The Police IndexStop data: 2024 · Pay and hiring checked Nov 2026

Oceanside Police Department

219 swornStarts at $91,021Not hiring new officers nowApplicant Score 27

City police department for Oceanside in northern San Diego County. It has three divisions under the Chief's office: Patrol, Support Operations and Investigations.

Department size
219 sworn
Authorized budgeted sworn, department About page, archived Oct 2026
Calls for service a year
Approximately 110,000
Per year, department About page, archived Oct 2026. About 301 a day
Chief
Taurino Valdovinos
Per the department staff page as archived Oct 12, 2026

About Oceanside Police

Filled: Oceanside city limits, within western San Diego County. Outlines: U.S. Census Bureau cartographic boundary files, 2023, 1:500,000.
The Oceanside Police Department's mission is to protect the vulnerable and serve our community.Mission statement, source
Area covered
Polices the City of Oceanside, a beach city 39 miles north of San Diego with more than 175,000 residents. Square miles are not published by the department.
Headquarters
3855 Mission Avenue, Oceanside, CA 92058
First assignment
Patrol. Open officer postings assign to the Patrol or Field Operations Division.

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Departments whose areas border this one. Most applicants shortlist by where they want to work.

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A typical day at Oceanside Police

Calls for service
About 301 a day
Approximately 110,000 a year. Per year, department About page, archived Oct 2026
People stopped
About 22 a day
7,917 in 2024. A stop is a detention or search.
Busiest hour for stops
9pm to 10pm
16% of stops happen between 10pm and 5am.
Oceanside Police
Average of 11
12am3am6am9am12pm3pm6pm9pm

Darker means a larger share of stops in that hour.

What officers do on the job

Working here

No entry-level posting was open on Nov 13, 2026. Recruit pay and the $91,021 to $123,677 officer range come from job board copies of closed postings.
Sworn strength differs by source. The department site says 219. Open city postings say 226 and 228.

Sources, checked Nov 13, 2026: OPD About page (mission, population, staffing, calls) · OPD Careers · OPD Hiring Process · OPD Minimum Qualifications · OPD Police Academy Information · OPD Recruitment FAQ · OPD Serve With Us (schedules, extra pay) · OPD Lateral Police Officer Candidates (incentive) · OPD Meet the Chief and Staff · City posting: Police Officer Lateral, job 25-10 (bonus, benefits) · City posting: Police Officer Graduated Police Academy, job 24-85 (benefit summary) · Entry-level posting dated Oct 2025, job board copy (recruit pay, PELLETB cutoff, waivers) · Entry-level posting job 25-48, job board copy (earlier pay, same test rules) · Archived copies of oceansidepolice.com pages (live site blocks automated access) · California DOJ stop data, 2024

Agency colors not applied yet. They are only used once pulled from the agency's own site.

Photo: Oceanside Pier. Oceanside-Pier-San-Diego-Drone-Photography.jpg by Redideo, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Cropped and tinted.

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