The San Francisco Police Department is hitting up four Texas universities as part of a recruitment effort that goes beyond its borders.
Beginning Wednesday, representatives from the San Francisco Police Department are scheduled to test potential recruits at Texas Southern University in Houston, Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Prairie View A&M University, and Texas A&M University, Corpus Christi. The department had presentations at the four campuses earlier this month.
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‼️?SFPD IS COMING TO TEXAS?‼️
Come join the San Francisco Police Department for ONE DAY TESTING!
For any questions about this event please contact us by phone, email, or DM. Hope you can make it!! #sfpd #joinsfpd #police #sanfrancisco #sf #california #ca pic.twitter.com/2IbL0zJWsp
— SFPD Recruitment (@JoinSFPD) September 6, 2023
The candidates will be asked to take a written test, a physical, and take part in an interview to see if they have what it takes to don the uniform. A police spokesperson told the San Francisco Standard that the number of applicants expected this year is 2,104, nearly a 20% increase from last year.
The push to find candidates outside of California comes as the department continues to face a shortfall and criticism mounts from businesses and residents about the growing homelessness and crime problems facing the city. In the past five years, the shortfall has led to the department shelling out millions of dollars in overtime payments. The number of overtime hours logged by officers on the San Francisco police force jumped 54% from 2021 to 2022, according to the City Controller’s Office.
While there has been an uptick in interest in joining the city’s police department after Democratic Mayor London Breed called for a tougher-on-crime approach to San Francisco’s open-air drug markets, the city is still about 600 officers short of the 2,182 recommended in the most recent city-commissioned staffing study, according to the SFPD.
With Breed’s approval, earlier this year, city supervisors agreed to increase the base pay for police officers as well as add retention bonuses, estimated to cost the city an additional $166.5 million over the next three years, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
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While some business leaders such as Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff have threatened to leave the city unless it reins in crime and homelessness, others, such as angel investor and crypto boss Chris Larsen, have spent more than a half a million dollars on a televised ad campaign to lure police recruits to the city.
San Francisco isn’t the only place crossing borders to recruit new officers. Shortages in Maryland’s Prince George’s County have officials turning to Puerto Rico to fill the 350 officer deficit. In addition to planning a trip to the island, the police department has been hitting up parades, running ads in Spanish, and attending events across the country to find officers.
