Two hires sworn in but shortage remains
The Beacon City Council on Tuesday (Jan. 21) approved the hires of police officers Derek Sherman and Ryan Cross, with Mayor Lee Kyriacou swearing them in moments later.
Sherman, 21, and Cross, 31, will report on Feb. 3 to a 21-week training course at the Rockland County Police Academy, followed by three months of field training with Beacon police. If all goes well, both officers will join a Beacon patrol squad before the end of the year.
Isabella Nocerino, whose hire was approved by the council in August, will graduate Feb. 6 from the Dutchess County Law Enforcement Academy. Nocerino, 21, participated as a teenager in the city’s Youth Police Academy and, throughout high school, the Town of Fishkill police cadet program. She should be on patrol by summer.
Once Nocerino joins the Police Department, which is budgeted for 36 officers, including Chief Tom Figlia, it will have eight openings, with two more patrol officers out with injuries.
Like all law enforcement agencies, the Beacon department has long dealt with the comings and goings of officers, but since 2020 the shortage has grown more chronic, and costly. Officers are retiring soon after reaching 20 years of service, City Administrator Chris White said. At the same time, the city in 2024 paid nearly 25 percent more overtime ($1,032,233) than budgeted ($842,233) to meet its contractual agreement with the police union to have at least four officers on each shift. That minimum has been in place since at least 2006, when Figlia was hired as an officer.
Beacon officials have implemented several policies aimed at stemming the tide. In 2023, the council approved a plan allowing officers to “sell back” unused vacation days, rather than “burning” them, which often forces other police to work overtime to cover shifts. Kyriacou included $1,000 “retention” raises for all municipal staff, including police, in the city’s 2024 budget and, in August, the council authorized additional 5 percent raises for police, an effort to bring their salaries closer to those of neighboring jurisdictions. To boost morale, the city also began renovations Thursday on the police station’s locker room and gym, facilities largely unchanged since being constructed in the 1990s.
Last month the council approved another measure, a $5,000 signing bonus for officers making lateral transfers from the state police to Beacon. A $5,000 bonus is also available to Beacon officers who refer transfers to the city. The program was authorized for 2025 only but could be renewed if it’s successful.
“Our thought was: If we establish this incentive, it helps to offset the imbalance in salaries with some of the municipalities that surround us,” White told the council in December.
According to figures provided by the city, a patrol officer in Poughkeepsie reaches the top pay of $106,414 after four years of service. In the Town of Poughkeepsie, it’s $117,266 after five years. In Beacon, a patrol officer would hit the ceiling of $98,553 after six years. Last year’s 5 percent raise brought the number to $103,481. It grew to $106,068 this year with increases already in the union contract.
“We are in crisis,” White said. “Unless we get some more bodies in the door, it’s really hard to staff.”
It’s not just Beacon. The New York City Police Benevolent Association reported in 2023 that New York City had 3.5 percent fewer officers than a decade earlier. Statewide, police forces shrank 23 percent, the most in the nation, between 2022 and 2023.
Figlia acknowledged this week that the murder of George Floyd in May 2020 by a Minneapolis officer amplified the anti-police sentiment that had been brewing nationwide since at least 2014 due to high-profile killings of Black Americans by police.
Figlia began investigating complaints filed against Beacon police in July 2020. In that time, he said he has investigated 32 complaints, the “vast majority” of which involved either discourtesy or improper handling of a call, and, in most cases, officers were found to have acted consistently with policy.
Three of the complaints involved use of force, with video evidence showing that officers reacted to suspects’ actions, used reasonable force and acted in a manner consistent with protocol, Figlia said. None of the suspects were injured.
Yet, while only 0.29 percent of the Beacon department’s 8,416 calls for service in 2023 involved any physical force, “when a profession doesn’t have the same shine on it that it once did, that’s going to impact people wanting to go into that profession,” the chief said.
Not only is it costly to run a police department short-staffed, it adds logistical challenges. It can be difficult scheduling training sessions, Figlia said, because there aren’t always enough bodies to do the training while covering shifts.
And as officers’ mental well-being has come under the microscope, a younger generation of recruits “less apt to gobble all that overtime up” has emerged, he said. Case in point: When police investigated a shooting on Mill Street in October, Figlia was called in on a day off to direct traffic, among other responsibilities, at the scene.
White said Thursday that he hopes to soon bring a transfer candidate to the council for consideration. “Having an officer say, ‘Hey, I moved to Beacon; it’s a great department, we have spaces and there’s a sign-on bonus,’ might help us get some momentum here,” he said.
