By Mary O’KEEFE

Captain Christopher Blasnek, Los Angeles County Sheriffs Dept. – Crescenta Valley Station, has been promoted to commander and will be leaving the CV Station sometime this month.

“I am stunned,” Blasnek said of his promotion and the move. “It will be bittersweet to [leave].”

Blasnek took over the role as CV Station captain on April 2, 2017. He came to the station after Capt. Bill Song, who had been at the station since May 2013, was promoted.

Though Blasnek was “stunned” he is grateful for the promotion, which comes after about 35 years of service. His promotion is among the department changes made by newly-elected LASD Sheriff Alex Villanueva.

Blasnek said Villanueva is changing procedures within the promotional system at LASD. He said he had thought he would end his over three decades of service at CV Station.

“This is the best stop I have had in those years [of service],” he said. “I have met [and worked with] so many great people.”

He said he loved participating in several of the community events, from the Montrose Christmas Parade to the Patriot Day and 9/11 Remembrance Motorcade and ceremony, as well as all the events at the American Legion Post 288.

During his time as captain the station has undergone changes.

“We have been moving in a very positive direction,” he said. “Our arrests are up, our staffing and morale are up and our [remodeling] project is done.”

Blasnek does not know when, or where, he will be assigned but said he has one project at the CV Station that he will continue to monitor.

“We are going to get that mobile command post,” he said.

That project is almost complete; he has one more piece of “unfinished business” to take care of but that will be completed before he leaves the station. He vowed to come back for the mobile command dedication.

With a lot of attention being paid to the recent robberies, one in La Crescenta where a woman using a walker was pushed down and robbed and one in La Cañada Flintridge where armed suspects threatened a couple, Blasnek looks at the overall statistics and see them at unprecedented lows. In La Crescenta, for example, there was one robbery in August and one in December. Blasnek credits the low crime in the area, in part, to a community that is not afraid to contact the sheriff’s station when it sees, or hears, something suspicious. He singled out President Harry Leon of the Crescenta Valley Town Council as someone who is in constant touch with his office to discuss issues in the area.

He also praised Fifth District Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger for her support of the station and the community.

He did add the one issue in the La Crescenta and La Cañada areas that the new captain will have to deal with is residential burglaries. There were 31 residential burglaries in La Crescenta in 2018, which is higher than 2017 but lower than years past.

Blasnek goes to his new job with experience as a captain, watch commander and patrol deputy. As for who his replacement will be, Blasnek said he has no idea. He is not part of that process.

Historically, the second-in-command acts as interim captain until a replacement is announced. At the CV Sheriff’s Station the second-in-command is Lt. Mark Slater.

Blasnek will most likely be leaving the CV Station in mid-January for his new position as commander.

  Mary Okeefe