Funding for new state troopers debated
Published: February 21, 2010
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share thisHARRISBURG - Bucking a trend, the Pennsylvania State Police is one of the few state agencies where new hiring is being considered to fill vacancies created by retirement or attrition.
An exception is being made for the gray-uniformed troopers who patrol state highways and provide law enforcement coverage to many towns that lack their own police forces.
Gov. Ed Rendell has proposed spending $5.1 million in fiscal 2010-11 to train a class of 100 trooper cadets at the state police academy in Hershey.
Some argue that 100 new cadets won't be enough to plug holes in the troopers' ranks.
The Pennsylvania State Troopers Association suggests a class of at least 200 cadets is needed, but it would be better to have a class of 300 cadets.
"We project that our ranks could be as much as 300 troopers below our authorized complement by the end of this fiscal year," said PSTA president Bruce Edwards. "Further, our force is entering into a four-year period when we will have over 1,500 troopers eligible for retirement."
Normally, about 150 troopers leave each year, Edwards added. A cadet class lasts six months, but it takes a full year before a successful applicant is in the field.
Col. Frank Pawlowski, the state police commissioner, told House lawmakers last week he expects discussions about the proper class size to continue during the coming months.
A potential spike in trooper retirements is one of several factors that determine the size of a cadet class. The agency wants to have jobs waiting for cadets to step into when they graduate from the academy. Tragically, openings were created when two troopers died last year while on duty. Trooper Joshua D. Miller, of Pittston, was mortally wounded last June during the high-speed chase of an armed suspect in flight with his kidnapped son.
The debate over the class size comes as lawmakers debate whether municipalities should be charged an annual fee if they rely on law enforcement protection from the state police because they lack their own police department.
Tough fiscal times led 14 additional municipalities to request full-time state police coverage and seven municipalities to seek part-time coverage since 2008. Most requests came from local officials in western Pennsylvania, said agency spokesman Jack Lewis.
The agency was able to keep up with these new coverage demands because service calls for troopers decreased two percent last year, Pawlowski told the House Appropriations Committee. It fits a trend where violent crime is on the downswing.
House lawmakers are weighing various bills to charge fees based on the population of a municipality receiving coverage. The Senate is considering a bill to deprive municipalities without police departments of the local one-half share of fines from tickets issued by state troopers in that municipality. The bill sponsors want to earmark an estimated $4 million to $5 million in relinquished fine revenue for a second cadet class.
While the class size is debated, the state police have taken on additional duties in recent years, including providing law enforcement at the slots casinos, conducting background checks of purchasers of firearms and investigating reports of terrorism.
For example, the Firearms Records Unit conducted the highest number of background checks last year - more than 237,000 checks for handguns and more than 267,000 checks for long guns - since it was created early last decade.
Contact the writer: rswift@timesshamrock.com
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