Police Services Specialist

Chief John Carli, now serving as mayor for the City of Vacaville, has 32 years of experience in law enforcement and is recognized as a progressive and innovative leader who promotes best practices in officer safety and wellness. Even after retiring in March 2021, Chief Carli has been an outspoken advocate and thought leader for the profession, with his most relevant work focusing on national best practices in policing, community engagement, and officer safety and wellness. He was instrumental in implementing body-worn cameras to all officers in his agency as early as 2009. In the summer of 2016, Chief Carli was summoned to the White House to meet with President Obama in the wake of national high-profile officer-involved fatal encounters. Since then, he has dedicated his time and efforts to improve the profession and implement meaningful change. His preventive approach to promoting this culture of wellness led to the development of a unique law enforcement wellness app that was recently highlighted at the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) national town hall meeting focusing on police officer suicides. More recently in 2020, the Vacaville Police Department, under his leadership, received the National Law Enforcement Memorial Fund Destination Zero Award within the category of General Officer Safety.

Chief Carli is a nationally recognized authority regarding use-of-force and de-escalation in policing, particularly addressing public trust and police legitimacy. He is an Executive Fellow with the National Policing Institute, focusing on the continuous improvement within the policing profession throughout his career. He holds a master of science degree in Strategic Leadership and is a graduate of PERF’s Senior Management Institute for Police.

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“I really want to express my appreciation for this work that’s been done in a collaborative way in which the study was put together. . . . I’ve seen a number of studies start in the fire department and this is the first one I can remember that has actually been fully completed and brought to the council, and it was done in a very thorough fashion. This is the best assemblage of comprehensive information about the fire department today, as well as what our needs might be in the future, that I have seen. So thanks to everyone. Thank you, Stewart, for giving us our money’s worth on our consultant contract with you.”

Ken Hampian

City Manager City of San Luis Obispo

“I am really, really impressed. I am impressed at the exhaustiveness of your study, impressed at the honesty and candor with which you expressed your findings; I am very impressed at the constructive tone of it, and that you came in under budget as well. So, thank you very much. I think that this document is going to be a cornerstone for us really moving forward for the next five, ten, twenty [years], half a century.”

Luke Garrott

Salt Lake City Council Meeting

“I wanted to offer my compliments to Citygate, to Mr. Gary for this very comprehensive report.”

John Ashbaugh

San Luis Obispo Council Member

“I really, really enjoyed reading your Word product. I appreciate the fact that it was direct, it was constructive, and . . . it wasn’t finger-pointing, it was just . . . the facts. And I think that the money was well spent.”

J.T. Martin

Salt Lake City Council Meeting

“Thank you very much for a comprehensive report. Thank you.”

Mayor

Palm Springs

“I was absolutely thrilled with the report because it was very comprehensive, very detailed. I call it the ‘time-in-motion study’ almost and some of the aspects [are] ‘how does your paper flow? How can you make your processes better? . . . As a government agency, how can we provide better service to the constituents?’ And to us we think that this study identifies those things down to all of the small paper processes and flows.”

Rita Geldert

Retired City Manager City of Vista, CA

“Thank you so much for this training. This was the best PIO training I’ve ever received.”

Lorrie Brewer

S-403 Information Officer class participant

“Thank you so much for all you have done. And it’s so comprehensive, I know it’s going to take a while for us to digest it all, but I think you’ve come up with some really good recommendations.”

Mayor

Pro Tempore City of Vista, CA

“I think Citygate has done a great job. It seems like you’ve been most thorough and even-handed in your evaluations and you’ve given us certainly a lot of suggestions and guidelines to work with.”

Council Member

City of Vista, CA

“I think this is one of the most comprehensive reports and I think probably one of the best presented reports I’ve seen in my years in government service. I want to start off by commending you for that and acknowledge that the work that you were able to do with cooperation from all of the different firefighting agencies in this region was second-to-none.”

Greg Cox

Supervisor First District San Diego County

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