The Philomath Police Department’s leadership went through a significant change this week with Dave Gurski taking over for the retiring Ken Rueben in the law enforcement agency’s lead position.
Gurski, 46, officially became the police chief at 8:39 a.m. Wednesday after Rueben led him through a swearing-in ceremony at City Hall.
Asked about moving forward without the strong and charismatic personality of Rueben in the office, Gurski said, “It’s going to be a little strange. There’s going to be a kind of hole in the briefing on Monday morning, that’s for sure.”
The transition appears to be a smooth one, however. In comments moments before leading the swearing-in ceremony, Rueben emphasized his need to have a plan in place for a successor.
“It was incredibly important to me that when I left, I felt that it was in a good place and the person that would take over for me would have … similar philosophies about policing and about what it means to police a small town,” Rueben said.
Gurski appears to be a natural fit.
“I’m thankful that we have a quality, high moral character police department,” Rueben said. “So picking Dave was not a difficult decision for me. (City Manager) Chris (Workman) and I talked about this for years on how this would work and I’m just incredibly happy and proud that Dave will be here to take this over and oversee a department that I care deeply about.”
Gurski said Rueben’s mentorship “has been huge” in his development in law enforcement.
“It’s been something that’s been incredibly helpful,” he said. “He’s got a lot of experience in law enforcement and then also has formed valuable partnerships with the Corvallis Police Department and numerous other agencies throughout the valley.”
Gurski said he never had his sights set on becoming Philomath next’s police chief until Rueben started talking about retirement. In short, the opportunity presented itself.
“I always thought once I had been here for a couple of years, I thought it would be fun to work my way through the department from the bottom up,” Gurski said.
Gurski initially got into law enforcement through Benton County’s reserve program and that led to a seasonal job with its marine patrol.
“I learned a lot there and formed a lot of really good friendships and relationships,” he said. “And then Philomath was hiring in 2004 and I applied for that position as well as one with the Albany Police Department in what was a joint hiring process.”
Ken Elwer, Philomath’s police chief at the time, offered a job to Gurski. Two years after he was hired, Gurski was involved with the department’s new K-9 program. In 2015 when Elwer retired and Rueben took over as chief, Gurski was promoted to sergeant. He then moved up to lieutenant in 2020.
“At that point, I definitely started thinking about the chief’s position and how I would love to finish out my career here,” Gurski said.
Technology and staffing are among the top priorities, he said.
“I think our big focus moving forward is going to be keeping up with technology with body cams, drones and those sorts of things,” Gurski said. “And then additionally, just hiring and retention. We’ve struggled over the last couple of years, as everybody has in law enforcement, trying to get fully staffed and retrain the people that you’ve got.”
Gurski and his wife, Jessica, fell in love with Philomath after moving to town in 1998. Their children have all gone through the local school system with a son to graduate this year and their youngest daughter to graduate next year. Their oldest daughter stayed in the area and earned a degree last year at Oregon State.
In another staff move this week, Brandon Thurman and Blake Bowers were both promoted to sergeant during a swearing-in ceremony led by Rueben on Tuesday afternoon.
“We kind of split the duties of lieutenant and created two sergeants positions so we’d have supervision or coverage on day shift and on graveyard where we were lacking,” Gurski said.
The department, which numbers 10 employees, has no vacancies but also isn’t at full strength.
“When we get fully staffed, we should have two on every shift,” Gurski said. “Currently, we’ve got two in the academy and we’ve got one in field training still so we’ve got three that are still kind of in recruit status or recruit level.”
Thurman earns the promotion while in his second stint with Philomath, rejoining the department in 2020. Bowers was hired at Philomath PD in late 2019
“Brandon is just an absolutely solid individual, really gives a lot to the town, volunteers for all of our events that we do in the community,” Rueben said. “Blake’s just an amazing individual, fantastic officer, leader in our office, a real genuine person and somebody that really believes in this job — both of them. It’s hard to find people that care any more than these two guys.”