WARNER ROBINS, Ga. — The Warner Robins Police Department is always hiring, and the number of officers needed is always fluctuating.
In July 2018, we told you there were 17 officer vacancies under Chief Brett Evans. In August 2019, the department had 8 vacancies under Chief John Wagner. In 2022, the department had 30 vacancies.
Now the department has worked their way to close that empty gap. Chief Fisher says they've filled those 30 jobs, but lost some officers due to retirement and other reasons. He says they currently have 21 spots to fill.
Recruitment has played a big role in that. It's why Omari Ferguson is on patrol.
"He said the P.D. is a really good P.D. and I said 'Let me take you up on that offer'. Three years later, I'm still here, with no plans on leaving," Ferguson said.
On top of new recruitment tactics, the city increased pay for officers.
"We're now where two or three people can go onto a call and we're not running from call to call all the time, that's nice," he said.
Chief Wayne Fisher says three officers hit the streets this week. They have five more completing the field training program. Five more in mandate. One waiting for mandate, and three in other stages of their background check.
"That frees up other positions that's outside of our patrol, like our traffic, our P.A.C.E team, SWAT team, more people can go to that," Ferguson said.
Fisher says this also offers more opportunities for them to meet community desires, like neighborhood patrolling.
"We want to increase our base service to the community and be more personable," Fisher said.
He says the entire department has room for 213 employees, and now they still have 48 total openings. He says 21 of those are for patrol officers.
"Some of them are part-time employees such as reserve officers and we have some vacancies in school crossing guards as well," Fisher said.
They hired five reserve officers, but they have room for 15.
He says through continued community engagement, they hope to bring in more recruits.
"We are like a family. We care about our employees. We have a lot of opportunity for growth, and we have a very big pay scale," Fisher said.
He says, the he loves seeing them hire more people, but there is one thing more pleasing than the numbers.
"What's more exciting is seeing the demographics of the folks coming in. We're having a broader base of people coming in, so our agency is going to look more and more reflective of the community in which were serving," Fisher said.
Fisher says they're also in the process of hiring a new assistant police chief.