Campton Hills, meet your first chief

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For Greg Anderson, the clock started ticking the day he was hired.

Forty-six days to build a police department from scratch.

Ready? Go.

It's been a whirlwind of activity since then, Sept. 15, when Anderson became the village of Campton Hills' first police chief -- and, for now, its only police officer.

As of today, the veteran law enforcement official still has 10 days remaining before the Kane County sheriff's department, on Nov. 1, relinquishes coverage of the previously unincorporated, 22-square-mile town.

He's confident he'll be ready, despite skeptics and incorporation opponents who question whether he can pull it off -- on time, on budget.

Anderson sat down with the Daily Herald recently to talk about his vision for the village's first department and how it will work. He also addressed what missteps he believes he's already taken. Some responses were edited for length and clarity.

Q. How are you preparing for Nov. 1?

A. A whole lot has happened. I'm working with the fire and police commission who will decide who is hired. By far the most important thing we can do as a police department is hire quality people. The fancy gadgets or anything along those lines … none of that matters. It's the feet on the ground that are going to make the difference, so it's important that we get that right.

Another thing that takes up a lot of time is getting the equipment we need -- organizing it, getting it set up, finding the vendors, getting the best prices we can. It's not just getting the first one, it's being fiscally responsible and looking for the best deals.

Another huge undertaking has been getting all the state certifications out of the way. We have to go through Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board, the Illinois State Police in order for our laptops to work and have the proper licensing and the purchases and licensing of radios. Coordinating with other police agencies has been another undertaking I've been spending a lot of time with.

There's been a lot of police departments that have just been fantastic to us, opening their doors. Anything we need, they're willing to help us: policies procedures, offers to take prisoners for us temporarily. The police departments that we've formed relationships with have really been good to us in a lot of different ways.

Q. What still needs to be done?

A. We still have to make all the job offers to the officers. They have to pass a physical and a drug screen. We anticipate the officers will start Oct. 29, and for 2½ or 3 days, we'll be doing range training, making sure all the officers are qualified, making sure they understand how to use the reporting systems we have here, making sure they know the Campton Hills Police Department policies and procedures. One of the advantages we're going to have is all the officers we have so far are extremely experienced, so it's not like they haven't done policing before.

Most of these guys are going to be able to come on the job and they'll be able to work on the fly and work their way through it.

Q. What will the department look like?

A. The main base of operations is going to be the squad cars. The officers are not going to be in the office unless they have specific reasons. We are going to have 24-hour coverage. There will always be an officer patrolling, dedicated to Campton Hills, answering calls for Campton Hills -- all starting Nov. 1.

We're looking to hire approximately 10, but I hate to say an exact number for the reason we only want to hire quality officers. It's easy for us just to go out and grab officers that may have experience somewhere else, but those are not necessarily the people we want.

We want specific officers who are going to be a benefit to the village. We want officers who bring a wealth of experience and some specific attributions: evidence, investigations, narcotics, community policing. There are probably going to be three full-timers, one on each shift. The part-timers will supplement on the afternoon and midnight shifts. I'll be here to answer calls on days and will be out there responding myself.

Q. How do you respond to those who say this can't be done with the amount of money the village has budgeted?

A. The village has said they're going to do this without a referendum or a tax increase, and they've projected out everything along those lines. In government in general, the formula is about 80 to 85 percent of your budget will go for personnel and or benefits. That's going to be different for us. We may actually be spending more money on equipment and other types of things because we are starting out new. We've been asked to provide quality police service to the village, and the main portion of that is getting the officers out on the street and getting them in the squad cars and out there responding to calls.

A lot of costs associated with many police departments are telecommunication centers, dispatching, jail services, permitting, zoning enforcement, animal control -- a variety of those things.

That can eat up budgets for a lot of police departments, but we're not going to do that. We're going to focus on police service itself. I would be the first one to say it, if we can't do it for the money. From the beginning, we've said the residents may determine at some point -- five, 10, 15 years down the road -- they want something additional, that they would like us to be a self-contained department, or maybe the residents determine when they pick up the phone and call 911 at 2 a.m. they want someone here at the department to answer the phone.

I believe strongly in the community involvement in the police department and for them to tell us and give us some direction as to where they want us to go.

Q. What will happen when someone calls 911 at 2 a.m.?

A. When you pick up the phone to dial 911, the call will go to the county (sheriff's office), just like it does for Elburn, Hampshire, Pingree Grove, Gilberts. They'll dispatch us over the radio, we'll respond to the address. If someone is taken into custody, they'll be brought here first. If they can't post bond or bail, then they'll be taken to the county jail.

Our holding capabilities would just be strictly a temporary hour or two at the most where an officer would transfer right to the jail on probably a quicker basis than some other towns.

