Resolving a Shortage of City Police Officers

1687 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: crime statistics comparison between cities

Resolving a Shortage of City Police Officers

Subject: Proposal to Write a Report Recommending a Pay Increase to Remedy the Shortage of City of Miami Police Officers

Over the past few years, the nation has faced a "crisis" with the shortage of police officers (Axtman, 2006). It is well known that crime rates increase with the decrease in the number of police officers. Researchers have looked for the cause of such a decline and have identified low pay as a major reason for the deficiency.

Problem

Recent protests by City of Miami Police Officers have captured the attention of Miami-Dade County. Protesters are complaining that very low wages have created a scarce supply of police officers in the City of Miami. Better salaries, protesters say, will prevent officers from leaving to higher paying police departments.

Many examples exist that support the protestors' claims. Also faced with the problem of officer shortages, the police department in McKinney, Texas found that a raise in wages helped "attract and retain qualified officers" (Dallas Morning News, 2006). McKinney, losing officers to neighboring departments, solved the problem with a salary increase. Focusing on a city closer to home, police officers were leaving Opa-Locka as well. Opa-Locka City Commissioner Dorothy "Dottie" Johnson identified that "officer turnover is high due to low starting pay" (Berggren, 2006). She plans to remedy this problem if re-elected to her position on the Board of Commissioners.

As mentioned earlier, there is a correlation between crime rates and the quantity of police officers. A comparison of the City of Miami and the City of Coral Gables illustrates this relationship. The City of Coral Gables pay range for police officers is $42,842 to $68,124 (Coral Gables, 2006). The City of Miami only pays $37,817 to $50,764 (Miami-Police, 2006). Although the difference in starting salary is only $5,000, new recruits consider it when choosing an employer. In addition, the cap differs by almost $18,000, showing that raises are limited. Figure one, right, shows the difference between crime rates per capita in Miami and Coral Gables. Figure two, below shows the exact numbers of the data in the bar graph. It is clear that Miami has significantly more crime than Coral Gables.

Miami Coral Gables

Murder: 17.9 2.3

Forcible Rape: 26.48 23

Robbery: 614.5 133.4

Aggravated Assault: 1018.5 209.3

Burglary: 1442.4 1124.6

Larceny Theft: 3803.9 4213

Vehicle Theft: 1115.6 404.7

Although the shortage of police officers is not the only reason crime rates were higher in Miami, the shortage made a major influence.

Show More
Related

  • Thompson Valley Police Recruit Case Summary

    1847 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Thompson Valley Police Service is seeking to double the number of police recruits over the next three years. In an attempt to attract more applicants, the newly appointed Police Commissioner, Commissioner Jason DeVillain is proposing two key changes to the current selection process. Firstly, Commissioner DeVillain is proposing to eliminate the requirement for partial or completed tertiary education. Secondly, it is being proposed that psychological testing should be removed from the selection process. As a research and policy officer for the Thompson Valley Police Service, the validity and likely impact of the above two proposed changes will be investigated thoroughly, followed by recommendations to Commissioner DeVillain to ensure the selection process is as effective as possible in selecting the most suitable candidates for the new police recruits. The role of a general duties police officer is broad in nature and requires the officer to be efficient in many areas, ranging from administrative duties to conflict resolution and problem solving. In addition to the recording and logging of all jobs attended while on duty, the officer may be required to prepare documents for court hearings, where written communication skills will also be

    Read More

  • Baltimore City Police Case Study

    907 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Baltimore City police have faced a myriad of problems in the last year. The riots following the Freddie Gray arrest were reported around the country and created a situation where the Governor was forced to call in the National Guard to protect the city. Community leaders report that African American’s are stopped, searched and arrested at a far greater number than Caucasian’s. The Baltimore city police are at an impasse with the community at this time, it is up to the city leaders and the police officials to come up with some real solutions to the issues that can no longer be ignored.

    Read More

  • The Kansas City Preventive Patrol Experiment

    1061 Words  | 3 Pages

    According to Kelling, Pate, Dieckman, & Brown (1974), patrol is the “backbone” of police work. This belief is based around the premise that the mere presence of police officers on patrol prohibits criminal activity. Despite increasing budgets and the availability of more officers on the streets, crime rates still rose with the expanding metropolitan populations (Kelling et al., 1974). A one year experiment to determine the effectiveness of routine preventive patrol would be conducted, beginning on the first day of October 1972, and ending on the last day of September 1973.

    Read More

  • Annotated Bibliography On Police Brutality

    1110 Words  | 3 Pages

    The author focuses on the U.S. Task Force on 21st Century Policing and Police Data Initiative or PDI to determine if it helps to restore trust and the broken relationship between and communities and police officers. The Task Force made by Barack Obama recommended the analysis of department policies, incidents of misconduct, recent stops and arrests, and demographics of the officers. The PDI has tasked 21 cities to comprehend the police behavior and find out what to do to change it. Also PDI was said to have data and information on vehicle stops and shootings by police officers. The use of statistics has a purpose to help rebuild trust and the relationship between and communities and police officers.

