Sunset West

Jeffco Sheriff's Department

Sheriff's Column

New Neighbor in Southeast Jeffco
By Sheriff Ted Mink

Did you know that 56 percent of Sheriff’s Office Patrol calls originate in the southeast area of unincorporated Jefferson County? The southeast part of our jurisdiction is the most heavily populated and the fastest growing. It is also one of the farthest from our Golden headquarters.
With that information and a Community-Oriented Policing philosophy in mind, the Sheriff’s Office is moving forward with plans to open a south precinct, decentralizing the department’s operations.
Of course, deputies already patrol the south, north and mountain areas of the county, 24 hours a day. So what difference will a building make?
I believe that a permanent law enforcement presence in southeast Jeffco will benefit the community in several ways. The office, staffed initially during normal business hours, will enable deputies to work more closely with residents, neighborhoods, businesses and homeowner groups. Sharing crime prevention information and providing more personalized services will allow deputies to be invested in what goes on in local neighborhoods, while helping communities take ownership of problems and their resolutions.
In addition to the crime prevention aspect, you will see improvements in emergency response as well. Having a closer “home base” for deputies will result in quicker response times to service calls. Stronger partnerships with the community will give our deputies and investigators more tools to identify crime patterns and to solve crimes when they happen. And, in an emergency, people in southeast Jeffco will have a safe place to go for help.
The south precinct, scheduled to open by the end of January, will be located at 9116 W. Bowles Ave., in the Sun Plaza/Ascot Center complex. The location was chosen because it is central to the populated areas and is near popular businesses on a major artery. Eventually, we hope to build a larger facility in southeast Jeffco, where we can provide more citizen services such as fingerprinting, criminal records, sex offender listings and a place to pay traffic tickets. Ideally, hours of operation at that yet-undetermined location will expand as more staff is allocated there.
Another phase of the decentralization plan includes streamlining operations at our substation in Evergreen (4990 Highway 73). We will begin briefing certain shifts there, enabling mountain-area deputies to reach their districts more quickly. The substation continues to provide basic services such as fingerprinting, animal licensing, and copies of reports. Our north Jeffco residents will continue to find full services at our headquarters location in the county government complex in east Golden.
As we make adjustments to our daily operations to accommodate decentralization, our biggest challenge will be maintaining good communication between staff at the various locations. We will adopt a problem-solving method based on the New York Police Department’s model. At periodic “SMART Jeffco” meetings (Strategic Management and Accurate Response Tactics), sheriff’s personnel will convene to identify specific problem areas and outline plans to combat problems. Supervisors will be held accountable for executing agreed-upon strategies.
I think you will find decentralization a benefit to you no matter where you live. Crime prevention and law enforcement are most effective at the local level, and we hope that by being closer to the community, we can be more effective, and improve upon the quality of life we have come to enjoy.