When Ken Rueben put on the uniform for his final day as Philomath’s chief of police on April 3, he admits that it was a difficult morning.
“This sounds bad but it’s not really the job, it’s the people,” Rueben said during a recent sit-down interview in the police station’s conference room. “I know that’s a corny answer but the camaraderie in this job … Coming to work every day — these people are really neat people who work here. And that’s everywhere I’ve worked, but here especially. We’ve hired some amazing people over the years.”
Gallery: Ken Rueben’s retirement (April 3, 2024)
A collection of photos from a retirement event honoring Police Chief Ken Rueben at Philomath Museum on April 3.
Retiring a week before his 60th birthday, Rueben swore in Dave Gurski as the new chief on the morning of April 3. In an interview just two days later, his words already revealed that he was missing his time within the department.
“You come in in the morning and have a cup of coffee and find out what happened the last 24 hours and what’s going to happen that day and talk in depth about what we’re doing and watch a video of some call that happened the night before or whatever — it’s a fun thing,” Rueben said. “I mean, it’s fun, it’s interesting and they’re really neat people and you get addicted to that — coming to work every day. A lot of people don’t have that luxury of coming to work every day and being happy about it.”
Make no mistake, working in law enforcement provides both mental and physical challenges and those aspects factored into his decision to retire at age 60.
“Even though it’s a tough job … if you have good people around you that really enjoy it and get along and you have that team environment, it makes it fun to come to work every day,” he said. “So yeah, it was really hard.”
Rueben worked in law enforcement for 40 years. Growing up in West Covina, California, and a graduate of Walnut High School, he was introduced to it as a possible career while working at a Mobil gas station. Deputies would often stop by the station and encourage him to look into law enforcement.
At the time, he was attending Cal Poly Pomona and had aspirations of becoming an architectural engineer.
“I went on a ride-along … it was like going to the fair,” Rueben said. “Immediately when you go on the ride, you think, ‘I’ve got to do this again’ — it was really neat … I just got hooked.”
Rueben successfully tested with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office as a 20-year-old in 1984, got hired and headed to the law enforcement academy. The LACSO required new hires to work eight months to a year in the jail system. Rueben was assigned to the biggest — Central Jail in L.A.’s downtown vicinity.
“Out of all the things in my career, that was probably the biggest eye opener,” Rueben said. “At that time, Men’s Central Jail had 10,000 inmates in one building, if you can get your head wrapped around that. It’s a city twice the size of Philomath.”
A significant part of the job involved feeding prisoners three times a day but he also learned various aspects of the profession needed in the day-to-day routine.
“It’s a very good learning environment of just human nature and being able to deal with security issues and use of force and officer safety issues and interviewing people because crimes are happening,” Rueben said. “Fights, those are crimes, and so you would have to separate those guys, interview them and write a police report. Those things were all great learning tools for when you go out and work patrol.”
Rueben worked with the L.A. County Sheriff’s Office for just under 10 years before relocating to Oregon for a position with the Corvallis Police Department. He started the job in early 1994 and spent seven years there.
“My parents and my in-laws had wanted to retire in Oregon and with my wife, we started looking to see if there were places to work up here,” Rueben said. “Eugene PD, Salem PD and Corvallis PD were all hiring and the hiring processes were going on at once. So I came up, took all three tests and got job offers from all three.”
Rueben said he fell in love with Corvallis after going on a ride-along with an officer.
A detective with Corvallis PD, Rueben eventually had his eye on a possible position with the Oregon Department of Justice. High-end murder cases, organized crime and big drug cases appealed to him as the type of work that he wanted to pursue.
Rueben applied but while he was waiting for an opening, he took a job as the security director at Evergreen Aviation in McMinnville. The position also included responsibilities of liaison with the Department of Defense.
“That was interesting, traveled all over the world but it was a lot of time away from home and that was not good,” Rueben said. “Then Sept. 11 happened.”
