Cops Flee PD

Two centuries of experience vanished form the police department as 10 veteran cops retired in June, joining an exodus of both younger and older cops.

Thirty-four cops have either retired or resigned so far in 2018, compared to 31 in all of 2017, according to the department.

That leaves the department with 389 cops and 106 vacancies out of 495 budgeted positions, according to Police Chief Anthony Campbell.

The exodus has two main causes:

• Other departments have been poaching young cops by offering as much as tens of thousands of dollars more per year and better benefits to work in lower-crime communities. So far in 2018, six cops — Ross Von Nostrand, Jinette Marte-Vasquez, Anthony Tarantino, Keron Bryce, Tyler Zajac, Jazmin Delgado —have left for departments ranging from Hamden, New York, Newington, and Meriden, and (in Von Nostrand’s case) the federal Drug Enforcement Agency. Click here and here to read previous articles detailing the poaching.

• Some cops with more than 20 years of service — especially if they support families — felt they couldn’t afford not to retire. That’s because they may end up paying tens of thousands of dollars more for health insurance after they retire, unless they retire now. The cops have been working without a contract for two years now. Negotiations have failed to produce a new contract; last week the police union voted 291 – 4 to reject the city’s last best offer. So for the first time since 1978, the police contract will go to arbitration. And most observers predict that the city will succeed in eliminating a current $525 cap on monthly health premiums for retirees.

And, Police Chief Anthony Campbell predicts, the exodus may have only just begun.

Retirement Rush

In June alone, Capt. Patricia Helliger, Lt. Elisa Tuozzoli, Lt. Darci Siclari, Sgts. Albert McFadden, Jr. and Eric Scott, Detectives Von Norstrand and Jeffrey Goodwin, and Officers David Rivera, Elvin Rivera, John Palmer, Leslee Witcher, and Steve Silk all put in for retirement. Many specifically identifiedthat the contract uncertainty as the reason.

Another 31 cops are eligible to retire. On Dec. 7, 37 more will become eligible.

Based on conversations with Campbell, the police chief anticipates another wave of retirements. Arbitration may take six months to two years, based on previous history; if it happens more quickly, he expects cops to rush to hand in papers before the health care change takes effect.

“People are applying for jobs right now. I know they are. They’re getting their resumes done. They don’t like this uncertainty,” Campbell said Monday.

Mayor Toni Harp and other officials have said the city is in a squeeze: It needs to offer cops better pay and benefits to keep them. But the city has entered a financial crisis, with limited money available for raises or benefits improvements. Some, like retired Assistant Police Chief John Velleca, have suggested slashing the size of the force, arguing that the city doesn’t need expensive walking beats to keep crime down. Harp responded on her ​“Mayor Monday” program on WNHH FM that walking beat-focused community policing has kept down the crime rate, and the city can’t afford to sacrifice that.

“Crime is down; that is a great thing. Part of the reason crime is down is we had 439 officers at our peak over the past couple of years. Walking beats. Project Longevity interaction. With a reduced police force, some of it is going to suffer,” Chief Campbell agreed. ​“This city is accustomed to a certain style of policing. They’re accustomed to high visibility.”

Police union President Craig Miller said cops are feeling dispirited by the lack of a contract and stagnated wages while they work hard to cover staffing shortages.

“We’re working double shifts. I talked to one guy last night — he worked double shifts three nights in a row. We’re running on fumes,” Miller said.

Miller said the the city’s last best contract offer shortchanged the cops, especially in light of raises for other city employees : ​“I felt betrayed. I felt insulted when the other unions received higher percentage increases than us — and then they turned around and gave raises to executive management and confidential employees after they told us they didn’t have the money.” He said that had agreed not to ​“litigate” the contract in the press, so he didn’t want to divulge the specifics of the city’s offer beyond saying it contained lower raises than those given the other units and the top execs.

Young And Outward Bound

Meanwhile, suburban departments are aggressively luring away cops from New Haven as early as two or three years after they graduate from the academy.

Consider the class that graduated from the academy in March of 2015. It had 35 original members. Ten already left for other departments by the end of 2017, according to the city’s human resources office. The list includes some early standout officers, like ​“Cop of the Week” Tiffany Ortiz, a New Haven native. Ortiz went to work in Norwalk in 2017.

New Haven minted another 59 new officers in 2016. Eight of them have already left the department, according to the human resources office’s records.

Cops who leave after less than three years on the job must reimburse the city $4,000 toward the cost of their training — which in reality costs the city more like $60,000. They’re often happy to give considering how much more money they’ll be making elsewhere, and in fact their new departments often cover the cost as a sweetener.

New Haven cops start at $44,400 a year. Officer salaries top out at $68,287. Hamden starts cops at $76,000. They earn $83,000 after four years. Cops there also get better medical and retirement benefits than New Haven cops do.

How can New Haven compete?

Campbell said he stresses to potential applicants that New Haven offers a more challenging and interesting career to cops interested in tackling homicide and sexual assault investigations, serving on SWAT teams, cooperating with feds on big cases.

Campbell said he hopes to replenish some of the empty ranks with two upcoming police academy classes, with a total of 72 approved recruits. Campbell delayed the first class, originally scheduled to start last week, to launch an internal affairs investigation following the revelation that two officers had filed false background check reports. (Those two officers were among those who resigned in June.) Campbell said Monday that he anticipates being able to start that class by the end of July now that the internal review is almost done.

But ultimately, Campbell argued, ​“the city has to make a decision: Do you raise more taxes to ensure that you have an attractive salary for your officers and benefits for your officers?

“Many people get into this for public serice. At the same time they have families and student loans and debts to pay. In New Haven you’re doing hard-core police work. If you can go somewhere else and get $20,000 and more to do work that isn’t as risky or as challenging, that’s a huge incentive. You’ve got a family and kids looking to spend time with you and go to college and have bills” to pay.