THE LAST OF THE COPS TREATED TO DUTCH

Published on July 11, 2004

© 2004- The Press Democrat

BYLINE:    Chris Smith

PAGE: B1

COLUMN: Chris Smith

This is a bittersweet week for the only Santa Rosa police officer on the force long enough to remember stammering, ``Yes, Sir! Yes, Sir! Yes, Sir!'' during an upbraiding by the larger-than-life Chief Dutch Flohr.

``I'm 6-foot-2 and I looked up to him,'' said Sgt. Blaine Hunt, who was born in Bennett Valley, the same part of town he patrols and supervises today. He's retiring Thursday, 31 years to the day since the late Melvin I. ``Dutch'' Flohr swore him in.

Blond and agreeable, Blaine is the last Santa Rosa policeman to have served under Dutch. He remembers well the day in 1974 that he was cruising Fifth Street when the chief's voice barked over the two-way radio, ``You there! Pull over!''

Blaine's pretty sure that every cop in the city pulled his cruiser quickly to the curb at the same instant he did. But only rookie officer Hunt peered into the rear-view and saw Chief Flohr striding toward him.

``He looked down at me and took 10 or 15 minutes to give me the lecture,'' Blaine recalled. The chief told him, ``I don't want you driving around in your car all day.''

Dutch made perfectly clear that the young officer was to be on the sidewalks and in the businesses, where townsfolk could see him.

For the past three decades, Blaine has tried, though more subtly than Dutch, to encourage young officers to do the same thing.

One thing Blaine has done countless times is take new recruits to lunch -- not at some private hole-in-the-wall, but at the hotdog counter at Costco. Blaine always figured that the more people who interrupt their lunch to say hello or ask a question, the better.

Though the SRPD is losing its last direct link to Dutch Flohr, Blaine said he's staying in town, and he'll still go by Costco for an occasional hotdog. If he runs into young patrol officers there from time to time, he'll know the big guy's legacy lives on.

THE HOUSE-RAISING: People close to the ``Extreme Makeover: Home Edition'' project to completely rebuild a Penngrove family's home say all of Sonoma County should be proud that it's happening.

It could have been called off had producers encountered foot-dragging from county building officials or the volunteer architects and contractors whose assistance is essential. But everything went clickety-click.

Architect Mark Quattrocchi said he'd start to tell contractors about the effort to build a new home for the sun-sensitive Shelby Pope and her family and ``I never got to finish. They'd all say, `Sign me up.'''

``It can't happen without incredible cooperation,'' said film commissioner Catherine DePrima.

PUSH AND PUSH AND PUSH and, sometimes, nothing happens. Then you let go and good things start popping like Orville Redenbacher.

Not long back, Deborah Walton stopped chasing publicity in the advertising and PR biz and ``retired'' to a ranch in Two Rock Valley with her husband, artist Tim Schaible.

She swears she wasn't looking for press on her Canvas Ranch but is thrilled even so that it's featured this month in two national magazines.

The July ``Gourmet'' dedicates a page to the cute miniature sheep that Deborah leases out for vineyard weed control, and a piece in the July 12 ``Fortune'' portrays her as a baby boomer who retired to a second career that she adores.

She's not sure what she didn't do to get the national attention, but intends to continue not doing it.

IT'S A NICE TOUCH for Santa Rosa's main post office to have pictures up on the wall of some of the local soldiers now in Iraq.

Whatever is going on in our lives as we wait there in line, to look at those young faces and imagine what they're going through puts our tribulations into perspective.

Contact Chris Smith at 521-5211 or csmith@pressdemocrat.com.

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