ST. LOUIS — The newest officers with the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department received their badges in a ceremony Thursday night. Nine candidates graduated amid a staffing shortage.
This comes on the heels of the department announcing 124 applicants applied to be a police officer trainee since May.
Mitch McCoy, director of SLMPD's Public Affairs and Information Division, In a news conference the day prior explained these graduates will be partnered with a field training officer for a minimum of 15 weeks. This will give new officers a hands-on experience and have a coach by their side.
Hours before the graduation ceremony, St. Louis Police Officers Association Business Manager Joe Steiger sat down with 5 On Your Side.
"It's great, we are happy that we're seeing an uptick in the interest of becoming a police officer, specifically in the city," Steiger said in reaction to the new wave of applications. "I’m glad they are bringing more people in. Our people on the street need all the help they can get."
Every application is processed with extensive background checks, oral interviews, physical tests and written tests before entering the police academy.
"We're down 350, 340 (officers) from the manning table, which is set at 1,224," he said.
For the latest recruitment class, a police source said 23 came in and nine came out.
Steiger said, "Nine is great, it's not enough." A retired police officer of 22 years, he said some recruits don't pass initial tests for a multitude of reasons.
Once they do pass those tests, they move on to the 32-week academy.
"Once you get into the academy, there is an educational part of it, physical part of it, there are firearm qualifications, you get multiple opportunities to pass these things, and some people aren't fit and it doesn't work out," he said.
Steiger told 5 On Your Side that current officers are maintaining a busy workload.
"The biggest impact is in patrol. I mean, people who are leaving, people are overwhelmed and overworked are coming into work with 15, 20 and 30 calls backed up," he said. "It’s nonstop, and you’re going from call to call a lot, and these are traumatic events that officers are dealing with."
He admits that with staffing numbers low, morale is too.
"I can tell you when they come in here on their meeting days, the officers who are working on the street every day ... the morale is not high, they are still feeling it, they are stressed out, they are overworked, they are asking for help. That's a constant occurrence here," Steiger said.
He said believes morale has bumped up with a recent pay increase. Because of that pay, he said some soon-to-be retirees are staying for better pensions.
"Pay will go a long way," he said. "You have to be competitive with pay, and if you’re not, we’re going to always be struggling trying to retain officers."
Steiger said once they increased pay, so did neighboring departments.
These are the numbers for starting pay according to their websites:
- For the St. Louis Metropolitan Department, it's $53,196.
- For the St. Louis County Police Department, it's $57,616.
- For the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office, it's $58, 344.
- For St. Charles County Police Department, it's $64,135.56.
So far this year, he said 50 officers have left due to retirement or for other departments. Last year, 140 left in total. Years prior, he said they lost more than 200.
He said he believes the pay increase is helping with retention but worries about a wave of soon-to-be retirees leaving within the next year.
Now, the focus is on recruiting and retaining.
"Enticing people to stay and once you get them here, hopefully, you can improve things and make morale better and get some more bodies on the street," Steiger said.
Right now, some 17 others are on the path to potentially graduating from the academy in November.
McCoy shared this statement about morale:
There are multiple factors that affect how law enforcement is portrayed. Morale in our department is an important issue to SLMPD leadership and something we work on each and every day. Dozens of people have requested to return after leaving for another agency. More than 20 have been approved and we welcome the officers back.