Union Gap might pay bonuses to attract veteran police officers

YAKIMA – The Union Gap Police Department wants to lure new officers from other agencies with signing bonuses to save time and money in filling vacancies.

The Union Gap City Council will consider a proposal from police Chief Greg Cobb on Monday to offer up to a $3,750 signing bonus to “lateral hires,” a term for hiring officers who hold similar positions in other towns. New hires would also have their previous policing experience used to calculate their starting pay and benefit amounts, which would be more than if they were completely new to the field.

Of the city’s 17 commissioned officer positions, Cobb said, there are currently just two vacancies. But training new officers can be costly and time-consuming because they are required to train at a state academy, he said, and those programs last up to five months because of a backlog in trainees.

After the academy, Cobb said, new hires could spend the same amount of time training locally before they are ready to go into the field.

“With a lateral hire, we could put them in the field in a matter of weeks,” Cobb said by phone Friday.

New officers are paid salary and benefits while going through training, while at the same time Cobb said the department is accruing overtime costs to cover the shifts they’ll eventually be assigned. He said it takes 12 to 14 months before a new officer is ready to be placed in the field alone and can cost up to $81,000 over that period.