When he joined the Escalon Police Department, Robert ‘Anthony’ Hardgraves, Jr. anticipated it was a job he would keep for a couple of years and then move on to a larger department in a bigger city.

But, nearly two decades later, Hardgraves instead has moved in to the top position in the department, named as the Escalon Police Chief by a unanimous vote of the City Council in May. His official swearing in was on May 20 and he has taken the past several weeks to formally settle in to his new office and new duties.

“It feels good,” Hardgraves said. “I am a little nervous but I think I’m up for the challenge.”

After graduating from the Ray Simon Police Academy in Modesto in December of 2004, Hardgraves was hired on as a patrolman in Escalon and started work here in March of 2005.

“My plan was to stay here for two or three years,” the new chief admitted. “At the two-year mark, I realized I really liked Escalon because I could do my own investigations, I could follow through on cases instead of just take the initial report and hand it off. I wanted to gain more experience here.”

A few years later, when Hardgraves once again thought about moving on, the economy was in a lull and many other agencies were laying officers off. He decided once again to stay and he eventually met his now-wife, further evidence that his life and career were well situated here.

“Her family is from the Merced area, my family is from the Merced area,” Hardgraves shared.

The longer he stayed with the department, the harder it became to leave.

Not only that, Hardgraves said he appreciated the opportunity to fill several different roles through the years.

He became an FTO, Field Training Officer, in 2007 and has continued to serve in that capacity ever since. He has also been an acting sergeant, served as a detective when former Chief Mike Borges was leading the department and was promoted to sergeant in 2020. He also did a couple of stints as acting chief during the tenure of Chief Gus Flores. It was the retirement of Flores that led to Hargraves being selected for the chief’s position.

He is now married with two daughters; his family was on hand for his official ‘Chief’ badge pinning, with one daughter holding the badge for the first part of the ceremony and the other pinning it on.

“I’ve been through a lot of different chiefs, a lot of different leaders in the department,” Hardgraves said.

Among them, he feels he learned the most from Borges.

“He did a lot of great things for this department; I feel he got the department going in the right direction, turned it around in a very good way,” Hardgraves said.

He also said the chiefs who followed, Rob Lackey and Gus Flores, worked to continue that style of leadership.

“There are some things that can be changed,” Hardgraves said, but added that initially, he wants to keep things running smoothly and not make any major changes as he settles in and learns new responsibilities of the role.

“We currently have eight fulltime officers, seven on patrol and one SRO, School Resource Officer,” the chief said.

There are also two sergeants – Jose Zambrano and Nathaniel Vieira – in addition to the chief. There is one officer position vacant, as the department staff includes nine officer positions.

There are also nine reserve officers and a couple of Citizen Patrol volunteers that work with the department.

Hardgraves said it’s important to him to see the small town, safe atmosphere of Escalon maintained. He said there are occasional areas of trouble but officers are quick to respond and many of the issues the city sees are crimes of opportunity, such as shoplifting, break-ins of unlocked vehicles, and the like.

“Our biggest thing right now is staffing,” Hardgraves added, noting that the goal is to maintain two-man coverage on all shifts, with two officers on duty at all times during any 24-hour period.

“I want to keep moving forward,” Chief Hardgraves said. “I would like to get more officers so we can better serve the city and its residents.”

For his part, the new chief said he can take a little bit of what he has learned from the many chiefs he has served with, implementing what works the best.

“The chief’s job is to make sure the officers have everything they need to do their job,” Hardgraves explained.

He also said if the city wants to retain good officers for the long term, the pay issue will need to be addressed, as Escalon is the second lowest paid department in the region, railing only Newman in terms of officer pay. The chief said he also is looking forward to maintaining a good working relationship with the city council and city staff; he is familiar with all of them from his time filling the chief’s role on an interim basis.