Minneapolis City Council reviews police recruitment strategy

MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) - Minneapolis city officials are reviewing its police officer recruitment strategy as the Minneapolis Police Department works to bolster staffing.

Background

Since the pandemic and 2020 riots, the department has fallen below staffing required under the city charter, as many officers retired and new officers became harder to find.

In March, the department launched an aggressive ad campaign aimed at bringing in new recruits. Last year, the department also offered a "retention incentive" to keep good officers on the job.

The city charter requires the city to employ 1.7 officers per 1,000 residents. With a population of nearly 430,000 residents, that means the city is required to maintain a force of about 731 officers.

As of August, the city only had about 570 police officers. However, Minneapolis city leaders said in August they had seen a 45 percent increase in officer applications, with more than a 1,000 new applications by August. In 2023, the department only saw 697 applications for the entire year.

Digging deeper

Earlier this year, the Minneapolis City Council's Administration and Enterprise Oversight Committee directed staff with the city auditor's office to review recruitment efforts by other cities.

During Tuesday's meeting of the committee, city staff went over their findings.

Comparing to other departments

Staff compared Minneapolis police's hiring efforts to other major cities, including St. Paul, Duluth, Cleveland, Seattle, Austin, Texas, and Baltimore.

The analysis found other cities were offering large incentive packages to lure in new candidates. Austin offers $15,000 plus education incentives, tutition reimbursement up to $3,000 per year, and a bonus for bilingual pay.

Baltimore offers a $10,000 academy graduation bonus, $5,000 in tuition assistance, a referral bonus, relocation assistance up to $12,000 and a $2,500 property tax credit for officers who live within the City of Baltimore.

Minneapolis, however, covers degree and certification tuition and will pay an officer's gym membership.

Challenges for MPD

The report from the auditor's office identified some challenges for Minneapolis when it comes to officer recruitment:

• Candidate pool: Staff says there is a "degree of regionality" when it comes to recruiting officers in Minnesota. Minneapolis isn't pulling from a nationwide candidate but mostly rather officers in the area. The struggle is to bring these officers to Minneapolis police versus other departments in the region. Another focus for the department is to increase the number of women on the force, aiming to get to hit a goal of 30 percent of the recruitment class being women. Currently, in 2024, women make up 15 percent of applicants.
• Resources: What's available for officers? What training or unique roles are available for officers?
• Data: There isn't a lot of data available to show what is working for hiring.

Potential options

The report also looked at areas the department could improve to bring in more recruits.

• Increase partnerships and pathways opportunities. The report highlights how St. Paul uses the Partnership for Your Success program to bring in former military members.
• Consider incentives to bring in new officers.
• Get increased feedback from candidates, allowing for the department to continue to refine its recruitment process.