Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer touted 92 new police officer jobs. Most are vacant
Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer last month touted that the city will have an “all-time high” of 930 budgeted sworn police officers in his proposed budget, adding a total of 92 sworn officer positions during his administration.
While the current size of the sworn officer force may be the largest force in the city’s history, it’s not as big the budget suggests.
And the number of officers in the city hasn’t grown since summer 2023.
Currently, there are about 76 open positions for sworn officers.
Why?
The main reason is because the city relies on vacancies across city departments, including these police officer vacancies, to balance the budget, as well as a directive from the mayor to slow down hiring citywide to prevent the city’s deficit from swelling.
Fresno Police Department Chief Mindy Casto said during the June 4 Fresno City Council budget hearing that the department currently had 850 filled sworn officer positions.
“Would I like more? Yes, but is it adequate? Yes. We have plenty of interest, but it’s hiring the qualified people that continues to be a challenge, but we’re doing pretty good,” Casto said.
Dyer said the vacancies are also a result of the pace it takes to recruit and hire quality officers.
“Unfortunately, we have high vacancy rates. Not as high as it was in 2020 and 2021, but still higher than I want it to be,” Dyer told The Bee following his May 15 budget presentation.
Given the budget deficit, it’s unclear if and when the city plans to fill all of the budgeted officer positions. The city is facing a $50 million budget deficit driven by rising expenses, inflation, contractual obligations and personnel costs, Dyer said. This is about $30 million more than the city projected in February.
Under Dyer’s administration, the department has surpassed its size from before the Great Recession, which had long been a goal of city officials. In 2009, Fresno had 837 sworn officers out of 849 funded in the budget.
The department grew to 860 sworn officers in July 2023 under former Police Chief Paco Balderrama. During last year’s June 2024 budget hearing, Balderrama reported the department had the same number of cops as the prior year.
Spokesperson Lt. Larry Bowlan said in an email that the number of filled positions have stayed consistent because the department’s hiring has matched attrition, retirements, resignations, terminations, etc.
Bowlan said the department has hired 16 new officers since January and will be graduating 17 additional officers from the police academy at the end of June. In addition, 22 officers were hired during the period of July 1, 2024, to December 31, 2024.
The department is also interviewing approximately 200 police cadet candidates over the next few months, he said.
A larger police force doesn’t necessarily mean a city is safer, according to academic research.
A 2016 study of police force size and crime between 1971 and 2013 found that “the overall effect of a police force’s size on crime is negative, small, and not statistically significant.”
City budget deficit
Dyer’s proposed $2.36 billion budget for fiscal year 2026 includes four new officer positions funded from an enterprise account from the Fresno Area Express, or FAX, transportation budget.
This will increase the number of officers assigned to FAX to two sergeants and 10 officers, Dyer said at a May 14 media briefing.
“This will also bring the total complement of sworn officers in the Fresno police department to 930 which is an all time high,” he said. “And that’s 92 police officer (positions) that have been added during my administration.”
To help lower spending, the police department — like other city departments except the fire department — has been asked to maintain a 6.18% attrition rate. (Attrition refers to the rate at which an organization reduces its workforce by not replacing positions after an employee resigns, retires, or leaves for other reasons, according to payroll company Paychex.)
Dyer said the police department’s planned attrition rate saves the department approximately $11.7 million dollars for fiscal year 2026.
“So those general funds savings are factored in as we build our budget,” Dyer told The Bee. “We anticipate those savings from all the departments, from police, fire. That is what’s used to balance the budget.”
Another challenge is the end of one-time pandemic-related federal funding. The city spent a combined $27.6 million of American Rescue Plan Funds on the fire and police departments — a chunk of which paid for officer raises.
“The general fund is absorbing these expenses in the FY 26 budget,” Dyer said.
The mayor is also having “preliminary discussions” about a general or public safety tax to sustain the police and fire expansions that the city approved with this one-time pandemic funding, according to a February report by nonprofit newsroom Fresnoland.
Dyer, who retired as police chief in 2019, holds the title of Fresno’s longest-serving police chief.
Fresno Police Officers Association, the union that represents Fresno’s police force, did not respond to requests for comment on the pace of hiring or open vacancies.
As of 2024, there were 860 sworn officers on the Fresno Police Department force, with 324 dedicated to patrol duties (other units also respond to calls for service from the public) and the other 536 working on district bike, district safety, traffic, K-9, student resource officer and other units, according to data provided by Fresno PD in 2024.
Fresno police staffing under Dyer
When Dyer was elected mayor in 2020, there were 835 budgeted sworn officer positions but it’s not immediately clear how many of these positions were filled. As of June 2020, there were 92 vacancies in the department between civilian and officer positions combined, according to a department budget report.
At the start of his administration, Dyer faced a “staffing crisis” in the police department.
In 2021, there were only 632 filled positions in the department, Balderrama, the former chief, said in 2023. Long-term absences related to workers’ compensation and officer pay were identified as problems.
Since then, the force has grown by nearly 200 officers — but has fallen short of reaching full capacity.
Balderrama told The Bee in 2022 he planned to have a fully staffed department by the end of 2023. But he wasn’t able to fulfill this goal before his high-profile resignation last year following an investigation into an alleged affair with an officer’s wife.
This story was originally published June 3, 2025 at 12:40 PM.