    Read More

  • Driving Corruption In The Baltimore Police Department

    818 Words  | 2 Pages

    The first factor driving corruption, Sgt. Wood identifies a metric devised by Baltimore political and police leadership to measure the success of policing by tallying the number of arrest by each police officer and assigning a required hard quota to each police officer in order to measure his or her success. This quota requirement unintentionally set the stage for corruption in the form on misfeasance. For example, Sgt. Wood indicated that after assignment to an upscale all white neighborhood he would enter a black poor neighborhood to meet his arrest stats because his supervisors complained that he was not meeting department numbers. Because of the crime that plagues inner-city minority neighborhoods, it is easy for police officers to meet arrest quotas. It was department policy for Sgt. Wood to meet the arrest quotas, but

    Read More

  • Corruption Of The Justice System In Just Mercy, By Bryan Stevenson

    1129 Words  | 3 Pages

    In areas with more poverty police become more aggressive and ruthless towards individuals, falling to respond to situations rationally. William Terrill, who studies police behavior at Michigan State University, says the "broken windows style of policing, in which officers crack down aggressively on minor infractions like fare-dodging and graffiti, may be partly to blame. Communities with high levels of poverty and high proportions of non-white residents are often the focus of broken-windows operations. This can cause a feeling among citizens that police are constantly harassing them” (Hudson). To me this is just a way for law enforcement to justify their actions. It would make more sense for officers to be trained to be more aware of how people in such circumstances work instead of being aggressive and cruel. It shows that officers are ignoring their training and relying more on how they feel towards certain groups of people. In an article by Dave Grossi, he mentions that “During a poll taken during this class which represented about a half dozen Florida law enforcement agencies, I asked how many train more than twice a year. No hands went up. When asked how many train or qualify with their duty guns only once a year” (Grossi). This not only shows how uneducated some offers may

    Read More

  • Addressing Police Corruption and Misconduct in the US

    1039 Words  | 3 Pages

    Police corruption, misconduct, and brutality in the United States have been issues since the creation of watch system in the United States (Grant& Terry, 2012). New policy and training is now in place and the corruption, misconduct, and brutality has gone down since the beginning of policing. This is a huge issue that impacts all police organizations in the United States. The extent of police corruption, misconduct, and brutality is hard to track in the United States. A lot of these crimes go unreported, tossed aside, or the officer responsible gets little or no punishment. This is huge issue in the United States criminal justice system.

    Read More

  • The Law Enforcement Hiring Process

    1126 Words  | 3 Pages

    This paper will show four different police departments that are currently hiring or recruiting for police officers. There will be a summary on the research found on the process used to recruit police officers. It will also show their current hiring trends and what hiring practices they have that are successful or not successful. The paper will also go over the different methods departments use to train their new officers and their values.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Police Myths Of The Police

    1066 Words  | 3 Pages

    The authors also explain that there are no real statistics to help explain how many times an officer has used a firearm. The text explains that there is no significant data to help explain police shootings and how many occur each year (Kappeler & Potter, 2005). Most of the data that can be found does not clearly state the numbers of times a firearm was used. Majority of data is found through data bases such as Vital Statistics (Kappeler & Potter, 2005). Even data bases such as Vital Statistics do not provide clear information on police

    Read More

  • Police Brutality and Corruption

    678 Words  | 2 Pages

    Bibliography Why Good Cops Go Bad. Newsweek, p.18. Carter, David L. (1986). Deviance & Police. Ohio: Anderson Publishing Co. Castaneda, Ruben (1993, Jan. 18). Bearing the Badge of Mistrust. The Washington Post, p.11. Dantzer, Mark L. (1995). Understanding Today's Police. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Inc. James, George (1993, Mar. 29). Confessions of Corruption. The New York Times, P.8, James, George (1993, Nov. 17). Officials Say Police Corruption is Hard To Stop. The New York times, p.3. Sherman, Lawrence W(1978). Commission Findings. New York Post, P. 28 Walker, J.T. (1992). The police in America, p.243-263, chp. 10, Walker, Samuel (1999).

    Read More

  • The Police Have Become the Criminals

    632 Words  | 2 Pages

    Across America, police have been involved in scandals and drugs. They are abusing the power that they have been given. The communities have begun not to trust the police because of their conduct toward the citizens. People have been beaten and harassed by the guys in blue. People in the communities have seen the police push individuals around and take things from individuals for no reason. People receive the wrong message. The public no longer can see a difference between the police and criminals.

    Read More

  • Crime Analysis

    939 Words  | 2 Pages

    Crime Analysis has many benefits to the community. Community engagement, targeted initiatives, strategic use of resources, and data-driven decision-making contribute to decreasing crime. Crime prevention and community satisfaction with police services, while linked to the number of officers on the streets, does not depend entirely on the visibility of patrol officers. Community engagement, targeted initiatives, strategic use of resources, and data-driven decision-making contribute to decreasing crime. So in closing I believe that departments that take the positive elements of foot patrols and combine their efforts with crime analysis that focuses on the time, location, and type of crime, may use the findings to develop strategies to decrease crime and enhance the quality of life in their communities.

    Read More

  • Job Dissatisfaction: Job Satisfaction With The Police Department

    897 Words  | 2 Pages

    The biggest reasons officers are leaving is job dissatisfaction. Officers claim that the pay is too low for the economy of the area; although many of these individuals are attempting to support families on $26,000 per year, which would be fine for a single individual but not for a family. The morale of the agency is very low with little to no interaction between employees during off-time and no competition between shifts or divisions. Community satisfaction with the police department is

    Read More

  • Police Recruitment

    1383 Words  | 3 Pages

    Police recruitment is very important to all law enforcement agencies; it seeks to recruit, select, train and maintain the best possible officers (Grant et al, 2012). This paper will give you the reader a general understanding of police recruitment and also discuss some of the problems happening in police recruitment; past and present, along with remedies to these problems.

    Read More

  • How To Reduce Police Corruption

    1275 Words  | 3 Pages

    Being a police officer requires high level of ethics and standards. Corruption within an agency can affect a community, state, and even a nation. Corruption may seem inevitable but using proper screening, extensive and continuous training and holding officers responsible can deter officers from becoming corrupt.

    Read More

More about Resolving a Shortage of City Police Officers

Open Document