Be A Cop. Write Your Own Ticket

On a recent Thursday morning, a troop of shorts-clad men were jogging around the track at Indiana University's campus in Indianapolis. Standing in uniform on the sidelines, police officer Jim Ritter barked some unusual words of encouragement at one of the stragglers. "Remember, $50,000 a year!" he shouted, clapping his hands. "That's the motivation. Keep it going!"

Ritter, 39, a recruiter for the Seattle police department, wasn't kidding. Faced with a diminishing pool of local applicants, he has spent the past year visiting a dozen cities in hopes of filling his agency's 70-plus annual openings. He is touting competitive salaries and diverse assignments--from narcotics to a mountain-bike patrol--to lure cops with itchy feet.

Seattle is only one of dozens of cities facing a decline in police recruiting. National statistics tracked by the Department of Justice are grim: in the past three years, New York City has seen the number of its applicants plummet from 32,000 to 15,000; in the next five years, Minnesota expects to retire half of its police forces statewide. The aging of baby-boomer cops is partly to blame. So is the profession's tarnished reputation in incidents ranging from the racially charged 1991 Rodney King beating in Los Angeles to the recent wilding incident in New York City's Central Park, where assaulted women claimed cops did nothing to help them. Recruitment has been especially difficult among minority candidates. "You used to see a line around the block with people applying to be an officer," says Eric Adams, co-founder of 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care. "Now that line doesn't go around the room."

But as in the case of teacher shortages in many cities, the major culprit is salaries that haven't kept pace with those available elsewhere in a hot economy. Says Bill Frio, head recruiter for the Los Angeles police department: "We really didn't have a problem increasing our numbers until the economy just went gangbusters. And at that point, we realized that we're in competition with major corporations that can offer kids stock options."

Since January, the L.A.P.D. has sent recruiters from New York to Honolulu on a 30-stop barnstorming tour, touting the California climate and a competitive starting salary: $41,000, plus a $2,000 relocation bonus. The department wants to add 1,000 officers to the 9,600 it now employs. Recruiters for the N.Y.P.D. spent $10 million last year on advertising that they say nabbed 1,500 new hires who will enter the police academy this September. The Seattle police have snared a high-profile ad agency to create glitzy sayings like "Bungee Jumpers at Space Needle. A job like no other. In a city like no other." Recruiters in Springfield, Mo., have assembled a network of college criminal-justice professors to help attract student candidates. They've even invited the teachers on ride-alongs. And Springfield's police have also upped their presence on the Internet, posting positions on sites like https://jobs4police.com .

If Seattle's Indianapolis test is any indication, police recruiting efforts are resonating. Experienced cops came from as far as Virginia and North Carolina to take the agency's written and physical exams. Some applicants said they were drawn by the prospects of better lifestyles or more challenging police work. But that $50,000 starting salary was also a powerful draw.

Officer Ken Robinson, 36, drove from Lawrenceburg, Ind., for the Seattle police test. Originally from Washington State, Robinson left a $14.70-an-hour job as a construction worker to become a cop. "I took a 50% cut in pay to come here, where I'm risking my neck for $8.70 an hour," says Robinson, a former Marine and father of two. Before moving in 1994, Robinson had made inquiries with the Seattle police department, but there were no openings. Now the recruiters are coming to him.