Operations Captain, Humane Law Enforcement

About the role

The Operations Captain supports San Diego Humane Society's mission to inspire compassion and advance the welfare of animals and people. They provide strategic direction and operational leadership for the Humane Law Enforcement (HLE) Department.

Responsibilities

• Partner with the Chief and Administrative Captain to provide unified leadership and strategic direction for the HLE Department across all campuses.
• Serve as the department’s primary operational leader, overseeing day-to-day field response oversight, deployment and scheduling, call/queue management, and operational prioritization.
• May serve as Acting Chief when required, or as Incident Commander/command staff as designated for SDHS participation in emergency situations/disasters.
• Provide overnight on-call duty coverage with other campus personnel as assigned on an as needed basis to support with emergent needs such as staffing or emergencies.
• Direct and oversee daily field operations across campuses/jurisdictions, ensuring consistent service delivery and alignment with contractual obligations and SDHS standards.
• Own field staffing plans and scheduling practices (shift coverage, workload balancing, resource deployment), in coordination with Lieutenants and Sergeants.
• Monitor call demand and operational constraints; adjust deployment tactics and priorities to meet response expectations and animal welfare outcomes.
• Serve as the primary owner of operational performance management, including the identification and resolution of barriers to efficiency.
• Hold primary responsibility for daily/weekly/monthly operational reporting, including response times, call volume and call types, workload distribution and staffing impacts, productivity and service-level performance indicators, and field training progression metrics (in coordination with training owners).

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Administration of Justice, Animal Science, Public Administration, Human Resources, or related field with at least seven (7) years of full-time progressively responsible related experience in law enforcement, investigations, or animal control organizations, including at least three (3) years supervisory experience; or an equivalent combination of education and experience required.
• Demonstrated strength in operational leadership, scheduling/deployment management, performance analytics, performance management and continuous improvement.
• Excellent organizational, problem-solving, interpersonal, conflict resolution, and verbal/written communication skills; strong report writing skills with ability to synthesize and translate information for diverse audiences.

Qualifications

• Must be able to work weekends/evenings as required and during disasters may involve overnight work.

Skills

• Operational leadership
• Scheduling/deployment management
• Performance analytics
• Performance management and continuous improvement
• Organizational, problem-solving, interpersonal, conflict resolution, and verbal/written communication skills
• Strong report writing skills

Benefits

• Starting range is between $92,429 – $120,158 per year.
• This is a full time job.

Pay

Starting range is between $92,429 – $120,158 per year.

Schedule

Based at our San Diego Campus. This position works 40 hours per week. Must be able to work weekends/evenings as required and during disasters may involve overnight work.