Short on staff, Oakland police will reassign community resource officers to patrol duty

"Since 1996, the Oakland Police Department has assigned several officers to develop relationships and solve problems in specific neighborhoods corresponding with their geographic police beat. Known as community resource officers, they attend monthly neighborhood council meetings and help residents with towing abandoned vehicles, responding to sideshows, preventing home break-ins, and lots more. Unlike patrol officers, community resource officers do not respond to 911 calls, focusing instead on their assigned beats."

"In the next few months, OPD's nine community resource officers will be reassigned to patrol duty to cover vacancies currently filled by overtime, according to multiple sources interviewed by The Oaklandside. A spokesperson for OPD confirmed the reassignment but said the dates are "yet to be determined." The department blamed its attrition rate of five to six officers per month - the number of officers who quit, retire, are fired, or leave OPD for other reasons - for the reassignments."

""This move will prioritize officers' assignments to department essential functions in patrol, criminal investigations, Ceasefire, and Internal Affairs," an OPD spokesperson wrote in an email. This isn't the first big change at the police department in recent weeks. In mid-September, OPD announced that six motorcycle officers were being reassigned to patrol, effectively disbanding the traffic enforcement unit. Yuliya Rzad, co-chair of the Golden Gate Neighborhood Council, said that her area's community resource officer broke the news during a Sept. 17 neighborhood council meeting."

Since 1996 Oakland Police Department assigned community resource officers to develop neighborhood relationships and solve local problems within geographic beats. Community resource officers attend monthly neighborhood council meetings and assist residents with towing abandoned vehicles, responding to sideshows, preventing home break-ins, and other local issues. Community resource officers do not respond to 911 calls and focus on assigned beats, with workloads informed by volunteer neighborhood councils. In the next few months OPD will reassign nine community resource officers to patrol duty to cover vacancies currently filled by overtime. The department cited an attrition rate of five to six officers per month and delays in holding the police academy. The move aims to prioritize patrol, criminal investigations, Ceasefire, and Internal Affairs assignments.

Read at The Oaklandside