成人X站

Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell took a victory lap on Monday, celebrating a surge in recruitment applications to the police department. He said the city has hired or re-hired 60 new officers, which is up considerably from last year’s total of 84 new hires.

“Public safety is what the people in Seattle want. So as we calibrate and balance our budget, that is a lens by which we will make decisions,” Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell said.

But the mayor left out important context that makes the numbers less impressive.

Why are Seattle Police Department applications up?

As of April, the department lost 25 officers, including seven so far this month. The city projects losing roughly 80 officers by the end of the year, but hiring or re-hiring 177.

There are undoubtedly more applications and new hires than in prior years. Raising the salary in 2024 helped attract new applicants. But Seattle Police Officer Guild (SPOG) president Officer Mike Solan says the data comes with an asterisk.

“Yes, we have a rise in applicants at really good levels. But that is due to the region in and of itself. All these agencies use a recruiting app that potential candidates, who want to get into the field of law enforcement, can basically do a shotgun approach on this app to apply to a number of different agencies (at the same time),” Solan noted on “The Jason Rantz Show” on KTTH.

Solan noted the numbers are also higher because of “lessening the standards…to get bodies in the door, especially if they’re boasting about the application process.”

Applicants can’t pass the polygraph?

Solan said SPOG welcomes the recruitment urgency. But it is also “deeply concerned about some of the backgrounds” of SPD applicants.

“There are some applicants who cannot pass a polygraph exam, and they are put forward in the application pool to continue the process,” Solan explained.

He noted that there have been nationwide problems with police recruits having drug problems or even gang affiliations. The Seattle Police Department did not respond to a request for comment by publication.

Previously, Snohomish County Sheriff聽Susanna Johnson said applicants to law enforcement agencies are hoping to become cops to join departments they think were dismantled and rebuilt after the influence of the Black Lives Matter movement.

鈥淭hey don鈥檛 realize that yes, we need compassionate and intelligent people, but we also need people that are able to defend themselves, and in cases where force is necessary to affect an arrest or protect another person, we do find that some people are not capable of that,鈥� Johnson explained to 鈥淭he Jason Rantz Show鈥� on KTTH. 鈥淭hat is kind of eye-opening, even though we try to insulate and we try to vet, and we do training before the Academy.鈥�

An aging Seattle Police Department

While the efforts to recruit new officers are welcome news, even with a sense of urgency, the Seattle Police Department may find itself in a larger staffing crisis. The department is aging.

Nearly 30% of the department is over 50 years old. Nearly 26% are 51 years old or older. At 53, depending on the length of service, officers are for retirement.

With only 847 deployable officers as of the end of April, if even a fraction of those eligible for retirement decide to leave, it’s unlikely a successful recruitment campaign would be able to make up for the departures in the short term. With the current staffing, Solan and many officers have routinely complained that precincts across the city are routinely operating below minimum safe staffing levels.

“You’re supposed to have 11 people. There are instances, more often than not, where we only have four or five across the entire precinct. And that’s what people don’t understand,” Solan warned.

Listen to The Jason Rantz Show on weekday afternoons from 3-7 p.m. on KTTH 770 AM (HD Radio 97.3 FM HD-Channel 3). Subscribe to the聽podcast here. Follow Jason on聽,听听补苍诲听.