GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Green Bay’s police chief has put in a request to use $150,000 of the city’s federal COVID-19 relief funds to help recruit and retain officers.
Chief Chris Davis didn’t request more officer positions in the budget because the department can’t fill the jobs it has.
With police departments dealing with shortages nationwide, Green Bay is looking to pay potential new officers up to $10,000 in moving expenses to come here.
“We did this in a contingency model because it’s really hard to predict exactly where we will get new hires from,” said Davis.
Out of 187 police officer positions, Green Bay currently has nine vacancies.
Davis wants to allocate $100,000, over the next two years, to pay for the moving expenses of new recruits. Any unused money would be added to the $50,000 Davis wants to spend on professional development, in an effort to retain the officers the department already has.
It’s a plan Mayor Eric Genrich says he’s on board with.
“We’re sending out the invitation far and wide to all highly qualified officers. We’d love for them to be working in the City of Green Bay.”
Alder Chris Wery first proposed the idea of using federal COVID relief funds to help recruit officers.
“They don’t have to be a rookie coming in. Sell it. Really sell what we have in Green Bay, especially to other officers across the country who might be willing to move.”
In an effort to be more efficient with what’s already on hand, Chief Davis says he’ll be using the next year to evaluate the department.
“Look at where we are, look at where we want to be and where there is a difference, that is where you need resources added.”
Davis says he wants to devise a data-backed stance incase he needs to ask for more resources next budget. This year, he became police chief while the budget process was already underway.
Genrich says the city will likely consider all the various requests to use the federal COVID money at once.
At the end of the month, a city committee will discuss a resolution that lays out the framework for how the city’s $23.7 million from the American Rescue Plan should be used.
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