Recruiting will be ‘very difficult’

Growing tensions between police and civilians in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd and others, has some experts warning that it will be a struggle to attract new recruits.  

Former New York City Police Commissioner Bill Bratton tells Yahoo Finance’s The First Trade that recruiting will be “very difficult,” particularly from minority communities because of “all the anger directed toward police and even existing black officers who are trying to protect and serve being described as Uncle Tom. So, for minority officers to join policing at this time, it’s going to be a very difficult decision.”

Bratton, who also served as the top cop in Boston and Los Angeles during his 50 years in law enforcement, predicts we’ll see a wave of officers retire from the force as the country debates the role police officers should have within communities.

 “I think you’ll see a surge this year in early retirements,” Bratton said. “Similar to after 9/11, you’re going to see a lot of New York cops leave.”

Recent budget cuts and calls for defunding the police has led some cities to impose a hiring freeze for their police departments. New York City Council has recently proposed a big budget cut to the NYPD. 

Bratton says the lack of new hires will “ironically” impact minority communities the most.

“It is one of the side effects – one of the negative side effects – that very few people are looking at. But it is going to be very problematic in the long run, in the sense of having police departments look much more like the communities they serve when if, in fact, those communities are vilifying the police so much that nobody from their community is going to want to serve.”

Alexis Christoforous is co-anchor of The First Trade on Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter @AlexisTVNews.

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