According to a new report from DOJ's Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program, a recent study shows the first-ever national decrease in law enforcement positions in 25 years. "Across the country, mayors, sheriffs, and chiefs have been asked not only to do more with less but to make painful budgetary cuts," Attorney General Eric Holder said in a speech at the recent International Association of Chiefs of Police Conference in Chicago.

"According to a new economic outlook report that our COPS office released this week, we expect that by the end of this year, nearly 12,000 police officers and sheriff's deputies will have been laid off."
Some grim facts from the COPS office study:

*By the end of the year, it's expected that nearly 12,000 police officers and sheriff's deputies will have been laid off.

*Approximately 30,000 law enforcement jobs are unfilled.

*An estimated 28,000 officers and deputies have faced weeklong furloughs in 2010.

*An estimated 53 percent of counties are working with fewer staff today than just one year ago.

Another key finding in the COPS study is the massive increase in police functions being performed by civilians, or non-sworn personnel.
Forty three percent of respondents to the survey reported that they increased the use of volunteers as a means to compensate for budget reductions."

"Another fundamental alteration that has been seen in delivery of police services as a result of the changing economy is the increased application of non-sworn individuals - both as employees and as volunteers," the study reports. "More and more police agencies have begun to shift some of the responsibilities that have traditionally been performed by sworn staff to civilian personnel as a means to mitigate payroll costs and maintain staffing levels.

Further, some agencies have even engaged citizen volunteers to help alleviate the strain on police work loads.

Such approaches can provide sworn staff with more time to focus on pressing and time-sensitive issues that can only be successfully managed by a law enforcement officer."

Sadly, this could be the end for the COPS program. It's become a target for fiscal conservatives in Congress.

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Constable
written by Texas border cop, January 28, 2012

I was a deputy that was laid off this past dec actually dec 31,2011' it hard out here and the jobs are not near home or the pay isn't anywhere close to what I made. Yet my dept is hiring young guys and letting us with experience go, doesn't make sense. They say they are cheaper to hire and pay, so it's not just economics its todays thinking is wrong no more loyalty.

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