Jeff Inorio, a South Tucson Police Department lieutenant, is one of only 14 field officers patrolling the streets of South Tucson. He works five eight-hour shifts per week now, limited by budget cuts.
When someone from his squad calls in sick, he has to work twice as hard and is spread thin trying to protect South Tucson, he said.
“It’s a struggle,” Inorio said. “When someone calls in sick, it affects us dramatically because we don’t have the resources that bigger cities have.”
Thanks to a $186,012 grant from the federal COPS Hiring Recovery Program, the South Tucson police force now has more stability. The grant pays for STPD to hire an additional officer, providing funding for the officer’s salary for three years.
“The grant makes all the difference in the world for a department our size,” Inorio said. “With the economic times, we’ve taken a hit; everyone’s literally not sure what’s going to happen in the future.”
“One extra body on the street makes a difference for public and officer safety,” Inorio said.
South Tucson City Manager Enrique Serna said hiring an additional officer would not have been possible without the grant.
“The position is definitely a shot in the arm for us,” Serna said. “This additional surveillance is critical to our community.”
That is exactly the aim of the COPS Hiring Recovery Program said Gilbert Moore, spokesperson for the grant.
“STPD and other agencies are all facing a lot of challenges: they’re asked to do more with less, to respond to all kind of issues, all while the tax bases are decreasing,” Moore said.
The program, which received an allocated $1 billion from Congress, reviewed more than 7,000 applications. Only 1,046 police departments received funding nationwide. In Arizona, 13 agencies were granted about $12.6 million to hire 56 officers. Out of those 13 Arizona agencies, four were from tribal police forces, including the Tohono O’Odham Nation.
STPD is waiting for the award letter from the federal program but is looking to hire one of several officers who are currently on reserve.
South Tucson asked for seven officers to be funded through the grant. They received one. Many departments, such as the Pima County Sheriff’s and the Tucson Police Department, were denied funding.
Ideally, Moore explained, the grant would help the police departments through the tough economic times for the initial three years of the grant, enabling the city to come up with funding.
“Like the rest of the country, we have faith in the system, and we’re hopeful that four years down the road we’ll be well on our way to recovery,” Serna said. “Like all other communities, we’ll be in a much more sustainable situation.”
The selection process was tough Moore said, with program coordinators looking to stretch the funding as much as possible while helping those programs most in need.
STPD was ranked number one in Arizona for need, based on three factors.
The most important factor, according to Moore, was the fiscal health of the community, which included issues like the poverty rate, tax base and foreclosure rates.
The other two factors, the crime rate and amount of community policing, were about half of the total index.
“South Tucson was hit with a double whammy,” Moore said. “In addition to poor fiscal health, South Tucson had a high crime rate, one of the highest in the country and certainly the highest in Arizona.”
The largest allocation in Arizona was given to the Mesa Police Department. They received $5.8 million to fund 25 officers.
