Facing a shortage of officers, the Palo Alto Police Department is upping its recruiting game by offering bonuses of up to $25,000 on top of starting salaries that range from $100,000 to $119,000.

Though budgeted for 92 officers, the department currently has only 71 on the force. Five new officers will be joining in coming weeks and four others after completing police academy, which will leave the department 12 shy of being fully staffed.

Lt. James Reifschneider said just about every police department in the state is short on officers, which creates a competitive atmosphere. He said it is normal to see fewer applicants when the economy is doing well and there are more lucrative opportunities in the private sector.

Reifschneider said that in his 12 or 13 years with the department, it has never been fully staffed and there sometimes have been even more openings than now.

“Normally, it’s not into the double digits like it is now,” Reifschneider said. “But we’re not at crisis stage. This is not completely unheard of.”

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Filling the gaps has led to officers working overtime and forced the department to shift resources as it prioritizes where they’re needed most.

The department’s traffic enforcement team, made up of a sergeant and three motorcycle cops, has been working patrol shifts instead.

The department also has one detective working fraud and identity theft cases where it used to have two and two detectives working on burglaries where it used to have three.

The $25,000 bonus is available to experienced officers moving in from other agencies. Reifschneider said the bonus “makes good financial sense for the city” because it saves from having to train new officers. The city pays a reduced salary and benefits to recruits while they go through six months in the police academy. Then it’s another four months of in-house training and evaluation before the new officer goes out on normal patrols, he said.

The department also is offering $10,000 bonuses to applicants who have already graduated from a police academy

Both bonuses will be paid for out of savings from unfilled positions.

Reifschneider said the department has offered hiring bonuses before, most recently 10 years ago.

“This is a more generous hiring incentive than we used 10 years ago,” he said. “We think it’s generous as compared to the incentive being offered by other agencies in the state, but not totally out of the same ballpark as what other agencies are offering.”

The city also is hiring five new dispatchers, which would give it a full staff of 20. The starting wages for dispatchers range from $34.30 to $44.34 per hour.

Reifschneider attributes the high number of Palo Alto openings to retirements and departures for other departments or different career fields altogether.

In addition to battling other agencies for officers, the department has a limited pool of potential hires.

“We’re always competing with other police departments for a finite pool of folks,” Reifschneider said. “Only a fraction of the folks who fill out applications with us to be an entry-level officer are going to ultimately get to the point where we can even make a choice to hire them. And that’s for a variety of reasons.”

Many applicants might lack qualifications. Others may not be able to complete the written exam or physical fitness test. Some don’t apply because they have criminal records, although there are exceptions to that rule if past offenses are not serious or recent.

“If we’re talking about a very minor criminal offense that happened some time ago, then they may not be precluded from applying,” Reifschneider said.

Reifschneider said the industry has seen a drop in applicants in recent years as police conduct has become a hot topic.

“I can’t speak to the mindset of applicants who choose not to apply,” he said. “… I can tell you anecdotally that the volume of applications in recent years is down. Whether that’s attributable to economic factors solely or some other things, I don’t know.”