Pleasanton Police Chief Tim Neal has announced that he will retire at the end of the year, wrapping up 30 years of police work at age 52.
A 26-year Pleasanton resident, he and his wife Robin raised their two children, Scott and Kathy, here during most of the years he served with four police departments: Union City, Mountain View, Tracy and Pleasanton. He was named chief of the Pleasanton force in 1999.
He was just 16 and a junior at Cupertino High School when he befriended several Santa Clara city traffic officers at the El Camino Real gas station where he worked part-time.
“I remember Anton Morec, who is now a retired police sergeant, talking about how great his job was, with something new and different happening every day,” Neal said. “I was hooked and decided to make police work a career.”
After receiving a bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice Administration from San Jose State University in 1976, we was hired by the Union City police department, where he was promoted several times and stayed 11 years before joining the Mountain View force, where he became a captain. He was also the department’s pick to serve on Secret Service details that guarded Presidents Gerald Ford, George H. W. Bush and William Clinton during visits they made to the Silicon Valley. Photos of Neal with the presidents adorn his office.
In 1997, after serving with Mountain View for 10 years, the police chief’s job opened up in Tracy. Neal applied and was hired, leaving that position two years later to accept the chief’s position in Pleasanton.
“Chief Neal’s 30-year career has been marked with significant accomplishments,” City Manager Nelson Fialho said. “Neal turned our police department into a model of community-oriented policing, hired good and honest people, and made significant strides in building bridges with the community, especially our youth.”
From the start, Neal made community relations a focus of his work. He began the department’s highly successful Citizen Police Academy and later the Teen Citizen’s Police Academy. These programs have now graduated more than 400 students.
Neal said he and his wife plan to stay in Pleasanton, and that he might work as a substitute teacher at Las Positas College, where he serves on the Criminal Justice Advisory Committee. He is currently president of the Alameda County Police Chief’s Association and will complete that term of office at year’s end. He is also vice president of the board of directors of Hope Hospice and plans to continue that role.
His wife works as a Property and Evidence Technician for the Fremont Police Department.
Fialho will start a search for Neal’s replacement this month, with the Pleasanton department’s two captains, Mike Fraser and Dave Spiller, expected to be among the candidates. Neal said that although he plans to retire Dec. 31, he had agreed to stay longer if needed during an extended recruitment or transition period.