Q. How will coverage be different than it is now, under the sheriff's office?

A. The sheriff's office, and I've said this on numerous occasions, has an awesome responsibility. They have to cover the entire unincorporated Kane County area, some 400 or 500 square miles. They normally put six or seven officers out on the street. But they're going to respond to calls where they're needed. There may be emergency calls in Campton Hills, in Big Rock, off Big Timber Road. The difference when we start is the Campton Hills police officer for the most part will be specifically assigned to do nothing but Campton Hills. So basically you're not sharing a police officer with anybody else. They're going to respond to calls in Campton Hills almost exclusively.

The caveat to that is I'm a big proponent in sharing resources. There are going to be times when police departments are going to come help us and times when we go to help other departments.

I envision what I like to call more personal policing. The residents will get to see the same police officers over and over and over again. It will be the same officers driving through your neighborhood.

If you have to call because your mailbox gets damaged, the officer taking your report today is going to be the same one driving through your neighborhood the next day. I see it as a police department the village will be able to take ownership of.

Q. You were criticized for not responding to the (Sept. 23) double-fatality domestic shooting. Exactly what happened?

A. I should have realized that for some people in Campton Hills, it was probably important for the chief of police to show up even if I didn't provide any police services. The appearance of me being there may have been somewhat of a calming effect.

I guess I want to say that's probably the one mistake I made. Professionally, it made no difference in the investigation at all.

The sheriff's office handled that; they're very capable and they conduct thorough investigations.

I was a detective for 12 years, and the reason I didn't want to go to the scene was it was more important for them in the early stages of the investigation to conduct the investigation and not have to come out and talk to me and, you know, fill me in when I'm not part of the investigation.

The sheriff's office had that responsibility and that authority. I was actually thinking from the professional side of an investigator, not the emotional side of the village. It was about four hours after the shooting before I found out the incident had occurred. But that's probably as much my fault as it is the sheriff's fault.

Since that happened, we've made the connection where I know how to get a hold of them, they know how to get a hold of me. But again, they still have full law enforcement services here, and it's their discretion when they want to call me and when they don't. Their priority was not to think, "Oh, this happened in Campton Hills and it's the very first week the chief is there, we better call him."

Q. What's crime like in Campton Hills and do you anticipate changes?

A. There are about 3,000 calls for service a year on average. They take about 700 or 800 reports a year from a variety of things, from aggravated battery, domestic, car burglaries criminal damage -- just a variety of things like that. I anticipate and I hope the public, once they know we're out there, they're going to feel more comfortable about calling in a lot of the smaller issues: suspicious cars and those types of things. And maybe we can prevent some crime.

Obviously, we may stumble on more crime. You know, not all crime is reported. Some people get their garages broken into and they don't report it, or they get a couple bucks taken out of their car. But with us being here, I'm expecting more calls from the public because they're going to want us to know what's going on. Crime may not go up, but reported crime may go up.

Q. You've done just about everything in law enforcement, but you've never built a police department. How has the experience helped?

A. Probably my biggest past experience is community policing in Aurora. Community policing is not just talking nice to the public and it's not crime prevention and it's not neighborhood watch. That's all part of it, but what community policing really is, is how to build and forge relationships.

One of the best relationships I've formed so far is with the Campton Township Highway Department.

They've been fantastic to me; I think I've been fantastic to them. One of the things they've done is put a fuel tank out at their facility strictly for the police department. They're working on storage of our police cars when they're not in use.

To reciprocate, I've allowed them to take a squad car out a couple days when they're in dangerous areas so they can turn the lights on and slow traffic down. Those are the kinds of relationships you have to form in a small village like this to make this work. The police department is not self contained; we can't do it all ourselves.

Q. How does it feel coming into this situation being under such close scrutiny?

A. The police department will always be the lightning rod for the village, just like it is with every other town. In Aurora, it was no different. People complain we have too many officers, that we don't have enough officers. That we respond to this, but we don't respond to that.

We are the front lines of the village, so when somebody calls we'll be the first ones to respond. There will always be pros and cons. Some people will be happy with our services, some people won't be. Some will want more, some will want less. I look at it as a professional debate. The election has been held and I'm here to do the job the village board has hired me to do. It's my job to provide good police services.

By the numbers

Village officials have budgeted $462,265 for the first year of police services in Campton Hills. Here's how the bulk of the money is being allocated:

$144,864 -- Salaries for the chief, and approximately three full-time officers and five or six part-time officers

$87,977 -- Capital projects

$80,438 -- Contractual services, such as dispatch communications and professional development

$77,044 -- Contingencies

$25,322 -- Employee insurance, benefits

$21,769 -- Pensions

$16,901 -- Supplies

$7,950 -- Other benefits

$462,265

Source: Village of Campton Hills 2007-08 appropriation ordinance

Anderson file

Age: 50

Family: Wife of 24 years; two daughters, ages 20 and 17

Hobbies: Golf, landscaping

Graduated: Batavia High School, 1980

Experience: 27 years with the Aurora Police Department, including time as deputy chief, patrol commander and investigator.