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Everyday Life & Health
The Houston Police Department is looking for a few good men. Well actually not a few, closer to several hundred. In 2001, HPD had a police force of 5,400, now the number dwindles at less than 4,600.
And they are far from being alone. Houston and other local communities are competing to recruit more qualified candidates. Houston’s strategy is to show potential recruits the money. With an enticing $7,000 signing bonus, HPD hopes to swear in the best.
“We’ve had a lot of retirements, and the city has an anticipated growth because of the hurricanes, and just growth in itself that we would have experienced otherwise,” said HPD’s head of recruitment Lt. Kenneth Miller. “But we have had an inordinate number of retirements. I think you can attribute a lot of it to the fact that when I came on and for several years before then, we did a lot of hiring so a lot of people are in the [retiring] age group.”
Officer Hans Marticiuc, President of the Houston Police Officer’s Union explained why it’s so difficult to recruit qualified candidates.
“It’s been more and more difficult to get people to want to sign up for this kind of work. For those of us that have come here early on, it was a career choice,” Marticiuc said.
Both Miller and Marticiuc explained nowadays a majority of college graduates seek employment in the private sector. Graduates look for higher starting salaries and opportunities to advance after a few years.
“We made it a point to come here. We wanted to do something for the community as well as being able to take care of ourselves at the same time,” Marticiuc said.
Another reason why it’s so hard to recruit is HPD’s firm stance on a person's past drug use and their credit history. HPD will not allow anyone with a history of any drug use to enroll in the academy. Also, HPD does a thorough credit check before anyone is allowed into the academy. Miller said if a person can’t take care of his or her own business, Miller couldn’t expect the person to take care of Houston.
Miller and Marticiuc said HPD is in need of approximately 800 patrolmen just to alleviate the mounting workload on officers. Active recruitment over a 10-year period is expected to add the needed officers to the streets.
Every year, for the next 10 years, HPD is expected to retire 250 officers from the department, making the 4,600 patrolmen shrink in size. The police academy can only hold six classes per year. With 70 cadets per class and if no one drops and everyone meets requirements and completes the probationary period, HPD will hire 350 graduates. Marticiuc said less than half of the 70 cadets will end up graduating.
Why work at HPD one might ask?
The $7,000 signing bonus offered to modified candidates. A modified candidate is a police officer from another department with at least five years experience. Experienced officers receive another perk. An officer is supposed to spend six months in the police academy, but if they come to HPD with experience, that time is cut in half.
“We’ve heard a lot of interest from neighboring departments, officers from neighboring departments,” Marticiuc said. “The economy here is good and we’re growing. It’s a much prettier picture over here as far as an employee. We’re stealing from each other’s resources.”
So where is HPD stealing officers from?
I visited Rosenberg, a city that sits along the Southwest Freeway, to see if they had acquired any officers, or lost any to their neighbor—Houston.
As I talked with Lt. Jeff Tucker, head of recruitment for Rosenberg, he pointed out Rosenberg’s tough time competing with larger agencies. In April, 2005, city council increased starting salaries to $16.40 per hour in order to compete with HPD’s minimum starting salary of $17.50. He says officers are primarily moving to large cities for better pay.
“We can’t fault HPD for trying to fill its ranks. It’s something that is taking place all over the country,” Tucker said. “It’s not just the city of Houston, it’s everyone. They have a need, the same as we do and I can’t fault my officers for going and trying to make more money for themselves and their families when the city [Rosenberg] can’t compete.”
What does Rosenberg attribute the decrease in candidates to?
Just like Houston, Rosenberg says increase in population is to blame. The 2000 census for Rosenberg calculated 28,000 citizens.
“I would expect, based on the 25 new subdivisions that are planned in our ETJ (extra territorial jurisdiction) these subdivisions will probably fill up within the next five years,” Rosenberg Mayor Joe Gurecky said. “And if they do then we will definitely see more than a doubling of our size.”
Rosenberg police can’t keep up with the flourishing community. In 2005, the department asked city council for 13 additional patrolmen, but with council’s budget spread thin, police were denied the request and were forced to make ends meet with only 37 officers on the force.
Tucker says he would never leave, not even for better pay.
“The city of Houston is large. You don’t necessarily know the people that you are working with,” Tucker said. “You don’t know who is going to be there today and who is not going to b there tomorrow. The rules change. I have consistency here. And I have a good community to work with.They are very supportive of us and of what we do.”
Appreciation and support from the community aren’t always found in big cities like Houston.
“Even though our crime statistics are favorable, we’re not in trouble like Houston,” said Gurecky. “Houston is experiencing a tremendous amount of crime. We’re not in that category. That tells me we have an outstanding police department.”
Marticiuc attributes the 10,000 robberies committed in 2005 in Houston to the lack of investigators. There are only 60 investigators. That’s almost 200 robberies for each investigator--not including other crimes.
“We require two years of college or honorable discharge from the military, and that is wonderful,” Marticiuc said. “But at the same time, we’re in unique times and there’s a lot of good officers out there that don’t necessarily have education, but four, five, six years experience in a police department. Is that equivalent to 60 hours of college? I would say so. That is certainly an option I would look at.”
It’s an idea Marticiuc is willing to take to city hall. The majority of Rosenberg officers don’t have a bachelor’s degree, but still a few have flocked to HPD’s nest.
Miller is already working on another bonus. He wants to offer current officers a monetary incentive when bringing an officer from another agency.
With all the attention on attracting new recruits, how do the current officers feel?
“Morale has been impacted. But it’s helped a little bit that there are now more officers working in some type of overtime program where the officers are getting adequate backup and taking some of the calls,” Marticiuc said. “Everyone is using extraordinary measures like paying officers to bring someone in--almost like bounty. You want good candidates. It’s got to be more than just a dollar you are looking for.”
Rosenberg’s mayor shares the same opinion.
“Throwing more people at a problem doesn’t necessarily resolve the issue,” said Gurecky. “The issue is how productive and effective the people are that you have on staff is what makes for a very successful department and a very safe city. Houston is trying to solve their problem by hiring more policemen. Is that really the answer? I don’t know. But throwing money against the problem doesn’t always solve the problem.”
It looks like it’s going to be years before Houston and Rosenberg receive adequate backup on the streets.
© Copyright World Internet News 2006-07
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