The
Phoenix Police Department has been awarded a $3.75 million grant by the
U. S. Department of Justice’s Community Oriented Policing Services
(COPS) Universal Hiring Program. The program helps law enforcement agencies
pay for the salaries and benefits of new officers. The City Council must
first approve receipt of the grant before the money can be accepted. It
is expected that this will be presented to the Council in September.
“Under the COPS grants, we have an opportunity to hire additional officers to enhance and build upon our community policing efforts,” said Commander Kim Humphrey of the Public Affairs Bureau. “We actually like to call our community policing philosophy “Phoenix Policing.” This reflects our unique style of working with our community partners, residents, and businesses to make Phoenix the safest major city in the nation. With 50 officers added to our force, it will help us keep up with the constant demands for service particularly in the area of Homeland Defense. In these times, we value our community based efforts and want Phoenix Policing to be the type of policing we can all be proud of."
This is the 3rd COPS grant the Department has received. In April 1995, the Phoenix Police Department received a COPS Universal Hiring Program grant in the amount of $48,900,000 to hire 651 officers. 471 of those positions were filled. In July 2000, a second grant was received of $22,500,000 to hire 300 officers. 119 of those positions have been filled. The grant will expire on May 31, 2006.