10:06am | Reports are indicating that the San Jose Police Department in the Bay Area in Northern California will promote acting Chief Chris Moore to full-time head of the department, over former Long Beach Police Chief Tony Batts. The race had come down to Moore and Batts as the final two candidates.
The city has not made a formal announcement but is expected to do so after the San Jose City Council approves the selection on Tuesday.
Batts served 27 years in the Long Beach Police Department, including seven as Chief, until he left in summer 2009 to become the Chief of the Oakland Police Department. His candidacy for the San Jose job caused a stir in Oakland, where Batts was well-liked and barely halfway through a three-year contract.
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January 17 7:30am | Former Long Beach Police Chief Anthony Batts, now the top cop in Oakland has his eyes on San Jose less than a year and a half after leaving Long Beach for Oakland, the Mercury News reports.
According to the Mercury News:
Batts is one of two finalists for the top cop job in San Jose, sources confirmed Sunday, setting up a stark and momentous choice between a popular, charismatic law enforcement star and a longtime San Jose police veteran. The other candidate, according to multiple sources, is San Jose acting Police Chief Chris Moore, who has been running the department in the two months since Chief Rob Davis stepped down.Neither finalist — nor the city manager, who will select San Jose’s next chief — would comment Sunday, but Batts called Dom Arotzarena, president of the Oakland Police Officers Association, to confirm the news, Arotzarena said. Batts, 50, was chief for seven years in Long Beach before coming to Oakland in late 2009 and is just over a year into his three-year contract with Oakland. Moore, 49, was tapped as acting chief after command stints throughout the SJPD.
Click here to read the story in the Mercury News.
According to this Long Beach Post story in August 2009, Long Beach Police Chief Anthony Batts left the the Long Beach Police Department – after 27 years as an officer and seven as Chief – to head the Oakland Police Department. The position in Oakland had been vacant for more than five months, and the announcement in August 2009 came less than 24 hours after Batts was questioned for about an hour by the Long Beach City Council on possible staffing cuts to the department and what effect they might have on public safety.