With just a month before Saratoga’s public safety contract with Santa Clara County expires, the city is looking to its neighboring town for a lifeline.
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For decades, Saratoga has contracted its police services to the county sheriff’s office. However, the county is raising the price for its services from around $9 million to almost $12 million in the upcoming fiscal year. On April 13, the county offered an amended proposal, lowering contract costs to around $11.6 million, but Saratoga city staff said that this increase would still put the city in a financial crisis within the next three years. As a result, the city is looking to other law enforcement alternatives; a couple months ago, Saratoga Mayor Chuck Page toured the Los Gatos-Monte Sereno Police Department in search of options. Saratoga held a special meeting on April 27 to discuss law enforcement alternatives.
On May 19, Los Gatos town manager Chris Constantin and Los Gatos-Monte Sereno Police Chief Jamie Field gave an optimistic presentation to the Los Gatos Town Council of an integrated regional municipal policing model that includes Saratoga. Field said a partnership would provide more coordination during emergencies and reduce spending in light of rising public safety expenses through shared fixed costs.
“This model would allow Saratoga to receive a higher-touch, locally accountable level of service while continuing to benefit from the broader support network created by mutual aid, regional initiatives and coordinated operations within the greater Santa Clara County and our regional partners,” wrote Constantin to interim Saratoga City Manager Leslie Arroyo.
Los Gatos police in 1995 entered into a 30-year contract with the city of Monte Sereno to provide law enforcement services. That contract was renewed last year for around $1.5 million, according to a Monte Sereno staff report.
Last year, a community survey revealed that many residents reported high satisfaction with the police department’s services. Fields emphasized that Saratoga and Los Gatos share many similarities and overlapping jurisdictions, such as the school district. If the town and the city go through with the partnership, that would mean that Los Gatos-Monte Sereno police would serve about 66,500 people across 26 square miles.
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Fields said the partnership would expand their integrated regional service delivery model. The police department has a shared patrol deployment with centralized dispatch, investigative services and specialty support. This approach also provides regional access to public safety resources, and Field’s presentation implied the possibility of a establishing a Saratoga substation.
Fields said she doesn’t anticipate any change in service levels to Los Gatos and Monte Sereno if Saratoga was added to her jurisdiction. The police department boasted speedy service with average response times of 4 minutes and 22 seconds for critical calls and 6 minutes and 59 seconds for routine calls. In Saratoga, the county sheriff’s office’s response times were 8 minutes and 26 seconds and 6 minutes and 44 seconds, respectively. Between 2024 and 2026, a significant number of crimes reported were residential burglaries, grand theft and identity theft, forgery or fraud, according to the December 2025 statistical data and public safety report compiled by the county sheriff’s office.
Los Gatos councilmembers did not make a decision regarding the potential partnership at the May 19 meeting, but they unanimously decided to allow staff to continue discussions with the city of Saratoga. Town staff’s preliminary estimate for the contract costs in the first year was $9.5 million beginning in July 1.
Town staff said Los Gatos would likely incur some startup and transition costs before the police department can start providing services, so they would need to identify costs in advance and establish a reimbursement system for Saratoga to repay for those costs. The town is working with Meliora Public Safety Consulting to evaluate departmental resource needs and workload demands associated with serving Saratoga.
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