Oakland gets $4.5 million to hire more cops

Mayor Jean Quan thanks Oakland police for all their hard work at a news conference, attended by Rep. Barbara Lee and Associate Attorney General Tony West, announcing a federal grant to hire more officers. Mayor Jean Quan thanks Oakland police for all their hard work at a news conference, attended by Rep. Barbara Lee and Associate Attorney General Tony West, announcing a federal grant to hire more officers. Photo: Lacy Atkins, The Chronicle Photo: Lacy Atkins, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 4 Caption Close Oakland gets $4.5 million to hire more cops 1 / 4 Back to Gallery

The U.S. Department of Justice awarded Oakland $4.5 million Tuesday to hire 10 police officers, bolstering a force that has struggled to battle rising violent crime while decimated by cuts.

The city - which has one of the nation's most understaffed police departments, according to government data released this week - received the most money among 263 cities and counties across the nation that were given the three-year grants.

Officials said the officers, when hired, would be deployed to the city's crime-plagued eastern neighborhoods.

"I want to assure our federal officials that these dollars will be well-used," said U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, at a news conference to announce the grant in the courtyard of the Ronald V. Dellums Federal Building in Oakland.

Associate Attorney General Tony West, an Oakland resident, said the funding program was designed to address "major issues like homicide, gang crimes, gun crimes, youth violence and crimes against children."

The Alameda County Sheriff's Department got $2.2 million to hire eight deputies. Vallejo was awarded $1 million to hire four officers, and East Palo Alto and Hayward each received $250,000 to hire two officers.

In Hayward, the new officers will work on school campuses, interacting with student and combatting gang violence, said Hayward Police Chief Diane Urban.

Oakland received similar federal grants in 2009 and 2011 that funded a total of 66 officers. Still, the city currently has 614 officers, down from an all-time high of 832 in 2008.

The department wants to have 700 officers within two years, said Officer Johnna Watson, an Oakland police spokeswoman.

An FBI report released this week showed Oakland's police staffing remained low when compared to other big cities challenged with high crime rates. In 2012, Oakland had 1 officer for every 638 residents. Detroit had 1 officer for every 275 residents, and Baltimore had 1 officer for every 211 residents.

"We're in the process of trying to grow the department," said Sean Whent, the city's interim police chief. "So this allows us to do it quicker, by either hiring lateral officers (from other agencies) or increasing the size of our police academy."

Whent said he hopes to offset attrition from officers who move on or retire. Referring to the plan to put more officers in East Oakland, he said, "Our No. 1 priority is reducing violent crime, so we put the cops where the violent crimes occur."

New officers graduated from the Oakland police academy in March, and 36 more will graduate Friday. Of those, Mayor Jean Quan said, more than half are minorities and a quarter are women.

Two more academies will begin later this year, and two more next year, Whent said.

Don Link, a North Oakland resident active in neighborhood community policing efforts, welcomed news of the grant Tuesday, saying more officers would deter criminals.

"If you're thinking about robbing somebody and you happen to see a cop working on the street, it's likely you're not going to be able to do that," said Link. "Every time we bring new officers on line, it allows the department to behave more as it's organized to do."