SOUTHERN COLORADO — Policing in Southern Colorado looks different than it did just five years ago. Some jurisdictions are below their ideal number of officers and are stretched thin, using technology to recruit and retain the officers they have. While the size, funding and resources for Colorado Springs Police and Pueblo Police differ, there are similarities in how the two departments take on the same challenges.
At 819 sworn officers, Colorado Springs Police expects to achieve something few departments nationwide have done. It is on target to meet authorized strength next year but already, it is not enough.
"So the 819 is our authorized strength, right? So right now, and we're hoping to increase that in January of 25 and I think we need to look when we forecast out for many, many years," said Chief Adrian Vasquez.
Now, the department plans to increase that number to 839. Instead of having the total sworn officers determined by the population of the city they serve, Vasquez wants to see it calculated by the number of calls for service his department receives. In part, he says, that's because of how the population of Colorado Springs is spread out.
"You have to drive a great distance to get to a call for service ... Someplace like New York that has 33,000 or 35,000 cops, they have a police officer on every corner responding very quickly, right? So it's not a fair assessment," he said.
CSPD got more than 267,700 calls for service last year, according to the department's data. And the chief says he is already reassessing how many more officers they will need since calls for help are increasing as our community grows.
Not every call for help is answered immediately. In Pueblo, Chief Chris Noeller says his 189 sworn officers are feeling the strain, working for a department authorized to employ 231 officers and handling 144,000 calls for service last year.
"That's an immense workload … Before I came down and did this interview, I looked and we have 23 calls holding. With manpower the way it is, those calls wait until we have an officer who's available to go on those calls," he shared with News 5.
But hiring enough officers is no easy task. Fewer people want to be police officers than they used to; a fact that law enforcement agencies across the country are facing. As a strategy to avoid losing candidates during the waiting time between academy classes, CSPD and Pueblo Police have pivoted to holding smaller classes multiple times a year.
"So since July, and then every 15 weeks since then, we've started a new academy. And we've been able to maintain, and usually we start somewhere between 34 and 36 people," Vasquez says.
On average, CSPD sees five retirements a month, so Vasquez is focusing on retention. In Pueblo, Noeller says he needs more qualified cadets.
"I think the last group we hired, we had four out of that 74 that we could actually hire. Now, I could try to hire some of those others, but they're not going to perform the way we need them to. They have background issues. They have drug use issues. They have issues passing the psychological and obviously, I don't want to be in a position as the chief or a community member of this city where we're hiring officers that are going to cause problems," Noeller said.
To work in either department, applicants must be 21 years old, cannot be a felon or have been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence, or have been convicted of a misdemeanor that would conflict with the Colorado Police Officers Standards and Training. Some departments nationwide have lowered their standards to afford them more qualified applicants in the hiring process. Colorado Springs Police is not one of them.
"We've really tried not to change the qualifications, because we believe that having very qualified people really helps lessen the impact when it comes to officers doing things incorrectly," Vasquez said.
To apply to be a CSPD officer, applicants must have a minimum of 60 hours college credit or an associate degree. Vasquez says his department is working with Pikes Peak State College to allow for more college courses to transfer over to his department.
In Pueblo, the minimum requirement for applicants is a high school diploma or GED. Noeller says he puts a premium on home-grown officers who know and care about the community.
"I think education is important. But I think it's also important in our community to give people that are born and raised here an opportunity to come work and serve the citizens of the city. And not everybody in Pueblo has an opportunity to go to college," he said.
The departments are competitive in their starting salaries for police recruits who have graduated from a training academy. New hires for CSPD start at $64,992 a year and police in Pueblo earn a starting annual salary of $71,471.
Pueblo is having a harder time bringing in new talent and Noeller says that is due, in part, to Colorado law.
"Changes the legislation. Changes in what we're allowed to do as police officers, as far as who we can put in jail, who we can't how the laws are enforced. Changes in those criminal codes have made a lot of people opt out of the of the profession," Noeller said.
To offset some of patrol officers' work, Pueblo PD is considering investing in three drones next year to act as first responders and assess fender benders and small incidents. CSPD is looking into technology that transcribes body camera footage to save officers time doing paperwork. Noeller says if and when there is community consensus on what is wanted out of police officers, the clearing of the existing gray area will make recruiting easier.
"One thing we've got to do as a country is decide what it is we want out of our police. And I think our job is to improve the quality of life of the citizens of Pueblo for my community and to put bad guys in jail. That's my job. We need to do it with with respect. We need to do it the right way, but that's what I get paid to do. And if we as a society decide that that's what we want our cops to do, and we're going to support our cops when they do it and not support the people that act out and don't do what the cops ask them to do, we're going to start attracting more people into this profession."
Both chiefs say they are pleased with the most recent budget allocation for their departments and can achieve what they need to with what each city is offering them.
___
City of Colorado Springs Shares Updates on William Palmer Statue Intersection
Making a left turn. At the intersection around the William Palmer Statue in Colorado Springs, it's anything but straightforward. The city recently shared updates on what could be in store for the future, but we will have to wait and see.
____
Watch KOAA News5 on your time, anytime with our free streaming app available for your Roku, FireTV, AppleTV and Android TV. Just search KOAA News5, download and start watching.
