The New Orleans Police Department has resorted to hiring civilians to do detective work, among other things, as the police struggle to keep up with the crime rates that have marked the city as the homicide capital of the US.
The city faces a shortage of officers amid the spike in crime, which has forced authorities to relax hiring requirements and hire civilians to help with service visits and administrative tasks.
Police officials have announced that police presence is no longer required for things like fake phone calls, medical calls, certain theft cases, lost animals and car accidents on private property, leaving citizens to deal with them.
NOPD Superintendent Shaun Ferguson announced the changes on Tuesday, also indicating that the department has changed hiring policies around credit scoring and marijuana use to bolster its strength.
“My message to you – to those of you who may have been disqualified in the past, I urge you to reapply as some of our hiring criteria have changed,” Ferguson said.
New Orleans Police Superintendent Shaun Ferguson, center, spoke about the new plan for the police and confirmed they will have “civilian investigators to collect that evidence”
The department hopes to move officers to city patrols to deter crime, and placing civilians on administrative duties will free those officers to do so.
The plan, which was implemented on Sunday, is partly intended to reduce the average response time of 11 minutes in the city
The citizens who apply must undergo a training program and background check before being hired. The civilian staff will mainly take phone calls, but some will be asked to go out on the field.
“If we take calls, there may be evidence to collect with that call,” Ferguson said.
“We will have civilian investigators to collect that evidence instead of an officer having to go out and collect that evidence,” he added.
The plan, which was implemented on Sunday, aims in part to shorten the average response time of 11 minutes in the city, which was negatively impacted by the force that lost 150 officers last year.
The department hopes to move officers to patrol the city to deter crime so investigators aren’t stretched so thin, and the 50 to 75 civilians they plan to hire will help with that.
“If we have that visibility, we hope we’ll be able to prevent further crime and that would be less than our investigators need to track, but it’s a balance,” Ferguson said.
Many of the changes recommended were highlighted in a report by New York Police Department’s Fausto Picardo, who was hired as a consultant to NOPD.
Picardo’s report says: “Action must be taken now if there is ever a chance to save the city and its reputation as a city where tourists can come to party and celebrate without falling victim.”
New Orleans recently passed St. Louis as the nation’s murder capital, with a 78% increase in homicides this year
The current plan recommends introducing incentives for current officials, such as student loan forgiveness and mortgage help, but that will come with a huge $80 price tag.
The report also calls for a chief of staff within the NOPD who would help manage day-to-day operations.
Picardo also recommends several incentives for officers, including take-home cars, student debt forgiveness, and mortgage relief — though the price tag on those is a whopping $80 million.
New Orleans criminologist Peter Scharf, who has studied crime and policing in the city for decades, said the cost is a big risk: “It’s a huge investment, and (if) it doesn’t work, then we’ll all have $80.” million spent on a plan that was ineffective.’
But Scharf also admits the city is “drowning,” and the report is “our last hope.”
“Now it’s time to make sure we’ve thought this through carefully and get a document that’s impeccable. Let’s move forward,’ he said.
New Orleans recently passed St. Louis as the nation’s homicide capital, with a 78% increase in homicides this year from September 11 and a 121% increase in homicides in 2019.