Patrol Division

The White Lake Township Police Department Patrol Division is the largest division within the Police Department and serves as the backbone of police services. The Patrol Division is currently staffed with a Lieutenant, four Sergeants, and fourteen patrol officers (authorized for sixteen). The Patrol Division handles on average 27,000 calls for service per year and is responsible for patrolling White Lake’s 37 square mile area. In additional to daily patrol duties and responding to calls, the patrol division is responsible for the following details and programs:

• PACT Program (Police and Community Together)
• Senior Welfare Check Program (Conducting regular checks on seniors in need)
• Vacation House Check Program (Residential house checks during times of vacancy)
• Focused Patrol (Detailed enforcement effort when suspicious activity is known)
• Directed Patrol (Data driven patrols in a specified area to reduce both crashes and crime)
• Radar Trailer Deployment (Speed measurement device)
• Community Policing Details (Regular checks of all subdivisions in the Township)
• Business Watch Program (Regular checks and walkthroughs of businesses, both while open and after-hours)

The Patrol Division takes pride in providing high quality services to the residents, businesses, and guests of White Lake Township. We operate with a community service-based philosophy and actively enforce traffic law in a professionally aggressive manner in order to reduce crashes and criminal activity. The Patrol Division operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The Patrol Division is currently under the command of Lieutenant Thomas Sarasin.

Lt. Sarasin attended and graduated from Northern Michigan University in 2011 with a Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice. He worked as a police officer for the Northern Michigan University Police Department and Chocolay Township Police department from 2012 to 2013. He began working for the White Lake Township Police Department as an officer in 2013. Since beginning his career with the White Lake Township Police Department, he has worked as an Officer, School Resource Officer, Detective, and Sergeant.

Lt. Sarasin has been a member of the Oakland County Mobile Field Force, Crisis Intervention Team Coordinator, Forensic Evidence Specialist, Union Vice President, Field Training Officer and Supervisor, Taser Instructor, Chemical Weapons Instructor, Defensive Tactics Instructor, De-Escalation Instructor, Mental Health Instructor, Recruiting Team Supervisor, Peer Support and Critical Incident Stress Supervisor. Sgt. Sarasin has also assisted other agencies with their mock Accreditation Assessments. Sgt. Sarasin has been teaching as an instructor with the LERTA Police Academy since 2014 and the Oakland Police Academy since 2020.