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Police departments struggling to hire black officers


WPMI--Police departments struggling to hire black officers
WPMI--Police departments struggling to hire black officers
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Right now a lot of police departments are having a difficult time recruiting black officers.

Many of them are retiring and recruitment efforts to replace them are complicated.

There are more than 18-thousand police departments in the U.S. and a lot of those departments are becoming less diverse.

On Monday we reached out to Charles Ward, he’s the former Director of Public Safety for ALEA and is currently Ozark’s Chief of Police.

Ward says in general that it’s hard to find officers for law enforcement agencies across Alabama and the country.

Ward says there are a few different reasons on why there's low turnout for black recruits.

Chief Ward says a lot of the recruits are turned off of being a police officer because of the scrutiny in the media and politicians constantly making law enforcement a campaign issue on whether you’re pro or again law enforcement.

Some critics also say the process is too slow and weighted toward candidates who have family members who were on the force.

According to the Atlantic some blacks are hesitate to work on a police force when they feel there’s institutionalized racism within the organization.

Some even blame the “defunding of police” movement to a lack of black recruitment.

Meanwhile, a lot of departments are doing everything they can to hire African Americans.

Some law enforcement officers and executives have been going into schools, colleges and community events to try and recruit more black officers.


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