19E - PD RECRUITING UPDATE - Laserfiche WebLink

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Police Officer Recruiting and Hiring Update October 20, 2015 Page 3 9/19/15: Santa Ana College's 100th Birthday Celebration Expedited Hiring Process Most other police agencies in Orange County are attempting to hire police officers, which means we are in a highly competitive environment to hire the best available candidates for the Santa Ana Police Department. With the assistance of City Personnel, a significant number of changes have been made to the hiring process to ensure we are hiring the best people as quickly as possible. The physical agility test was recently changed without lowering our hiring standards. The new test allows for almost immediate results regarding who passed or failed. This change resulted in a time savings of at least 2 weeks per candidate. The Commanders Oral Interview process was changed so that a panel is convened as soon as there are candidates to interview rather than waiting until there are 8 -10 candidates before convening a panel. This change can reduce the hiring process by up to 1 to 3 weeks. Recent changes to the process, which are too early to assess, are the hiring of part-time background investigators to assist the full -time background investigators. Also, the eSOPH background software package was purchased and setup. The new software will expedite each background investigation by 1 -3 weeks because most of the processes are now handled electronically instead of by U.S. Mail. Progress The Police Department is already starting to see progress in the number of candidates moving through the hiring process. In May 2015, 18 candidates were invited to the Background Orientation which comes after the Written, Physical Agility and Oral Interview steps. In June, July and August 2015, the number of candidates invited to Background Orientation was 12, 10 and 9 respectively. But in September 2015, 37 candidates have been invited to Background Orientation; a 95% increase from our best previous month in 2015. Conclusion The environment for hiring new police officers is highly competitive. The best new officer applicants have their choice of police agencies. We continue to review our hiring process to find ways to reduce the time it takes to hire so we don't lose out on highly qualified candidates. The recruiting website is at the center of our marketing strategy. The Santa Ana Police Department is a great agency to work for and is highly respected in the law enforcement community. The recruiting website helps us to get our message out to potential candidates. Once a candidate has been recruited, we are continually in contact with the candidate to expedite the hiring process and to prepare them for the police academy. The new software and the new 19E -3