HOLLISTER
Capt. Bob Brooks on Friday will retire following more than 25 years with the Hollister Police Department.
Brooks moved to Hollister from the Pacifica Police Department and joined the HPD in December 1983. In 1991, he was promoted to sergeant and another eight years later in 1999 he was promoted to captain, of which there are two on the force directly under Police Chief Jeff Miller.
The chief at last week’s council meeting announced Brooks’ retirement and that Sgt. Carlos Reynoso will be promoted to captain.
Brooks said he decided to retire simply because “everybody reaches their time.”
“Everybody keeps asking why I’m leaving – whether I’m tired of it or upset. It’s nothing like that,” Brooks said.
He noted he has told people an analogy.
“If I give you your favorite plate of dessert and an endless amount to eat, at some point you’re going to get tired of eating it,” he said. “I don’t hate it. I’m full.”
Brooks said he will mostly miss the people with whom he has worked.
He said the current group on the HPD has “been through a lot as far as growth stagnation” and that they have “held it together and haven’t had a massive bailout of people.”
Brooks noted how the department’s detective bureau when he came here in 1983 had a detective sergeant and two detectives – and how those are the same numbers in the bureau today.
Through his years, Brooks has worked under three police chiefs – Miller, along with former Chiefs Cam Sanchez and William Pierpoint.
“I feel good about the things I was able to do, the things I was able to accomplish,” Brooks said.
Miller at the recent council meeting noted in particular how Brooks did an exemplary job in coordinating the annual biker rallies.
“There will be a void in the department,” Miller said at the meeting.
Council members at the meeting congratulated Reynoso and lauded Brooks’ service.
“It’s going to be one less police officer who will remember me from my younger days,” Councilman Victor Gomez said. “I’m just kidding – sort of.”
Along with Reynoso’s promotion to captain, Don Magnuson has been promoted to sergeant, Miller said.
