By Martin B. Cassidy
Staff Writer
March 11, 2008
After facing a staffing crunch and shortage of qualified
applicants two years ago, the Greenwich Police Department has
netted dozens of eligible candidates for police officer with new
recruitment efforts.
A total of 62 people passed written and oral employment exams in
recent months and are on a waiting list for openings at the
department, according to human resource officials.
This week, police Chief David Ridberg and police will interview
16 candidates for five vacant police officer spots, Ridberg said.
"The numbers are still not huge, but it's a big
difference," Ridberg said. "We've recovered quite
nicely from where we were two years ago."
Ridberg credited increased recruitment efforts by the department,
including visits to college and military job fairs, for spurring
interest in the entry-level police officer position.
"We took a more aggressive hand in our recruiting É and it
seems to have worked," Ridberg said.
The department received 284 applications from October to December
2007, versus 105 during a fall 2006 recruiting drive. Retirements
and attrition caused a staffing crunch by the end of 2006, with
11 officers leaving the department in a short period of time and
the town's list of eligible candidates exhausted.
The department's ranks fell to 143 officers, 13 below the
recommended number of 156, officials said.
The number of candidates seeking to become police officers has
dropped significantly in recent years, Ridberg said, because of
increased competition from other police departments, which have
raised salary and benefits for new officers.
Of the 284 applicants for the job this winter, about half passed
the physical fitness test to qualify to take the written exam,
Mary Jo Iannuccilli, assistant director of human resources for
the town said.
"I think we did pretty well over all with the number of
candidates who qualified for the written exam," Iannuccilli
said. "We had a nice pool of candidates from which to
choose."
Once offered the job, the candidates must also pass a
psychological evaluation, a polygraph test, and pre-employment
physical, Ridberg said.
The starting salary for a Greenwich police officer is $51,837.
Officers earn $65,163 after five years.
At the Norwalk Police Department, administrators also face a
challenge balancing being selective in hiring candidates and
preventing the qualified applicants from going elsewhere, Chief
Harry Rilling said.
Of the 528 candidates who applied for the job last year, only 119
passed both the written and physical fitness tests. About a dozen
of them were hired.
To become more competitive, the Norwalk department is planning to
hold an employment exam every few months to try to cut the lag
between evaluating candidates and offering them jobs.
"With the economy changing the way it is we may start to see
things improving," Rilling said. "However, we have to
be cautious that we don't lower our standards and accept people
who might not fit with the profession."
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