Recruitment and retention lessons for the New Orleans Police Department

Since Hurricane Katrina, resignations from the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) have increased, and the department went more than a year without recruiting enough candidates to justify a police academy training course. The authors present practical recommendations for change that could help the...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Rostker, Bernard
Other Authors: Hix, William M., Wilson, Jeremy M.
Format: eBook
Language:English
Published: Santa Monica, CA Rand Gulf States Policy Institute 2007, 2007
Series:Rand Corporation monograph series
Subjects:
Online Access:
Collection: JSTOR Open Access Books - Collection details see MPG.ReNa
Description
Summary:Since Hurricane Katrina, resignations from the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) have increased, and the department went more than a year without recruiting enough candidates to justify a police academy training course. The authors present practical recommendations for change that could help the NOPD improve recruiting and retention. Issues addressed include the lack of affordable post-Katrina housing, the fact that the families of many police officers no longer live in the New Orleans area, the destroyed departmental infrastructure, and a budget that does not provide enough resources to meet basic needs. They focus on compensation, including housing; the promotion process and the career management system; recruiting; the mix of officers and civilians; and ways to improve the morale of the NOPD. The recommendations, which are specifically tailored to the unique circumstances of the NOPD, include (1) using civilian employees, where appropriate, for jobs currently being performed by uniformed officers; (2) developing a proactive recruiting program; (3) offering some of the city's housing stock in-kind to police officers or selling the property and using the proceeds to improve compensation; (4) increasing the frequency of promotion examinations; (5) eliminating the backlog of promotions to higher levels in the department; (6) restructuring compensation to attract recruits and retain serving officers; (7) establishing a first-responders charter school; and (8) rebuilding the police infrastructure to improve morale
Item Description:"MG-585-RC"--Page 4 of cover
Physical Description:xi, 35 pages
ISBN:1281181099
9781281181091
9780833041425
6611181091
0833041428
9786611181093