agency. Those options come with a price. What are you looking for?

[not-a-deputy-yet]

With respect to crime you name it and the county patrols it. From Blackhawk an exlcusive country club in the south end of the county to North Richmond which rivals the ghettos of Watts to Bethel Island which is a little bit of Appalachia on the banks of the Delta. They have three jails, courts, and quite a few special assignments. Like many SO's there's always a bit of turnover due to the jail committment and the rising retirement contribution over the past 10 years has created more personnel loss than comparable agencies. I would say morale overall is comparable to most big agencies.

You'll have to go to the FBI website and pull up the uniform crime report and compare CCC to other counties if you want to look at actual crime rate statistics. West CCC (Richmond/San Pablo/North Richmond) has a lot of homicides. Central and East CCC have fewer violent crimes but are certainly not quiet places to work.

I'm a former CCC reserve and worked for a local agency in CCC for 14 years for bailing to the greater Sac area. Lots of good people at CCC but due to past financial decisions of the board of supervisors CCCSO will always have money problems for a long time to come. If they are only paying 14% that's better than before. When I applied for the CCC DA's office a couple of years ago they were paying 19%.

The agency has four contract cities now and depending on how well San Ramon PD does on it's own you may see some of the other contract cities look at leaving in years to come (reducing the amount of patrol positions). Time will tell.

Would I recommend working for it? That's an awfully subjective question. From my perspective it depends. CCCSO offers things you won't find at any other CCC agency. Those options come with a price. What are you looking for?

I am looking for to get into LE period. This is my second agency that I've applied for. The first agency was not something I really wanted to do bec
ause it would have been far from Sacramento area, however I still went through the process but failed the Oral Interview, not really failed just didn't get enough "points" 5 points away from passing and continuing with the process. I am also looking for an agency that will pay enough for me to be able to afford to support my family of 2 kids and wife. Wife currently works and makes $20k a year and I make 37k a year, that seems to be enough to live and have some fun. I want my wife to stay home with both kids atleast until they are old enough and go to school, so making 57k a year just myself would be good. I know CCC Sheriff pays more than that but also the retirement deduction is significant. I am not too affraid of crime, well afcourse being in LE you have to deal with crime all the time, but on the other hand I would never go work for LAPD BECAUSE of the crime rate and gang activity, you see my point? I also like the fact that CCCSO has so many different assignments, such as Marin Patrol (would love to do for a while) and Investigator assignments, K9, and so on. Any other advise from anyone would be greatly appriciated.

[sgttom]

Like any agency, there are the ups and downs. Some agencies have more "ups," others have more "downs."

You realize that you're going to spend at least 2 to 3 years in the jail before you see patrol. There are a lot of other positions / specialities and you have to "test" or wait on a list for those separately.

If you're concerned of LA crime, West County patrol - i.e. No. Richmond... your eyes are gonna open up. Just saying and not implying anything on / toward you. If you're looking to get in. It is a start.

I know of people who bailed and who remained and retired out of CCCSO. There are always two sides to the story. Bottom line, it's what you do with your time at CCCSO (or any other agency).

Good luck

[not-a-deputy-yet]

Like any agency, there are the ups and downs. Some agencies have more "ups," others have more "downs."

You realize that you're going to spend at least 2 to 3 years in the jail before you see patrol. There are a lot of other positions / specialities and you have to "test" or wait on a list for those separately.

If you're concerned of LA crime, West County patrol - i.e. No. Richmond... your eyes are gonna open up. Just saying and not implying anything on / toward you. If you're looking to get in. It is a start.

I know of people who bailed and who remained and retired out of CCCSO. There are always two sides to the story. Bottom line, it's what you do with your time at CCCSO (or any other agency).

Good luck


Thanks for all the advice and info. If anyone else has anything else to say or add, please do so. So N. Richmond is bad I take it? As far as crime and all....I just don't hear too much about N. Richmond, well atleast not as much as LA. As far as this quote made by previous post "You realize that you're going to spend at least 2 to 3 years in the jail before you see patrol." I hope its not true, I appreciate the info but when I talked to a recruiter from CCCSO, he said some people spent only 11 months before going on patrol. Their website says first 18 months is mandatory jail work. The jail time does not bother me that much anyways, I mean as long as its not 2-3 years, 18 months tops I hope.

[sgttom]

north richmond is what it is... called over there a lot for code 3 cover back in the day.... OR responding there for CCCSO 'cuz their units were not in the area..

the CCCSO jail thing is.. yes, you may get out early BUT you will be called back in to "finish" the remainder of your jail time, sometime in your future there...

no biggie.. bottomline, know or have an idea of what you're getting into and make it what you want during your time there...

[LeeRoy]

"You realize that you're going to spend at least 2 to 3 years in the jail before you see patrol." I hope its not true, I appreciate the info but when I talked to a recruiter from CCCSO, he said some people spent only 11 months before going on patrol. Their website says first 18 months is mandatory jail work. The jail time does not bother me that much anyways, I mean as long as its not 2-3 years, 18 months tops I hope.

Don't go work there unless you can do three years up front in the jail. Most likely you will not have to do that much but you may depending on staffing levels. On July 1 the San Ramon PD contract will ending 30+ deputy positions in the patrol division. If other contracts end in coming years you could find yourself in the jail for a longer time than expected.

You say you wouldn't go work for LAPD because of the crime and gangs? You could find yourself newly assigned to patrol division in a few years assigned to the West county substation. I suspect your perspective will have changed by then after locked in a jail module with one other deputy and a 100 inmates. I suspect you'd jump at the chance to work "northtown". Be careful about ruling out jobs based on your current perceptions.

Make sure you test with Sacramento Sheriff's Department. Having now worked with both CCC and Sac they are comparable agencies. Also SSD still has some potential to grow while it is unlikely CCCSO will grow in ranks significantly. The Arden Arcade area of unincorporated northeast is looking to incorporate. If they do they will not be in a position to start their own PD and will end up contracting with SSD creating more patrol positions. Rancho Cordova may leave but there's talk of Orangevale/Fair Oaks also incorporating which would again result in more patrol positions.

Good luck in your decision. My wife has stayed home with our kids for over 10 years and we wouldn't have it any other way. Shift work is tough on the family. Very tough if both of you work.