Momentum - Business to Business Online Magazine MOMENTUM September 2018 | Page 18

Q: What is one immediate goal you have as chief?
A: One of the things that we’ve done over the last several
years is try to bolster our recruiting capabilities. We’ve
done that through a number of different things. The first
thing we started doing a few years back was launching an
actual recruiting campaign; created a recruiting video, and
started putting it on billboards. We really pushed out
farther than we ever had before. From there, the next thing
we started was creating a signing bonus. If someone was a
police officer in another agency for three years or more,
and came in here and successfully completed their field
training program, they would get $2,500. When they
finished their year of probation, they would get another
$2,500. So it was a $5,000 signing bonus in the first 12
months just for coming in.
The next thing we started supporting is we changed our
local civil service rules which allowed certified officers from
other agencies come in to test, they would end up
automatically moving to the top of the list as certified
peace officers with their test grades. Not that it really makes
a tremendous difference, because typically we exhaust the
list each time we do it anyway, but did that as well.
We also started looking at why we were not getting as
many people passing as possible that were taking the
written test, as it’s written at a 12th grade education level;
and is a reading comprehension test. I realize that some
people have test anxiety and issues along that line and so
we created a pre-test orientation where they can sign up
and attend 6 weeks out before the test. They come in and
the officers explain to them, beginning to end, what they
can expect the day of the written test. They walk them
through the process and tell them exactly what they need
to look for and, at the end of that, they will answer any
questions that they may have that may deal with the
background issues that people have concerns with. Once
that is complete, they are given the opportunity to go
through the physical agility and are put through exactly
what they do on the day of the test to see if there is
anything that they can improve on over the next several
weeks prior to the test.
On the other side of things, we went from having 19
openings last year down to 8, and I now have a very large
list to select from. I can fill those 8 and potentially hit into
the +6 that council has allowed me to go over hiring for
and I hope to be that by January. Now that we are able to
fill these positions, I’m able to fill all the slots I had that were
open in the different positions. That will include a crime
analyst back into position, which will allow us to move
forward with intelligence led policing. Those guys can use
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MOMENTUM / September 2018
data-driven information so that we can send reports to
our people in the field to know where it is that they
need to be at the time to catch the bad guys in the hot
spots that we’re dealing with. The gentleman moving in
that position will start in September. He’s been going
to training for the last two years, preparing and getting
ready for that move.
We are also putting together a drone program so we
will have a fleet of drones that will be available to us
once we get our policies in place and get our people
trained.
Q: Tell us what you like to do in your spare time
A: I like to play golf, although I don’t play it too well.
I’ve also just recently fostered and adopted a shelter
dog, and am enjoying spending time with him.
Thank you Chief Ratliff.
DEVEREUX TEXAS
SUPPORTS OUR
FIRST RESPONDERS
Rising waters, evacuations and damage — through
it all, you stood with us. Thank you for going above
and beyond to protect our community during
Hurricane Harvey.
WE WILL ALWAYS BE THANKFUL!
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