The allocation of personnel is the assignment of personnel to meet the operational needs of each organizational unit within an organization, to most effectively provide service and accomplish the stated mission of the agency. In the law enforcement profession, the demand for service and the increasing diversity of services provided by police departments must be balanced against personnel limitations created by fiscal constraints and continuously evaluated and adjusted to reallocate finite resources to meet existing and emerging needs.
Police administrators may encounter environmental factors such as changing demographic conditions or emergency situations that could impact the numbers and types of calls for service, and personnel issues such as collective bargaining agreements that must be adhered to when developing a personnel allocation strategy. Administrators may also have to contend with external political considerations that could dictate a change in the philosophical and operational directions of their agencies at any time and have an analogous impact on the deployment of personnel.
Any or all of these factors could have a significant influence on the implementation of an allocation plan, which is why the effective allocation of personnel continues to be one of the most critical challenges facing police managers.
Allocation Models in Law Enforcement
Much of the early research on personnel allocation in law enforcement agencies analyzed the deployment of the patrol and traffic components in larger municipal police departments. The advancement in the study of patrol allocation methods has been fueled greatly by two key developments, technological advancements in radio communications and the computerization of the patrol dispatch process.
The most widely known program utilizing radio dispatch and computerization is computer-aided dispatching (CAD), which greatly enhanced a police department’s ability to more efficiently deploy patrol and traffic units and for the first time allowed police managers to implement allocation plans based on computer-generated data. The CAD system is a centralized dispatch station communicating directly with remote terminals, utilizing radio and computer technologies to relay all pertinent information to responding units. The computerization of the emergency call system also allowed for more efficient data storage capabilities and statistical analysis. As newer digital communication technologies such as the mobile data terminal (MDT) are developed to augment and enhance the CAD system, the speed of dispatch will continue to improve, and data storage capabilities will increase exponentially.
One of the most significant benefits to field personnel of digital upgrades such as MDT is real-time access, which allows the responding unit to access all available information from its remote location almost instantaneously. The availability of realtime information access can reduce time spent on each call for service, and this may have an appreciable impact on personnel deployment.
Other technological advances such as geographic information systems (GISs), created in the 1970s, which can produce maps for dispatchers to utilize in providing responding units with the most efficient travel route, and the global positioning system (GPS), which is utilized to track field units and also to cut response time by providing responding units the most direct route right on their remote terminals, may also be factored into any allocation plan since these advancements can impact response time, a critical component of any police department’s allocation model.
The scientific study of personnel allocation in the United States began in the early 1900s with the work of August Vollmer. Vollmer listed the various police functions such as patrol, investigation, and crime prevention and set early standards for police patrol allocations. Vollmer was also one of the first advocates of utilizing communication technology to enhance patrol assignments (Swanson, Territo, and Taylor 1997). Fosdick expanded on Voll-mer’s concepts by incorporating changing demographic conditions into personnel allocation plans. In the 1940s, Wilson introduced the ”hazard model,” which called for the prioritization of the allocation of resources based on the type and severity of criminal activity. The ”St. Louis model,” introduced in the mid-1960s, was one of the first models to utilize a computer-assisted dispatch system to track the distribution of calls for service by prioritizing them by perceived seriousness, and responding based on need and not just time of call (Swanson, Territo, and Taylor 1997).
More recent allocation models include Larson’s Law Enforcement Manpower Resource Allocation System (LEMRAS), which coded calls for service into one of three categories and assigned response priority based on severity of event, and the Patrol Car Allocation Method (PCAM), which was designed to optimize response times through improved dispatch and deployment. In 1983, the Commission of Accredited Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA) set professional standards for personnel allocation in investigative services, and in 1993, the Police Allocation Model (PAM) was revised as part of a study conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Northwestern University Center for Public Safety.
The PAM was originally designed primarily for utilization in the deployment of patrol and traffic units, but its scope was expanded as a result of the NHTSA study. The model employs a “what works” methodology by incorporating components from various law enforcement agencies into a generic allocation formula that police administrators can utilize as a template when formulating their own personnel deployment plan or when drafting proposals to hire additional personnel to meet projected future staffing requirements.
In 1997, the Washington, D.C., police department implemented the Patrol Service Area (PSA) model, in which the District of Columbia was divided into eighty-three patrol service areas, with specific patrol units assigned to each area. The PSA model was introduced as part of that department’s community policing initiative and was designed to strengthen bonds between police and the community by reducing the response area for each unit, thereby increasing the familiarity of the patrol units with the neighborhood and its residents. It was felt that this move away from traditional response-driven policing would better serve the community. An allocation formula was developed for Washington, D.C.’s PSA model, prioritizing each call for service based on its perceived seriousness (DC Watch 1999).
Workload Assessments
Police administrators recognize that the design and implementation of an allocation model for their agencies is only the initial step in an effective personnel deployment strategy. To maintain efficiency, any allocation plan must be followed by an ongoing workload assessment plan. Workload assessments are designed to improve efficiency by ensuring the equitable division of work assignments and allow for the most efficient allocation of personnel to meet the operational demands and service goals of the department.
The utilization of workload assessments as part of a personnel allocation plan can have a significant impact on the organizational structure and overall operational efficiency of a police department, can assist in determining future staffing requirements, and can serve as a justification for requesting increases in fiscal appropriations to meet future staffing needs. Since it is to be expected that workloads may fluctuate due to any number of factors, such as changes in the demographics of a particular district, it is essential that workload assessments be conducted on a regular basis to maintain effective deployment of manpower and to maximize the utilization of resources.
Factors to be considered in any workload assessment include the number of employees needed to complete each particular assignment, the type, complexity, and volume of tasks to be performed, and the time needed to complete the assignment. Another variable that must be addressed in any workload assessment is the relative importance of each task to the mission of the agency. The ability to effectively prioritize workload assignments, with a greater proportion of resources dedicated to tasks deemed to be of critical importance, is an essential element of any viable personnel allocation plan.
A critical aspect of workload assessment is choosing the correct method of evaluation. A faulty workload analysis can have detrimental long-term repercussions for a law enforcement agency, such as understaffing or inefficient deployment. Another potential problem could occur if an agency attempts to utilize one standard allocation format to assess all organizational units within the department. The assessment process to determine staffing needs may vary greatly in some organizational units within a police department. These may include but are not limited to the traffic safety, patrol, investigative, homeland security, or special operations and administration functions. It is essential that each organizational unit be evaluated based on its own needs, and those requirements must be prioritized as part of an overall assessment strategy.
Conclusion
The development and implementation of an effective personnel allocation model is one of the most critical challenges facing administrators of law enforcement agencies. Although most of the early studies on the allocation of personnel in law enforcement dealt primarily with the patrol and traffic functions, it is essential that all organizational units within the department be incorporated into the allocation model. The ability to prioritize work assignments and an ongoing workload assessment process are two key elements of allocation. A well-developed progressive allocation plan must ensure the continued deployment of sufficient personnel to accomplish most critical tasks while also anticipating trends such as political intervention or fiscal constraints, which could significantly impact allocation and future staffing capabilities.
