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Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE BUREAU OF JUSTICE STATISTICS Advance for Release at 5 P.M. EDT Friday, July 2, 1993 202-307-0784 The nation's more than 17,000 state and local police and sheriff's departments had 840,647 full-time employees as of June 30, 1992, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced today. BJS, a Department of Justice agency, said 603,465 of these men and women (or 72 percent) were sworn officers with general arrest authority and 237,182 (28 percent) were non-sworn civilian employees. "These same state and local law enforcement agencies also employed about 90,000 part-timers, including 39,200 part-time sworn officers," noted acting BJS director Lawrence A. Greenfeld. "During the last six years the number of civilian personnel in police and sheriff's departments has grown about twice as fast as the number of sworn officers, " Greenfeld said. "Between 1986 and 1992, total full-time employment in police and sheriff's agencies grew by 17 percent. This included a 13 percent increase in the number of full-time sworn officers and a 28 percent increase in civilian personnel." Among law enforcement agencies, sheriff's departments had the largest gains--28 percent more full-time officers and 48 percent more full-time civilians than in 1986. Such growth may have been the result of increases in local jail populations--between 1986 and 1992 the number of local jail inmates increased more than 50 percent. Most sheriff's departments operate jails and provide courtroom security in addition to law enforcement functions. Last year 81 percent of the nation's sheriff's offices operated jails, compared to 4 percent of the local police departments and none of the state police agencies. Idaho and Louisiana were the only states in which at least half of all full-time law enforcement officers were in sheriff's departments. BJS said that as of June 30, 1992, there were 17,360 state and local law enforcement agencies, of which 12,504 were local general purpose, 49 state police (each state except Hawaii), These special police agencies (60,926 full-time employees, of which 41,371 were sworn officers), included airport, part, transit, school, housing and public college and university police departments. General purpose local police agencies had 476,193 full-time employees last year (373,024 or 78 percent sworn), sheriff's departments had 224,958 (136,090 or 61 percent sworn) and state police agencies had 78,570 (52,980 or 67 percent sworn). The 25 largest agencies and the number of their full-time employees and sworn officers were: New York City.................35,753 (28,812)sworn Chicago.......................15,008 (12,605) Los Angeles County Sheriff....11,771 ( 7,960) Los Angeles (City)............10,710 ( 7,900) Philadelphia.................. 7,221 ( 6,347) Calif. State Highway Patrol... 8,894 ( 6,062) Washington, D.C. (City)....... 5,750 ( 4,889) Cook County (ILL.) Sheriff.... 5,620 ( 4,801) New York City Transit......... 4,766 ( 4,409) Houston....................... 6,038 ( 4,262) Pennsylvania State Police..... 5,232 ( 4,075) New York State Police......... 4,684 ( 4,013) Detroit....................... 4,463 ( 3,852) Dallas........................ 3,678 ( 2,878) Baltimore..................... 3,352 ( 2,822) Texas (state)................. 5,605 ( 2,789) Harris County (Texas) Sheriff. 3,223 ( 2,731) Nassau County (New York)...... 3,844 ( 2,717) New York City Schools......... 3,000 ( 2,700) New Jersey State Police....... 3,550 ( 2,572) Metro-Dade County (Florida)... 3,607 ( 2,512) New York City Housing......... 2,754 ( 2,481) Suffolk County (New York)..... 2,830 ( 2,328) Massachusetts State Police.... 2,579 ( 2,070) Milwaukee..................... 2,566 ( 2,063) Nationwide there were 24 full-time officers for every 10,000 residents, of whom 15 were local police officers, 5 sheriff's officers, 2 state police officers and 2 special police officers. Excluding the nation's capital, which had 89 sworn officers per 10,000 residents, New York State had the highest per capita ratio of full-time sworn officers to residents among the states--38 per 10,000 inhabitants-followed by Louisiana (34), New Jersey(34), Illinois (31) and Massachusetts (27). Single copies of the "Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies, 1992" (NCJ-142972) as well as other BJS statistical bulletins and reports may be obtained from the National Criminal Justice Reference Service, Box 6000, Rockville, MD 20850. The telephone number is 1-800-732-3277. Data from the tables and graphs used in many BJS reports can be made available to news organizations in spreadsheet files on 5 1/4" and 3 1/2" diskettes by calling (202)-307-0784. END OF FILE ----------- Owning Topic : T=BJS Press Releases - 93 E= 265 Type = e
Date Published: July 2, 1993