The attacks in 2001 forced DOJ operations across the country to shift resources to fight terrorism. Rueben got the call and went to work with the agency as a criminal investigator, a position that’s now referred to as special agent.
“I got promoted within like six months to assistant special agent in charge of the criminal intelligence unit,” Rueben said. “That part of it had to do with running the state terrorism center. So it was just timing … with the world events going on and the expansion of DOJ and a change of focus of what was going on there.”
Rueben worked on several high-profile cases during his time with the agency while earning a promotion up to chief investigator. He crossed paths with several law enforcement agencies in the region while working with task forces organized under a grant program to fight drug organizations and organized crime.
After 11 years with DOJ, Rueben learned from a colleague that Philomath’s police chief, Ken Elwer, was planning to retire. Although the DOJ job forced him to work in Salem, he had maintained his residency in Corvallis.
To make a long story short, Rueben applied for the job and was hired in March 2014 as the eventual replacement for Elwer. After a transition year, Rueben took over as chief in August 2015.
Through his years with Philomath, Rueben has enjoyed the challenges of small-town policing. A few significant cases came through the department during his nine years but Philomath’s reputation as a safe community was established.
Staff development has always been important to him, including moving Gurski up to lieutenant and then as his successor upon retirement. The day before his retirement, Rueben also swore in two officers as sergeants — Brandon Thurman and Blake Bowers.
In law enforcement, the retirement age is 55 and Rueben technically went that route five years ago. But he continued to work for the city on contract at his regular rate. The move benefited the city because it no longer had to pay into the state’s retirement system and it benefited Rueben because he could collect a regular paycheck while also collecting money out of his fund.
Asked about when he started to seriously think about actual retirement, Rueben said he had age 60 in mind.
“This is a job that is difficult to retire from and be healthy,” Rueben said. “It’s a hard mental strain and a lot of cops don’t live a long time after they retire — some do, some don’t.”
Rueben and his wife, Ginny, came up with a plan.
“I said, ‘hey, I’d like to retire as early as possible that we can afford,’” he said. “So we targeted 60 years old as a number so we just still can walk when we want to travel and do all those things.”
Rueben said he told the city manager of his plan five years earlier so the city wouldn’t be surprised and could develop a plan to put in place.
“I think it was the right thing to do for the agency because in a small agency, having a plan for what that’s going to look like over time is good for the office to know and the people that work here for the potential of promoting to different positions,” Rueben said.
Rueben was honored on the afternoon of April 3 at a retirement party in a packed room at Philomath Museum. Among the several presentations was a slide show that included several photos of Rueben set to music that matched his sense of humor and generated in his honor (view and listen below).
Percy, the department’s comfort dog brought in seven years ago through the Philomath Police Foundation, has retired alongside Rueben and is now living with him. The dog, 9, became attached to Rueben through those many hours in the station, his bed even located in his office.
The foundation made a gift of Percy to the city and to Rueben.
“We had just lost our dog that we’ve had for 15 years so the timing was good for that,” Rueben said. “He needs time to be a dog and run around in the yard and sniff stuff, you know.”
Percy’s presence in the office will be missed.
“We put him in some nasty situations … he was in a lot of bad environments with some very emotional people both good and bad,” Rueben said. “He deserves being retired.”
Rueben himself is not exactly retiring in the traditional sense. He signed up with an Oregon Association of Chiefs of Police program that matches retired law enforcement with agencies that are going through difficult times, such as a new chief that needs mentorship, helping a department go through a leadership change or assisting with tasks like organizing an evidence room.
“I’ve got two opportunities already that I’ve agreed to do over the next three to four months to help two small agencies,” Rueben said, mentioning that he established a consulting business as part of those endeavors.
He will also continue to be significantly involved with the Northwest Accreditation Alliance, which he’s been connected with for several years. Rueben said he’ll be doing work as an accreditation adviser for small agencies.
Congratulations, Chief, and best wishes for a well-earned retirement. Thank you for your partnership over the years, and for the extraordinary impact you have had on our community. See you around the campus!