Shrinking San Jose Police Department Has Few Recruits For New Academy

SAN JOSE (KCBS)— San Jose is having a hard time attracting new police officers and has only filled 29 of 60 slots in next month’s police academy.

San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed admits that’s not an acceptable recruiting job.

“It’s something to be concerned about. We obviously need to do a better job of recruiting. We’ve had thousands of people interested in taking jobs with the San Jose Police Department, but getting 29 out of 60 is not a very successful recruiting effort,” he said.

Police Union President Jim Unland said San Jose is having a hard time attracting new officers because the city is less competitive with other police departments as a result of the passage of pension reform.

“We’re going to continue to lose cops, we’re going to continue to struggle to put police on the street and our numbers are going to continue to drop,” he said.

Unland claimed the department’s own projections has them losing another 100 police officers over the next two years.

“We’re at a crisis stage now. I don’t even know what we’d call what happens in two years,” he said.

This past week, two city council members proposed modifying the pension reform measure.