Police Task Force

In September of 2020, Los Altos City Council created a special Police Task Force to look at two things:

1. Evaluate SROs at Los Altos High School

2. Suggest improvements to the Police Complaint Intake process.

On November 24, 2020, the Police Task Force presented their suggestions to City Council. You can take a look at the two presentations here.
Evaluation of SRO's
Police Complaint Process

The following recommendations were made, which were then approved by vote of the City Council:
1. Eliminate the SRO program at Los Altos High School
2. Hire a 3rd Party Independent Intake Official so that people don't have to file a complaint about police with the police.

Independent Intake Official

Since the City Council vote, LARE has been following up with Chief Galea and the Los Altos Police Department (LAPD or PD) to make sure that the process for filing complaints with the Independent Intake Official is kept simple and accessible. We wanted to ensure that the public is aware of the options they have in filing a police complaint, namely that they can file a police complaint with the Independent Intake Official or through the Police Department, and both complaints will be investigated with the exact same process.

Filing a Police Complaint

If you need to file a complaint against the Los Altos Police Department for any reason, you have multiple ways of doing so. We've provided you all the information here. This information is also available on the LAPD website here

File a complaint with the Independent Intake Official (IIO), Stephanie Atigh. You can choose to have your contact information sent to the PD along with the complaint, you can also choose to provide your contact info to the IIO but withold it from the PD, or you can choose to file an anonymous complaint (although that may hinder investigation into the complaint).
1. Online
2. Email a completed pdf form (English, Español, Chinese)
3. By Phone at (831) 915-4643
File a complaint directly with the Police Department
1. Online
2. Email a completed pdf form (English, Español, Chinese)
3. By Phone at (650) 947-2770
4. In person at the LAPD, 1 N San Antonio Rd., Los Altos, CA 94022

There are a couple of flowcharts outlining the process of filing, investigating and reporting on the complaints. Flowchart for formal complaints is here. Flowchart for informal complaints is here.

There is also a useful FAQ here if you have more questions, or you can always reach out to the PD or the IIO if you want clarifications on the process.