As law enforcement agencies across the country suffer from record waves of resignations and retirements in the wake of the left’s ‘defund’ movement, police departments have resorted to showering new hires in cash – doling out tens of thousands of dollars in signing bonuses to attract recruits.
Redding, CA police chief Bill Schueller was having trouble attracting new cops last year after raising signing bonuses from $5,000 to $7,500 – so this year he raised the offer to $40,000 – more than half of a year’s starting salary at the agency, the Wall Street Journal reports.
The outsize bonus was necessary, he said, to recruit experienced officers in a line of work that has lost its popularity. After nationwide protests over the 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer, Mr. Schueller said, “the negative attention brought to law enforcement really started people thinking that maybe this isn’t the job for me. ”
Law-enforcement agencies across the U.S. have said they are facing staffing shortages as resignations and retirements rise. The tight labor market is compounding what police chiefs describe as waning interest from job seekers amid heightened scrutiny of officers’ actions, a less favorable view of the profession by some Americans and a surge in violent crime. -WSJ
Seattle – which has seen more than 460 officers depart over the past 2.5 years, approved $30,000 bonuses for lateral hires and $7,500 for new recruits, while the city of Ithaca, NY is now offering $20,000 for hires from other agencies.
“You’re hard-pressed to think of a time when police departments had to incentivize hiring with bonuses and pay officers to stay on the force,” said Chuck Wexler, the executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, adding “I haven’t seen that ever.”
In 2021, the average salary for a police officer was $70,740, vs. $58,620 for all occupations, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This comes after the number of cops dropped nationally in 2020 after rising over the previous decade.
