EAST PALO ALTO
CITY COUNCIL
STAFF REPORT
DATE: October 4, 2022
TO: Honorable Mayor and Members of the City Council
VIA: Patrick Heisinger, Interim City Manager
BY: Jeff Liu, Interim Chief of Police
SUBJECT: Police Department Recruitment and Hiring Update Recommendation
Accept the report from Interim Police Chief, Jeff Liu.
Background
On July 19, 2022, the Interim City Manager provided the City Council with the following update regarding the Police Department’s staffing levels:
“The East Palo Alto Police Department is currently experiencing uniquely urgent staffing issues. The Department has thirty-six (36) budgeted sworn positions (Police Officer, Police Sergeant, Police Commander, and Police Chief). However, nine (9) of those positions are currently vacant and another four (4) are out on long term leaves of absence, leaving a total of twenty-three (23) officers available for active duty. Of those, six (6) are in the hiring process for employment by other police agencies. If those individuals leave and are not replaced, the City will be left with an unacceptably low staffing level of seventeen (17) officers available for active duty.”
As part of the City’s Fiscal Year 2022-2023 budget process and recent labor negotiations with the Police Officers Association (POA), the City Council made several investments to ensure that the City’s Police force remains at adequate levels. Some of those investments were:
· A compensation increase of 15% over two years for members of the POA; · Creation of 6 Community Service Officers
· Creation of Reserve Officer positions
· Authorizing a one-time retention bonus for current Police Officers · Approval of a competitive signing bonus for hiring new Police Officers The purpose of this informational report is to provide the City Council and community with an update on the Police Department’s recruitment and retention efforts since July 2022.
Analysis
The East Palo Alto Police Department has been actively working with Human Resources (HR) to recruit and hire high quality applicants to fill vacancies for Police Officer, Reserve Police Officer, and Community Service Officer. When I came before Council in closed session, we had 6 Officers actively being hired by other law enforcement agencies. Due to the newly approved competitive compensation package, three of the six withdrew from their hiring processes.
Currently our Police Officer classification has 6 vacancies for which we have 5 applicants in various stages of our hiring process. One of the five applicants is scheduled for his final appointment on October 5. The other four applicants are working through their background investigations, which on average lasts 5-6 weeks. For the remaining position, we have 3 applicants being considered and are awaiting their completed Personal History Questionnaires for departmental review. Since July 2022, we have hired 4 Police Officers. Of the 4, one is currently working her way through the police academy, two are in field training, and one is already a solo officer and assigned to patrol.
The Reserve Police Officer (Reserve) is a new classification and recently opened for recruitment. We already have 2 applicants to consider for Reserves.
Our Community Service Officer (CSO) position has been challenging. Working with HR, we opened separate recruitments for the Full-time (FTE) and Part-time (PTE) classifications. HR screened the applicants and invited 7 FTE applicants in for oral examinations. A separate oral panel examination took place for the PTE with 6 applicants were invited in. Currently only one CSO applicant remains in our hiring process for various reasons.
HR has combined the two classifications and launched a new recruitment.
To further our recruiting efforts, we redesigned and updated our Police Officer Recruiting Brochure and assembled a Recruiting team to recruit at job fairs, entry level police exam (Pellet-B) testing events, and police academies. On October 4, our department will be recruiting at career faire at California State University East Bay where we will be recruiting for all open positions. Additionally, I solicit community assistance in my weekly Chief’s Community Update which is posted on our department website and distributed through Nextdoor and Facebook.
Conclusion
As Interim Police Chief, I want to thank City Council for the investments made in July 2022, which have resulted in significant strides in recruiting and retaining quality officers and other non-sworn staff to support the residents of East Palo Alto. Your investment in our police department exemplifies how much you value our community safety