Arlington Police Groups Urge County To Approve Bigger Pay Raises For Officers

ARLINGTON, VA — Arlington County is proposing a nearly $2 million increase in its police department's budget, with most of the additional money going to higher salaries for police officers.

The proposed increase in police funding for fiscal year 2023 is coming nearly two years after the start of a nationwide movement that called for a shift in spending from police departments to other community services.

Groups that represent police officers in Arlington, however, do not think the county's proposed boost in funding, which includes a 6.5-percent salary hike for police officers, is large enough.

The Arlington Coalition of Police and the Arlington Police Beneficiary Association want the Arlington County Board to approve an across-the-board 10-percent pay raise for police officers in its FY 2023 budget.

The police groups say officers are leaving the Arlington County Police Department at an "unprecedented rate" and that the department cannot fill the vacant positions quickly enough.

“A major factor that contributes to our ongoing vacancies is our inability to compete with other local jurisdictions in terms of pay and compensation,” the Arlington Coalition of Police and the Arlington Police Beneficiary Association said in a news release Wednesday.

Arlington’s proposed FY 2023 budget calls for a police budget of $74.49 million, up from an adopted police budget of $72.61 million in the previous fiscal year. The 6.5-percent salary increase would cover police officers below the rank of lieutenant.

Police officers would be getting a larger salary increase than most other Arlington County employees. Under the proposed budget, all general employees in the county would receive a 4.25 percent salary increase.

The police unions' call for a 10-percent across-the-board salary increase comes as a decline in staffing is forcing the Arlington County Police Department to make changes to the way it delivers services to the community. Currently, the department has authorized 376 sworn police officers. As of Tuesday, the department had 290 certified and functional police officers, Arlington County Police Chief Andy Penn said in a statement.

As a result of fewer employees, Penn said it is necessary to implement service adjustments to prioritize the department's workload in alignment with the department's key initiatives of Crime Prevention and Control, Community Engagement, Transportation Safety and Employee Wellness and Safety.

Arlington County is going through a review process on its proposed $1.47 billion FY 2023 budget. On Tuesday, the county board held a public hearing on the proposed FY 2023 budget. In addition, a budget wrap-up is scheduled for April 7, followed by final budget decisions on April 21 and final adoption on April 23.

At Tuesday's public hearing, criminal justice and police reform advocates expressed concern with the county's proposed police budget increase.

READ ALSO: Arlington County PD Adjusting Services Due To Smaller Workforce

Jeff Feng, who lives in the Rosslyn area, argued that Arlington County should not increase its police budget "to address so-called recruitment problems."

“We do not need more police officers. This is an incorrect problem to be addressing," stated Feng, a member of the DeFund NoVA Police coalition who was speaking on behalf of the Northern Virginia branch of the Metro DC Democratic Socialists of America.

Another speaker told the county board that there are other tools aside from increasing police budgets, like greater funding for community services and neighborhood revitalization, that can be used for crime-fighting.

"I believe the resources spent on policing could be better spent serving community needs," Nathan Goodman, an economist who lives in Arlington, said in his comments to the county board. "They could be used for public health, infrastructure, libraries, food, parks, environmental cleanup, or any number of other projects. Many such projects can also reduce crime."

Goodman also spoke out against Arlington County police officers receiving additional compensation for serving in the department's civil disturbance unit and SWAT team, as proposed in the FY 2023 budget.

"One of the most troubling parts of the proposed budget is increased spending on the SWAT team," he said. "SWAT teams are emblematic of the militarization of the police."

After the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in May 2020 put the national spotlight on police departments and the criminal justice system, Arlington County Manager Mark Schwartz appointed a Police Practices Group that recommended the creation of a Community Oversight Board, a public body charged with advising the board on how to improve transparency and accountability in the Arlington County Police Department

The Arlington County Board welcomed the recommendation and approved the creation of a Community Oversight Board in July 2021. Last week, the board appointed nine members to the board. The oversight board will accept complaints about the police from the public, review ACPD investigations into police conduct, and work with the community to improve its relationship with the police department.

But police reform and accountability efforts are losing momentum as crime rates increase in parts of the country.

In his State of the Union address on March 1, President Joe Biden criticized the “defund the police” movement, saying that he wants to “fund the police.” On Monday, he released a federal budget proposal calling for more money for local law enforcement programs.

"The national narrative on policing has made it difficult to recruit and retain officers across the nation, not just in Arlington County," the Arlington Coalition of Police and the Arlington Police Beneficiary Association said Wednesday.

The pool of people willing to enter the profession has dwindled, and police departments in the D.C. area are all competing for the same applicants, the groups said.

"ACPD’s employment offer is being turned down by qualified candidates who instead choose other local jurisdictions with better starting salaries," the groups explained. "This is a new phenomenon that ACPD has not faced in the past."

Unlike Arlington, the City of Falls Church took immediate action, giving its officers a 12-percent across-the-board salary increase that went into effect Jan. 1, 2022, according to the groups.

At a budget town hall on Thursday, Falls Church City Manager Wyatt Shields said the city's police department had dropped 25 percent below its full staffing levels last September. But the city's police department had returned to full staffing levels by March, Shields said.

According to data provided by the Arlington Coalition of Police and the Arlington Police Beneficiary Association, the current annual minimum salary for an Arlington County police officer is $57,179 and the annual maximum salary is $96,762. In Falls Church, the annual minimum salary for a police officer is $58,492 and the annual maximum salary is $98,556.

The groups are calling on Arlington County to increase the annual minimum salary for a police officer to $62,897 and the annual maximum salary to $106,439.

"We are not asking for an increase to make us the best-paid department in the area, just one to make us competitive," the groups said. "A 10% across the board increase would put us into the top 6 for each category, making our pay structure more comparable to the agencies that recruits have chosen over us in the recent past."

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