Chandler Police Chief Bryan Chapman voices his department’s main fiscal 2026 budget request to his City Council on May 2, with some of his assistants seated behind him. The department is requesting a budget for fiscal 2026 of about $99 million. (Independent Newsmedia/Jason W. Brooks)
One of the topics addressed during the Chandler Police Department’s focus during the City Council’s daylong budget briefing May 2 was overall staffing levels.
Assistant Chief Melissa Deanda said the department has made some progress in hiring enough officers.
“The department has 13 officer vacancies to fill and 30 on the civilian side, plus the 18 additional ‘overhires’ that we have yet to fill,” Deanda said.
At one point last summer, there were only 339 sworn officers and 26 vacancies and about 182 civilian employees.
The city has spent more than $800,000 with Phoenix advertising agency Davidson Belluso alone, over the past three and a half years, for marketing services on recruitment campaigns targeting specific in-state and out-of-state markets to get more lateral transfers.
Deanda said on top of trying to build numbers, there is also normal attrition.
“We are coming up on some of our biggest drop years, in terms of many retirements likely to occur within the next five years,” she said. “So we have to step up on aggressive hiring and recruiting, beyond what we’re already doing.”
The department’s website said there were 362 sworn officers as of January 2023.
Council made changes in 2021 to add 44 positions to the department and to increase incentives in both hiring bonuses and relocation expenses.
Chandler Police Chief Bryan Chapman says the results are clear, in terms of crime going down 25% in 2024 and in terms of the department being a destination. Hiring comes primarily through transfers of officers who’ve already established a law enforcement career, though it still hires and sends some young recruits regularly to a police academy.
Chapman and three assistant chiefs made their remarks during their request for almost $99 million as its fiscal 2026 budget. That’s almost $85 million in salaries and benefits for its 540 full-time employees and about $14 million for operations and maintenance.
Last year, the department request was for about $101 million for personnel and operations, with about $10 devoted to capital projects. The biggest police capital expense the city will take on in the years ahead is to construct an all-new forensic police lab, with a design contract recently approved.
The total price tag and budget for the forensic lab construction hasn’t yet been finalized, though numbers discussed in 2024 work sessions floated as high as $65 million.
Jason W. Brooks News Editor | Chandler Independent
Jason W. Brooks joined Independent Newsmedia, Inc., USA, in July 2021 as an associate editor. After a year covering Buckeye, he has covered Chandler since the fall of 2022, in addition to assisting the Daily Independent throughout his time at INI.
Education: University of New Mexico, bachelor of arts in journalism and mass communication, print emphasis, English minor.
Random Fact: He and his siblings witnessed a Space Shuttle launch and landing in the same year in person, on opposite coasts.
Hobbies: Karaoke, bicycling and American Sign Language.
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