OAKLAND — James Beere, the city’s interim police chief appointed in November, said Tuesday in an interview that he has applied to fill the job permanently.
Beere, a 29-year Oakland Police Department veteran, will seek to lead a police force that has struggled to retain staff and seen a revolving door of chiefs who rarely stick around for more than a couple years before they either resign or are fired.
The most recent, former Chief Floyd Mitchell, lasted just over a year and a half before announcing his resignation last October.
Mayor Barbara Lee soon afterward appointed Beere, an assistant chief whose name had long been floated by political insiders as a future candidate to be the city’s top cop.
Amid a citywide drop in violence and overall crime since the COVID-19 pandemic’s worst days, Beere appears enthusiastic about the prospect of remaining in his role long term.
“This city has been nothing but great to me and my family,” Beere told this news organization during a series of scheduled media interviews. “This police department is all I’ve known my whole life.”
“My wife and I have raised three boys here, all three in the Oakland public schools,” he continued. “This is home. We love Oakland. So I just want to make sure that Oakland’s in a good place when I leave, whether that’s three months or three years from now.”
Oakland interim police Chief James Beere works in his office at police headquarters in downtown Oakland, Calif., on Tuesday, March 24, 2026. Beere has applied for the permanent chief’s position. (Jane Tyska/Bay Area News Group)
Beere had applied for the job when it was last vacant but failed to emerge as a finalist in the recruitment that led to Mitchell’s hiring in 2024.
The chief search became fraught with a bitter political standoff between then-Mayor Sheng Thao and the civilian-led Oakland Police Commission, centered around Thao’s earlier firing of Mitchell’s predecessor, former Chief LeRonne Armstrong.
Per Oakland’s city charter, the volunteer commission is tasked with presenting a shortlist of chief candidates to the mayor, who makes the final hire.
The current search began in earnest late last year but remains in a relatively early stage, with the commission hiring a national recruitment firm to field applications and holding a series of community forums to gather input from residents.
The last recruitment did not yield any internal candidates among the finalists. Beere, however, appears to have built a solid relationship with Lee, who has spoken warmly at public events and news conferences about the interim chief’s leadership.
Even as crime declines, OPD’s staffing levels have dropped to historic lows in recent years, with 614 sworn officers on the force as of Tuesday — down from 720 officers five years ago.
Oakland interim police Chief James Beere works in his office at police headquarters in downtown Oakland, Calif., on Tuesday, March 24, 2026. Beere has applied for the permanent chief’s position. (Jane Tyska/Bay Area News Group)
But the department has managed to avoid any major scandals since 2024, when felony bribery charges against a police detective led nearly the entire command staff to face heavy discipline for not previously holding the detective accountable. A separate internal affairs scandal a year earlier led to Armstrong’s firing.
The department appears poised to soon exit the two-decade-long oversight of a federal judge, with Beere noting Tuesday that he has built a positive rapport with the court-appointed monitor, Robert Warshaw, who oversees OPD’s affairs.
“We had great conversations,” Beere said of Warshaw, who made a relatively rare in-person visit to Oakland last year. “I’m very hopeful we can get to where we need to get.”
Shomik Mukherjee is a reporter covering Oakland. Call or text him at 510-905-5495 or email him at shomik@bayareanewsgroup.com.