After a week of being laid off 18 of the 21 Tulsa police officers are rehired and the city says there’s still a shortage for the Tulsa Police Department.
A Department of Justice grant is providing $3.5 million to rehire the 18 officers.
However, three officers are not back on the force and Tulsa police say Tulsa needs more officers.
FOX23’s Abbie Alford explains with manpower studies showing that TPD is short between 60 and 100 officers, many people wonder how long it will take to see additional officers on their streets.
It’s been a tough week for the 18 officers who are now relieved to be getting their badges back.
“They say it’s a vacation but it’s been stressful for all of us. I know how we have all done. But we have come together and we can share this moment together but it’s been rough,” says Officer Anthony Finnegan.
Their commader says it's been a tough week too.
“It’s been up and down and I am still trying to recover from laying them off from last week and the thing about it is that we are all in this together," says TPD Chief Ron Palmer.
Three officers are still out of a job. They might get some help paying bills through a $49,800 federal grant that Tulsa Public Schools can use to hire private security officers. TPS Police Chief Gary Rudick says security is needed at Memorial, Rogers and McLain High Schools.
However, those officers would not have benefits and no equipment.
"There's some legalities in regarding TPS using our equipment in that capacity," says Palmer.
However, here’s the bigger problem: TPD is predicting it will lose three officers a month to retirement. In 18 months, that’s 54 officers and add the loss of up to 30 new officers, who could have graduated from the academy (the spring 2010 academy was cut from the budget) that adds up to a total of 84 officers.
Assuming the academy is funded in the 2011 budget, the earliest the academy could start is July 1, 2011. TPD says the officers from the academy wouldn’t be ready to hit the streets and fill the officer shortage until May 2011.
That’s on top of manpower studies that TPD is already down at least 60 officers.
One officer wrote on FOX23's Abbie Alford's Facebook page, “It's gonna be a long and tough few years then."
That’s based on what we know now. Chief Palmer says he doesn’t expect it but he admits there is no guarantee there won’t be more officer layoffs this year.
“We don’t believe based on the rest of the fiscal year that there would be additionally lay offs but you never know,” says Palmer.
read more about the city's obligation to pay for the rehired officers on page 2
