This article was acquired from Berkeleyside and written by Alex Gecan.
Persisting vacancies leave more work for sworn staff, which has tanked morale, which makes recruitment and retention more difficult, according to Citygate Associates. Police also don’t feel they have support from the community or the City Council.
The Berkeley Police Department, which has a nearly 19% vacancy rate for sworn officers and supervisors, is stuck in a vicious cycle, according to a recent consultant report: Low recruitment and retention means more police officers have to do more tasks and work more hours, which is tanking morale and in turn making recruitment and retention more difficult.
The department currently has 147 sworn officers and supervisors, including one currently in academy training, out of 181 authorized sworn positions, a department spokesperson confirmed. The vacancy rate “frequently necessitates overtime or divesting staff from other units to fill vacancies in Patrol,” according to a Sept. 4 report from Folsom-based Citygate Associates, which the department published online last week.
High overtime rates and taking on extra responsibilities are burning out the department’s staff, according to Citygate’s report. Officers and supervisors surveyed who said they may leave within the next few years cited better job opportunities, concerns about the department’s work environment and culture and “a perceived lack of support from the community and City Council,” according to the report. Recruitment has not been able to keep pace with attrition since 2020.
The consultants delivered their report six days before the City Council signed off on a new four-year, $1.3 million contract with Sacramento-based All-Star Talent to recruit police officers and firefighters.
In a memo to the council backing the contract, Interim City Manager LaTanya Bellow listed several obstacles to police recruitment — “shifting societal expectations for law enforcement officers,” more intense competition and the fact that “traditional recruitment methods are failing to attract a diverse and qualified pool of candidates.” The Berkeley Fire Department is also experiencing a high vacancy rate, as well as a steadily increasing workload, according to the memo.
The city’s dispatch center currently has 20 dispatchers and supervisors out of 36 authorized positions, according to BPD. The agency is down seven of 32 possible community service officers as well, but all 23 parking enforcement officer positions are filled.
The city previously contracted with Arizona-based Epic Recruiting for police recruitment alone — not bundled together with fire department recruitment — paying that firm $410,000 for work done between March 2019 and April of this year. Police department staff also work on recruitment.
Citygate’s 155-page report included 54 different recommendations for BPD, mostly concerning the proposed restructuring of sworn and civilian personnel, many concerned with recruitment and retention. The consultants recommended that the city create 31 new positions within the department, over and above the ones already vacant, and that the department “collapse” its 14 beats into seven in the early morning hours. The department shrank its beat structure from 16 to 14 in 2023 on account of low staffing numbers.
Deputy Chief Jen Tate told the Police Accountability Board Wednesday that the department should “have a better sense of the timing and our priorities for those recommendations” by the time the City Council gets its next update on the “Reimagining Public Safety” effort, the last week in October.
The city hired CityGate last August to conduct their study for $120,000.