At-large D.C. Councilman David Catania plans to introduce a bill Tuesday meant to force the Gray administration and the police union to develop plans to stop the District’s police force from dwindling to critical levels. The proposal to create a six-member commission to study police recruitment and retention is the latest in a series of measures designed to bolster the number of sworn D.C. officers. There are about 3,880 sworn officers in the department. If the force dips below 3,800, “we’re going to have trouble,” Chief Cathy Lanier has said. In response, the mayor has proposed adding 120 officers next year. Ward 2 Councilman Jack Evans has introduce legislation that would require the department to maintain 3,900 sworn officers.
Catania told The Washington Examiner that his bill will assess the situation before moving forward.
“A number of solutions and remedies have been discussed and proposed in recent weeks,” Catania said Monday. “It makes sense to create an emergency commission … to conduct a thoughtful examination of the contributing factors to the retention and recruitment challenges and propose joint recommendations on how to best address this issue.”
If passed, the bill would require the mayor to appoint three members to the commission, and the police union to appoint three members. The group would then have 90 days to issue a report to the council that will suggest legislative fixes to the department’s retention woes.
The department is losing about 15 members a month to retirement and about 1,000 are up for retirement in the next three years. At that rate, by the time the officers Gray has proposed hiring are trained, the force will be about 100 officers below the 3,800 limit.
On Monday, Lanier said during a Washington Post online chat that she feels the department has “adequate resources” to face rising security threats in the wake of the killing of Osama bin Laden. Lanier said she placed the department on heightened alert and added officers to the streets. She did not respond to a request for comment on Catania’s bill.
Police union leader Kris Baumann said he hopes the commission can find a way to put more officers on the streets permanently — not only when there are concerns about terrorism.
“We need to have this type of effort in every neighborhood, day in and day out,” Baumann said. “The public safety of this city will be damaged if we don’t.”
