Mission Statement

The Oakland Police Department is committed to reducing crime and serving the community through fair, quality policing.

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SERVICE IMPACTS & EQUITY CONSIDERATIONS

Reductions

Community Safety, Prevention & Healing

1. Freezes 93.0 FTE vacant Sworn positions, which will reduce the department’s Sworn authorized staffing to 710.0 FTE positions. The 710 Sworn police positions funded in FY 2023-24 are 16 fewer than the 726 Sworn police positions funded in the FY 2022-23 MidCycle Budget. Patrol makes up the majority of OPD’s operations and will have 29.0 fewer funded FTEs, but other units that will experience their funded FTE decrease are: Criminal Investigations (28.0 FTEs), Crime Reduction (21.0 FTEs), Traffic (14.0 FTEs), and Community Resources (1.0 FTEs).
   • Equity Consideration: Black residents and other residents of color are disproportionately impacted by violent and serious crimes. The loss of police officers may result in significant increases in response times to Oakland residents, depending on the involved police unit.
2. Freezes 19.0 FTE vacant professional staff positions, which will reduce the department’s professional authorized staffing to 332.5 FTE civilian positions. These vacant positions are 1.0 FTE Account Clerk I, 4.0 FTE Account Clerk II, 1.0 FTE Administrative Assistant I, 4.0 FTE Complaint Investigator II, 1.0 FTE Complaint Investigator III, 1.0 FTE Crime Analyst, 1.0 FTE Criminalist II, 1.0 FTE Latent Print Examiner II, 2.0 FTE Payroll Personnel Clerk III, 1.0 FTE Police Communications Dispatcher, Senior, 1.0 FTE Police Evidence Technician, and 1.0 FTE Police Services Technician II. This freeze lowers staffing in Internal Affairs, Human Resources, Fiscal, Patrol, Crime Analysis, and the Crime Lab. With the department unable to hire and fill these vacant positions, these units will have to handle their ongoing workload with current staff capacity. Depending on the volume of work, this freeze may result in an increase in the amount of time it takes to complete internal investigations, slower processing of DNA and sexual assault kits, fewer analysts who are able to provide tactical overviews of problem crime areas, and a slower internal response to personal-related matters for OPD employees.
   • Equity Consideration: Black residents and other residents of color are disproportionately impacted by violent and serious crimes, especially unsolved crimes. The reduction in possible staff dedicated to solving these crimes will lower the department’s capacity to support these residents and their families.
3. Reduces OPD’s Sworn overtime budget by 15% across the entire department. Patrol makes up the majority of OPD’s operations and uses most of the department’s overtime budget, but other units that use overtime and will be impacted are the homeless outreach unit, human trafficking operations, and violence prevention. Overtime is primarily used to support staff changes between shifts or cover the additional time major crimes take from responding police officers. It is also used for other patrol-related and mandatory administrative tasks for both Sworn and civilian staff, including following up on leads, surveillance, writing warrants, attending special events, completion of public records requests, attending recruiting events, and more. The department will be monitoring its OT use and what units it authorizes for OT to ensure that it meets this reduction.
   • Equity Consideration: Reduction in overtime may result in an increase in police response times to calls for service. Vulnerable populations, including Black and Brown people in the areas most impacted by violent crime, small business, and unhoused residents, will be impacted the most from a slower police response. The area that has had the most prostitution activity, or the “Blade,” is Beat 19, which was the most violent beat in the city in 2022.  Human trafficking was one of the major drivers of this violence. Reducing overtime will impact the department’s ability to respond specifically to incidents that occur in Beat 19 while also covering the rest of the city. Department Management will be assessing and prioritizing its OT usage to provide OT to the most critical functions, including combating the violence that occurs around human trafficking because that is a major racial equity issue in Oakland.
4. Reduces the number of police academies in FY 2023-25 to three (3) in FY 2023-24 and three (3) in in FY 2024-25. With an average monthly Sworn attrition of five (5) police officers, a reduction in academies increases the possibility may result in OPD falling below the number of officers needed to address the public safety needs in Oakland. However. current projections estimate that the number of filled Sworn positions will be higher over the Biennial Budget than in the current fiscal year. In prior years, the department has had a minimum of two police academies a year but has budgeted up to four police academies a year.
   • Equity Consideration: Depending on the department’s ability to retain its current police officers, having less police academies could impact OPD’s day-to-day operations. Newly graduated police officers tend to work in Patrol. With fewer academies, the risk that OPD may not be able to keep up with its monthly attrition grows as does the possibility of increased response times for calls for service because less police officers are on duty. Due to violent crime occurring disproportionately in the most under-resourced areas of the city, response times to critical incidents is the primary way that OPD can most directly address the safety of Oakland’s BIPOC residents.

SIGNIFICANT BUDGETARY CHANGES

FINANCIAL INFORMATION

POSITION INFORMATION