SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Law enforcement agencies across the nation and in the Sacramento region continue to see staff shortages.
The Sacramento County Sheriff's Office is down about 100 deputies. They are hoping that, through recruitment events and incentives, they'll be able to hire enough officers to fill the gap.
"We're trying every avenue we can... whether they're job fairs, military bases, college campuses. We're trying everything," said Sgt. Amar Gandhi, spokesperson for the Sacramento County Sheriff's Office.
Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper spoke about the problem during a joint hearing of the Assembly and Senate Public Safety Committees this week on Prop 36.
Sheriff Cooper explained why they can't respond to every call for service.
"I'm down 100 (deputies), so everybody is down. And they're doing signing bonuses up to $100,000. No one wants to be a cop. The legislature made it harder. Now, you have to have a degree in two years, so it is tough to hire in this environment," Sheriff Cooper said.
"Staffing shortages are real and sometimes response times are delayed depending on the certain types of crimes. Things are prioritized. Obviously, when you've got a crime against personal safety, those are going to take precedence over a property crime," Sgt. Gandhi said.
He added that the agency is largely losing deputies to retirement and are trying to fill that hole. They're running four academy classes a year.
"Right now, we're in one of those waves where we're looking for a lot of people in a short amount of time, and then what happens 20, 30 years down the line, is that you have a wave of retirements. And that's kind of what we're going through," Gandhi said.
After graduating from the academy, Gandhi said deputies make over $100,000 a year with incentives.
Gandhi said the recruitment challenges stem from a combination of things, including potential recruits not meeting qualifications or the rigorous training. That also includes, for some, the stigma surrounding law enforcement.
The California Highway Patrol is also dealing with staffing challenges.
"We're definitely down a very large number of officers, and it probably started back when COVID hit and it stalled our hiring process. But it didn't stall our retirement process, so we started losing officers and we were already playing catch up. But now, it's probably doubly as bad," said Officer Ruben Jones, a spokesperson for CHP Valley Division.
The agency launched a campaign in 2022 and continues their mission to fill 1,000 officer positions, but the exact number of officers they're down is unclear.
The CHP added an extra academy class to bring them to a total of four classes at a time, but Jones said they still can't keep up with retirement.
However, there is some good news. On Friday, the CHP will add 119 new officers to the force. They told ABC10 this is the largest class since the inception of their ongoing campaign to hire 1,000 new officers.
After graduating the CHP Academy, officers make a base salary of up to $117,000.
The CHP said their academy takes 26 weeks and the sheriff's office takes around 25.
To learn more about what it takes to be an officer, click here to view the CHP's recruitment page and click here to view the Sacramento County Sheriff's Office website.
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