(The Center Square) – A presentation to the Spokane City Council during their study session outlined the state of staffing for the Spokane Police Department, and currently, things aren’t trending in a good direction.
Spokane Assistant Police Chief Justin Lundgren highlighted the difficulties, noting that since 2020 the Spokane Police Department has seen 91 commissioned officer departures from the force.
Combined with troubles in recruitment, hiring, and retention, SPD has 70 positions that are either vacant or “cannot [be utilized] for their primary purpose,” as Assistant Chief Lundgren put it.
These vacancies are due to “people in training, vacant or open positions, or people on injury or family medical leave.” This is relative to planned staffing levels, which have increased for 2023 over the previous years, with an additional 7 to 12 officers on shift every day.
According to the Assistant Chief, this increase in staffing has meant SPD has been able to provide better service to the public, as well as improving several internal metrics.
Use of force, on-duty injuries, and sick leave needed by officers are all internal workforce metrics that have improved over the prior years. This improvement comes while calls for service have increased 13.6% over the year prior, and additional training requirements have been imposed as well.
Recruiting, hiring, and retention were the main focus of the presentation, with the Assistant Chief calling it “the path to get to where we need to be from where we are now.”
Hiring is trending down, and departures are trending up.
In 2020, the department saw 14 officers retire or leave for other opportunities and hired 40 new officers.
In 2023, the trends inverted, with a projected 42 officers departing and only 17 new officers hired. Additionally, 65 officers within the department are classified as eligible for retirement, meaning a large percentage of the SPD can choose to depart with little to no notice.
The SPD is implementing some changes. Moving an officer to full-time recruitment duty for starters.
Another is implementing a Department of Defense SkillBridge program, which would allow someone leaving military service to volunteer with SPD and receive their full military wages and benefits. This would also open up marketing to spouses of military service members.
The most attractive change to officers and their family members may be reworking how shifts are scheduled.
Currently, the shift schedule for the year is decided each January. This means for officers with families, they could go from working mornings to overnights in the middle of their child’s school year.
Of those 70 positions mentioned earlier, only 42 are actual vacancies. Ten are officers on light duty, 16 are officers who are injured or on family medical leave, and two are on administrative duties for various reasons.
Additionally, of the 42 vacancies, 21 are expected to be filled by recruits graduating from the academy later this year.
“Staffing is the issue that’s driving increased costs on overtime, and the recruiting environment is as difficult as it’s been in my career,” said Lundgren during the presentation.
