This is the time of the year when the Grand Rapids Police Department begins receiving applications from new recruits. But not this year. Raul Alvarez, public information officer for the department says the current hiring freeze has put the program on hold.
“With the impact of COVID and the unknown that COVID has brought for how many months now the city put in place a hiring freeze in everything else across the board and that included the Grand Rapids Police Department.”
Back in May, City Commissioners voted to spare the program from the chopping block arguing its responsible for recruiting the most racially and ethnically diverse class of police officers. Although the program still exists, Alvarez says the program is suspended for the time being.
“It really is difficult to recruit these future officers in order to continue diversifying the department when there is no money to hire them through the process.”
Currently, GRPD employs 297 officers and has no plans to hire any new officers for the foreseeable future.
