Debate on Police and Civilian Budget Preparation

Part I: In support of hiring civilians to complete financial reports and prepare budgets

Police departments should hire civilian personnel to complete financial reports and prepare budgets.

I.                    Civilians improve the effectiveness during budget crises.

A.    Civilian occupation focuses on the reduced number of sworn officers

B.     Due to the loss of sworn officers, utilizing civilian personnel is critical to the functioning of administrative duties as officers are busy with performing critical duties

C.     Civilians are an adaptive use of police staffing

II.                 Civilians combat the effects of budget cuts

A.    Civilian employment does not require specialized training or trespass on fringe benefits

B.     Utilizing civilians improves community policing proposals

C.     Civilian employees often work part-time and do not require regular benefits generally taken up by full-time personnel

III.              Hiring civilians improves the budget processes and flow of administrative financial reports

A.    Civilians often gain specialized outside agency experience in areas of budgeting and finance planning

B.     Technical specialist civilians are trained and qualified in the area in which one works

C.     Civilians are knowledgeable in preparing policing needs budgets

IV.              Financial crime investigations are improved utilizing civilians

A.    Civilian personnel pose no threat to the interfering of police undercover processes

B.     Non-sworn personnel can perform as equals to both the public and police

C.     Civilians can be trained out in the field as crime scene

investigators or in-house in fingerprinting, booking, etc.

V.                Sworn officers can prepare budgets without a degree or education

A.    The budgeting process involves all levels of the police department

B.     Sworn officers are well-informed on community needs, calls for service, interpreting collected data in order to properly prepare financial reports and preparing budgets

C.     Sworn officers can conduct strategic analysis to illustrate the impact of budget cuts on the department

Part II: In opposition to hiring civilians to prepare financial reports and prepare budgets

Police departments should not hire civilians to complete financial reports and prepare budgets

                             I.                Police agencies should not hire civilian employees to prepare budgets and financial reports

A.   Civilian employees do not necessarily represent the official position

B.   Civilian employees take positions that ill, injured, or on leave officers could fill

C.   Civilians may not have completed any trainings and cannot carry firearms

 

                           II.                Budget cuts force agencies to become desperate to hire civilians

A.   Civilian employees do not fit comfortably within the cultures of law enforcement agencies

B.   Civilian employment takes precedence over the number of sworn officers in some agencies

C.    Sworn officers may resent being supervised by younger supervisors with little or no experience in law enforcement

 

                        III.                Civilians are not knowledgeable enough to address policing needs with budget planning and implementing

A.   Civilians are often limited in their capacity and training expertise

B.   Training new civilian employees is costly and time-consuming with a high turnover rate

C.   Civilian employees reduce and displace the status of officers

 

                        IV.                Sworn officers need higher education and a bachelor’s degree to perform duties of budget and finance reporting

A.   Police officers with higher education are prone to understand budgeting, financing, and planning

B.   A degree allows an officer to provide evidence to superiors to defend budget analysis

C.   A degree enhances community relationships and less violence from officers is shown to exist

 

                           V.                Civilians are perceived as outside the bonds of solidarity and do not promote better community relations

A.   Civilian employees may bring a biased approach to which communities’ benefit from specific programs; community policing, community sentiment, etc

B.   Civilians take the desired positions of police dispatchers, desk officers, and crime photo lab tech

C.   Civilian employees have no legal power to arrest and are not required to take an oath