Officer Grubb with Lieutenant Price Photo Sophie Braccini

Mary Ann Grubb is a no-nonsense woman who knows what she wants and goes out and gets it. A passionate coach and teacher for the first 12 years of her career, she decided to become what she had always wanted to be - a police officer - "Once I got the coaching out of my system," she explains. Now Grubb patrols the streets of Moraga, mostly on weekend nights, one of the tough shifts on which newcomers must make their debut.

Grubb attended Carondelet High School in Concord and Santa Clara University for her BA degree; she now lives in Walnut Creek. She said she always wanted to become a police officer, but she fell in love with coaching cross country. "I didn't want to give coaching up," she said, "so I taught math for 12 years, as a means to get to coach."

Grubb says that the pride of coaching resides in taking young athletes who, at the beginning of the season will run 2 miles in 19 minutes but after 2 1/2 months of training will cover the distance in 13 minutes. "The progress of kids is fantastic," she says, "it gives them confidence, and being a big kid myself, I love hanging out with them." Grubb enjoyed coaching varsity as well and recounts with pride the many wins of her teams.

In 2009 she decided it was time to become a police officer and she put herself through the Napa Valley College Police Academy, a six-month program she found very rigorous. "It was a positive experience," she said, "I learned a lot about myself and police work." She notes that the program enforces a very strict discipline, "You find out if you are tough enough to come back the next day."In her class of 50 (five of whom were women), 30 graduated (three of them women).

Grubb was recruited by the Moraga Police Department in August of 2010. "I received other offers, but then those departments went into a hiring freeze," she says, "it's not that there is no need for more police officers, it's that there is no money to hire them." Some of her classmates have not found police jobs yet.

Grubb says she has found a good fit for herself in Moraga. "There are a lot of plusses in a small department," she says, "you get to know the people quickly, the learning curve is pretty good, you do a lot of the leg work." She works the graveyard shift from 6:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. over the weekend, three or four days in a row, "The Chief (Bob Priebe) works that shift too," she says, "it's great to see him work; it's the best way to learn."