"Dan
McCay of the Journal wrote an excellent article on December 14, 2014
detailing the manpower crisis within the Albuquerque Police
Department. Mr. McCay's article unfortunately did not answer one very
important question; Why did APD go from 1,100 officers in 2010 to 884
officers in December 2014? Answer this question and Albuquerque can
start to fix their police staffing problems, without getting PERA and
the State of New Mexico involved. But does Mayor Berry want to know
this answer?
Here
is what happened, in early 2010 newly elected Mayor Berry got rid of
the Senior Police Officer Retention Bonus program. This program did not
involve PERA and was run in-house by the APD. An audit of this program
in 2012 showed that 129 APD officers delayed their retirements to take
advantage of this program. Once Mayor Berry ended it, those 129
officers retired. In 2010 Mayor Berry set aside the labor agreement
that had been agreed to between Albuquerque and the APOA. APD officers
subsequently went five years without any pay raises, and the raises that
were promised were taken away by Mayor Berry. More APD officers then
retired because who wants to stay working for a city that won't honor
it's own contract? In 2010 Mayor Berry changed APD hiring standards to
require sixty college credit hours to become an APD
officer. Immediately, the hiring pool for APD shrank, just like it did
in 2001 when past Mayor Jim Baca tried the same requirement. APD, which
under the old standards, would have Academy classes of over fifty
cadets, saw this number shrink to less than twenty. Several times since
2010 APD would graduate only ten new officers. With cadet classes
lasting six months it was easy to see that APD Recruiting was not
keeping pace with retirements. If Mayor Berry thought this college
requirement would bring in more actual cadets he needed to raise the pay
accordingly (college graduates), but instead he took away pay and for
five years refused to sign a labor contract with the APOA. The college
requirement excluded candidates who, instead of going to college, went
to work. These non-college applicants showed they could keep a job,
support a home and family. Under the college requirement at APD,
proving you were a mature worker and a stable part of the community
didn't matter, all Mayor Berry wanted was sixty college credit hours,
this even includes degrees in Liberal Arts and Culinary Arts!
Now
you have your answer as to why APD has lost over twenty five percent of
its’ police officers since 2010. Poor policies by Mayor Berry at the
beginning of his tenure as mayor has come back to haunt us now. And
what is the biggest problem with APD? Mayor Berry's refusal to accept
responsibility for his actions and his refusal to change
direction. Mayor Berry finds it easier to blame PERA and others instead
of looking in the mirror and seeing that he created this mess."
Thank you for your service Sergeant Klein. And our Eyes inside APD tell us that the exodus within APD is not stopping with the mere offering of cash to those who are eligible to retire. One would think by now Berry-Alcalde would know that you can't pay somebody enough to risk their life everyday while at work. So what's causing these retirements must be something other than money.......
