Law enforcement training center seeing log jam of new candidates - newschannel20.com

MACON COUNTY, Ill. (WCCU) — While many police departments across the state are shorthanded, police training academies say there are waiting lists to get them.

"We got people knocking on the door to get in," said Deputy Commander Jim Getz with the Macon County Law Enforcement Training Center. "So you hate to tell a police department 'No, we can't get you in,' but right now that is the circumstances we face."

Getz said they are dealing with a log-jam of candidates waiting to get trained in Illinois, with available spots being limited.

"We got a lot of people retiring that started in the mid to late 90s that are now retiring and doing other things. Some departments also didn't hire during the civil unrest," Getz said.

Getz shared how the defund the police movement and COVID-19 pandemic really halted the number of candidates they were seeing.

This came when many departments were under question over budgeting and where the money was going.

Danville Police Chief Chris Yates said now that things are back to normal, it is causing waitlists to be used heavily.

"We have hired for five of the slots we have in the academy, and we will hire an additional five, where I am on pretty much every waiting list in the state when it comes to academies," Yates said.

The issue it causes is when it comes to hiring new candidates.

Danville recently received a grant to hire new officers, but can't due to the lack of slots.

"We select them and we put them on a waiting list, but obviously they are not committed to us if they got a job offered somewhere else, they have the right to take those jobs," said Yates.

This is heavily impacting understaffed communities, who are struggling to get new candidates into the academies.

"A department of five that is missing an officer, they are down 20% of their police department. So that one person may be more important than a department down 10 officers," Getz said.

source: https://newschannel20.com/newsletter-daily/law-enforcement-training-center-seeing-log-jam-of-new-candidates

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