During the recent State of the Lansdale Police Department, Chief Trail and I outlined the progress the Lansdale Police Department has made over the last year. However, the work of managing and improving a police department is never done. We are constantly looking at ways to enhance our police department to further improve our service to the community. One of the careful considerations that we must make is around the appropriate amount of staffing within the department and when the appropriate time is to add to our ranks.
Historically, since 2002, our Lansdale Police Department has operated with either 23 or 24 officers at any given time, with the department currently sitting at 23 officers. However, almost everyone can agree that the borough does not look like it did in 2002. Lansdale has grown. Our borough has added multiple housing projects that are expected to add to our population total when the census data is released later this year. As such, the Lansdale Police Department must grow with it.
To determine the “right” level of staffing, there are multiple organizations that offer their unique formulas based on officer time per call, volume of calls, population, patrol factors and a multitude of other internal statistics. Together, Chief Trail and I are reviewing these formulas together to see which one makes the most sense for Lansdale. Preliminary data from a few of these formulas suggest that Lansdale, according to the old census data, needs to add officers to our ranks. Nothing in these formulas mandates we add officers, rather they are suggestions that our community would benefit from the added staffing.
So, what does more officers mean in our PD? It means more patrols. It means more time with the community. It means more enforcement in areas that need more focus. Adding officers adds flexibility to the department that we otherwise do not currently have and will help make our department better over time. As I said in my address to council last week, “dollar for dollar, few can argue with the cost per impact each officer has on our community. They celebrate with us, they kneel with us, they empathize with us, and they protect us. Ultimately, the impact of our police department is that they help shape the very community that we are and the community that we hope to become.”
In preparation of the new census data, it is believed that the Lansdale Police Department can, and should, add at least three new officers to our department to continue to keep pace with the size of our community. This would take us from 23 officers today to 26.
I am sure some are asking: “What is stopping us from just hiring more officers?”
Hiring is a process that takes multiple months to complete. Recruits must sit for an exam and interview, then pass multiple background checks and polygraph tests. While this is going on, other departments are hiring new officers as well (many in the same pool), so qualified officers often are hired mid-process, removing them from our list and making us look at other candidates more closely. To add complexity to this process, our current staff may have the opportunity to retire. So, if we hire two or three officers, but two more retire after that occurrence, we have only added one officer to our ranks making adding to the department difficult in a short period of time. We can “add” part-time officers to help fill the gaps, but they can be hired by other departments at any time leaving us short staffed again.
To deal with the coming need to hire, Chief Trail and I are hoping to go through two hiring processes this year. The first is underway currently, which is likely to bring us to 25 officers. It is our hope that in the fall, we will be able to hire two more officers to reach a total of 27. Then, due to the anticipation of losing one officer to retirement, we would reach our desired number of 26 active officers.
This is an investment in our community and goes a long way in helping Lansdale continue to be a great place to live, work, and play.
(Mayoral Musings is a weekly op-ed column submitted to North Penn Now, courtesy of Lansdale Borough Mayor Garry Herbert.)
See also:
Mayoral Musings: State Of The Police Department Presentation Coming Tonight
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Mayoral Musings: Martin Luther King Jr. Day
