Figures released Tuesday show Pittsburgh police lost more officers in 2024 than they have in at least 12 years, triggering calls from elected leaders and public-safety watchdogs to stem a staffing crisis that’s also playing out in police departments nationwide.
In 2024, a total of 103 sworn officers left the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police, according to Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 1, the union representing Pittsburgh police’s rank and file.
Of the 103, 66 officers retired and 36 — including 12 police recruits — resigned, union President Robert Swartzwelder told TribLive. One officer died this year.
“We’re in trouble,” Swartzwelder said. “We’re just waiting for the levee to break.”
It remained unclear Tuesday whether the 2024 tally topped 2023’s single-year loss of 102 officers. If accurate, the bureau has lost more than one-quarter of its police headcount in just two years.
“It’s becoming a small-town police department with big-city problems we can’t fix,” said Elizabeth Pittinger, executive director of the Pittsburgh Citizen Police Review Board. “We’ve had such chaos in Pittsburgh.”
Pittsburgh police leadership said the force’s roll call of full-time officers stood at 712 on Tuesday. Additionally, 49 recruits currently are training in the police academy.
Police pension officials were not available to confirm any staffing figures. The pension board’s ninth-floor office in the City-County Building was dark Tuesday. Pension officials did not return phone calls seeking comment.
Swartzwelder maintains, though, that police staff now totals 644 officers — when subtracting police recruits, members of command staff and officers on parental leave, workers’ compensation and related absences.
Acting Chief Christopher Ragland, who took the helm of the bureau following the Nov. 1 resignation of then-Chief Larry Scirotto, pushed back on suggestions that police staffing in Pittsburgh is at “crisis levels.”
“We are still able to respond to priority one calls in a very quick fashion,” Ragland told TribLive on Tuesday. “When someone picks up the phone and calls 911, we respond.”
‘Tough situation’
Pittsburgh City Council members sounded alarms on the police staffing trend.
“It’s not sustainable, the amount of officers we’re losing,” said Councilman Anthony Coghill, D-Beechview, who chairs the governing body’s public safety committee. “We lost more this year than we’re putting on. It’s a tough situation. There’s no easy answer, (and) we’re going to continue to lose police officers.”
Councilwoman Theresa Kail-Smith, D-West End, agreed.
“I absolutely feel the numbers are concerning,” she said. “We hear people go to the police station and there’s no one there at the zones to take reports. I can tell you my residents are asking more about the police and why there are not officers as often.”
City officials said a lack of officers also contributes to more forced overtime, which often leaves officers frustrated and worn out.
Pittsburgh paid about $20 million in police overtime in 2024. Mayor Ed Gainey slashed that figure to about $15 million in the 2025 budget, claiming new recruits will lessen the dependence on overtime hours.
The Gainey administration also has lowered the ceiling on the bureau’s staff — from 850 in 2024 to 800 in 2025.
Kail-Smith said she believes the Gainey administration is intentionally trying to defund the city’s police force.
“I can’t think that this is not all intentional to some degree, that there’s a larger picture here,” she said. “I have been wondering whether or not this was an attempt at allowing our police department to be dismantled.”
The mayor’s office did not respond Tuesday to emails seeking comment.
When Pittinger, the police review board leader, started working in Pittsburgh in 1999, she said the police force boasted more than 1,200 officers.
Police positions are difficult to fill
Police agencies nationwide are staring down staffing headaches.
About 80% of all law-enforcement agencies in the U.S. reported they had a hard time filling policing positions in recent years, according to a Center for State and Local Government survey.
Departures are up and applications are down.
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Overall staff levels have dropped about 5% since 2020, according to Police Executive Research Forum, a nonpartisan Washington, D.C., think tank.
About 65% of law-enforcement agencies in the U.S. reported an increase in retirements between 2020 and 2022, PERF said. About 66% reported increases in resignations.
Nearly seven out of 10 police forces nationwide reported drops in the number of applications for full-time officer positions, the group said.
In Seattle, police staffing levels this summer hit their lowest since 1958, according to reports.
The 1,200-officer force, which polices a city whose population is more than double that of Pittsburgh, expected to lose 94 officers this year. As of June, they had hired 34.
The department responded by offering a “hiring bonus” of $30,000 to attract new officers.
Officials in Cleveland responded to a police staffing crisis by reducing funded positions in the city budget from 1,498 — which one official called “unrealistic and unachievable” — to 1,350. In February, the force’s staff numbered 1,175.
“Committing more resources in the mayor’s estimate in excess of 1,350 would lock up money that could be used for other positive outcomes across the city,” Cleveland Finance Director Ahmed Abonamah told reporters.
Kail-Smith acknowledged Pittsburgh’s peers have struggled to recruit and retain officers. But, she believes Pittsburgh should do more to address the problem.
She suggested providing low-cost housing or tax breaks to encourage people to join or remain with the bureau.
Coghill, who supports the idea of offering tax incentives to police officers, said he also would like to propose requiring new recruits to sign a contract with Pittsburgh police for a minimum of five years. The city would seek compensation — from the officer or the bureau hiring them — for the cost of their training if they left before that time frame.
Acting police chief denies crisis point
Police leadership Tuesday attempted to quell concerns triggered by the year-end staffing numbers.
“While police staffing is a challenge on a national and international level, the bureau is actively working on a number of initiatives to address the issue,” spokeswoman Eliza Durham told TribLive. “We also employ a full-time recruitment officer to focus on expanding recruitment efforts and ensure that officers receive comprehensive training.”
Bureau figures keep Pittsburgh within traditionally accepted officer-to-resident ratios. The union’s numbers do not.
An average ratio of about 2.4 police officers per 1,000 residents has remained a stable figure nationwide for several years, FBI data shows.
That figure would place Pittsburgh, with a 2023 population of 303,255, at about 720 officers.
Trade groups such as the International Association of Chiefs of Police, however, have dismissed these ratios to evaluate local staffing numbers.
“Ready-made, universally applicable patrol staffing standards do not exist,” that group said in 2023.
Ragland agreed.
“I don’t think there’s any formula you can use to say, ‘This is the number you need,’ ” Ragland told TribLive. “And each city is a little unique. I think it’s hard to compare apples to apples.”
“I wouldn’t say we’re at a crisis point,” he added.
In 2025, the acting chief said he hopes to focus more on recruitment and retention.
“I think it’s very important to make people feel their work is being valued. If I sit in this seat on a more permanent basis, that would be somewhere I focus,” Ragland said.
Ragland also hopes to work with the police union to establish a lateral transfer program, which agencies in other states maintain.
If adopted, a program of that kind could enable veteran officers from other police forces to join the Pittsburgh bureau while still retaining their salary scales and pension benefits.
Ragland on Tuesday continued to caution Pittsburghers against getting alarmed about staffing figures.
“It’s like asking a person ‘Do you have enough money?’ Everyone’s going to say, ‘No,’ ” Ragland said. “If you ask any chief, then it’s ‘Yes, I need more staff.’ But if you call 911 and need police there, we’re there.”