PHOENIX — The Phoenix City Council pledged last year to make their police department the highest-paid police agency in the state.
The council fulfilled that pledge to officers in a unanimous vote Wednesday, as part of a larger goal of attracting new employees citywide and keeping current workers on board.
The city's goal: lowering a 17% vacancy rate for jobs citywide.
The Phoenix Law Enforcement Association agreed to a one-year contract with a 2.16% pay raise for officers, plus a one-time payout of 5% of their salary.
New recruits will start at $70,000 a year. The top of the salary range for officers will be almost $108,000.
Boosting the top of the salary range gives veteran officers more opportunities for raises.
The raises are based on an internal Phoenix "classification and compensation" study that compared police pay by Arizona law-enforcement agencies.
The pay raises for the police union and other employee unions are coming out of Phoenix's budget surplus. City Manager Jeff Barton set aside $114 million for the raises, according to city spokesman Dan Wilson.
High vacancy rates are affecting police service.
According to 12News research, 10 years ago Phoenix had 3,200 sworn officers serving 1.5 million people. That was one officer for every 470 residents.
Today, 2,560 sworn officers serve 1.65 million people. That's one officer for every 645 residents.
"We need growth, we truly need growth," Interim Police Chief Michael Sullivan said in a March interview.
Sullivan said that police staffing had stabilized. But 18% of the Phoenix Police Department's budgeted positions are still empty.
"We'll continue to work very, very hard to do what we can to recruit folks in and make sure that we retain the people that are already here."
The police department is moving toward what Sullivan called "civilianization" - shifting some duties from sworn officers to civilian employees.
Last year, the city council approved the hiring of two dozen "civilian investigators." They are new, non-sworn positions that help reduce caseloads by doing background checks, helping with search warrants, and performing other tasks.
Civilian investigators can't make arrests or carry a weapon.
Sullivan was brought in to deal with a U.S. Department of Justice investigation of police practices.
That investigation of alleged abuses - now in its second year - played no role in the new union contract.