San Jose police memorial proposal moves forward
The Napa-based artist Gordon Huether has been selected from a pool of 86 contenders to build a memorial in honor of the 13 San Jose police officers who have lost their lives in the line of duty since 1924.
Huether is set to begin building the memorial this fall. It should be done by May 2019 and will be installed at the city’s Police Administration Building at 201 W. Mission St.
First proposed more than a decade ago, the memorial had stalled because of funding problems. When Officer Michael Johnson was killed in 2015, Mayor Sam Liccardo and several council members revived the idea and eventually secured $162,000 in funding.
The project is estimated to cost $450,000 in total. On Tuesday, the City Council unanimously agreed to allow the San Jose Police Foundation and the San Jose Police Officers Association up to six months to raise the rest of the funds.
“I think we can hit that goal,” said Councilmember Raul Peralez, who served on the city’s police force before being elected to the council and has been supportive of the memorial.
Huether has created public artworks across the country, including a glowing fuel tank at San Jose’s Fire Station No. 17 and etched tempered glass at the Oakland Ferry Terminal at Jack London Square. He has proposed a seven pointed police badge with a black band angled across it to signify mourning the loss of an officer in the line of duty for the memorial. It would measure about 8 feet by 8 feet and be made of dichroic glass, which changes colors depending on the angle of the viewer. The band would be made of black metal. Each fallen officer would be named on plaques around the base.
“We want to provide a permanent tribute to San Jose’s 13 fallen officers,” said Kerry Adams Hapner, the city’s director of cultural affairs. “We want to also create a focal point for ceremonies and memorial events, as well as personal moments of remembrance.”
Huether also has designed a pared-back version of the memorial in case the organizations can’t raise enough funding.
There is already a memorial for fallen Santa Clara County officers, including those from San Jose, outside the sheriff’s department on Younger Avenue, just a couple of blocks from the police department on Mission Street. But there was a renewed push for a San Jose memorial after Johnson was killed on March 24, 2015, by a suicidal gunman.
He was the first officer killed in the line of duty in San Jose since 2001. The next year, on June 14, 2016, Officer Michael Katherman was killed when the police motorcycle he was riding collided with a minivan.
Police Chief Eddie Garcia said placing the memorial at the police department will mean officers going to work each day will see it and be reminded not only of the sacrifice made by the fallen officers but also of the “perils of the job.”
“It’s very important,” Garcia said, “that it be at the police department.”