Albuquerque Police Department seeing increase in recruits [Video]

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (KRQE) –Following a national trend, the Albuquerque Police Department says it’s seeing more cadets joining the force after years of declining interest and a flood of retirements. “Obviously during 2020 and a lot of the things that happened around George Floyd, there was a lot of exodus from policing,” said APD Chief Harold Medina.

Story continues below

It’s been an issue for years, waning interest in becoming a police officer has left APD struggling to hit its goal of at least 1,000 sworn officers. “We currently have somewhere around 885 sworn officers,” said Medina.

Medina says 1,000 officers could now be just around the corner. “We are working on our second academy class with 45-plus people in the fall. We started a class last year and we graduated 51 and we currently have 49 in the academy in one academy class and we have an additional class started of 23,” said Medina.

That’s …