Plans call for hiring 150 new officers, and using civilians to fill administrative jobs currently assigned to cops, freeing them to patrol. A recently launched program will allow retired officers to serve as Police Assistants to handle some non-patrol jobs, allowing more sworn officers to be redeployed, Wiley said.
Police Commissioner Ricardo Moore, a Detroit cop for 10 years, said at least 550 new officers are immediately needed.
“I thought more was going to be done during the bankruptcy to immediately bolster the police department, but we haven’t seen that,” he said.
The city’s post-bankruptcy plan calls for a $114.2 million increase to the police department’s $315 million budget by 2018.
Something needs to be done now,” Moore said. “If you have only one or two marked units working in a precinct, that’s a safety issue for the officers as well as the citizens.”
The vast majority of people who apply to become Detroit officers are rejected because of criminal records, unpaid tickets and other issues, Stair said. Last year, of the 2,462 who applied, only 131 were hired.