09/21/2026
🚨 Another shooting in Charlotte’s North Division - just one day after a 4-year-old child was tragically killed by gunfire in that same division.
At some point, Charlotte has to ask a difficult but necessary question:
What is our city prepared to do to put more qualified, experienced police officers on our streets, and keep them there?
Last year, amid significant increases in applications and hiring, then-Chief Johnny Jennings expressed optimism that the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department was on track to reduce its officer vacancies to fewer than 100.
That projection never became reality.
CMPD continues to operate hundreds of officers short.
And we want to be clear: we support Chief Patterson and recognize the difficult position she is in. We understand that she is doing the best she can with the personnel and resources currently available.
But there is only so much any police chief can accomplish without adequate staffing.
The responsibility for addressing that challenge cannot rest on the Chief and our officers alone. Charlotte must give them the resources necessary to succeed.
Those vacancies aren’t simply numbers on a staffing report. There are real consequences on the street.
CMPD serves a major city with an enormous workload, answering nearly a million calls for service each year and a level of violent crime that places tremendous demands on the officers responsible for protecting this community.
Yet Charlotte is competing for qualified officers with smaller surrounding agencies that may offer attractive compensation, benefits, take-home vehicles, and a substantially different workload.
Compensation and benefits should reflect not only the badge an officer wears, but the demands and responsibilities that come with wearing it.
When officers spend their shifts running call to call to call, their ability to conduct proactive policing, saturation patrols, and targeted enforcement in areas experiencing violence becomes increasingly limited.
Charlotte cannot expect officers to handle a relentless volume of 911 calls while simultaneously expecting the proactive presence necessary to address violent crime before the next call comes in.
Citizens deserve better. Officers deserve better.
Charlotte must make recruitment, and equally important, retention, a genuine priority.
➡️ Restore healthcare benefits for retirees. Give experienced officers a reason to finish their careers here.
➡️ Provide competitive compensation and benefits that recognize Charlotte’s workload and the realities of policing a major city.
➡️ Enhanced injury/workers’ comp program. Take better care of employees when they’re injured in the line of duty. The current system leaves them waiting for proper care.
➡️ City-paid health insurance. Covers 100% of a high-quality individual health plan for sworn officers. Several smaller surrounding agencies already offer this
➡️ 25-year retirement with city-paid separation allowance included. 30 years is a long time, this would be a HUGE recruiting tool.
➡️ Expand take-home vehicles as a recruitment and retention incentive. Charlotte should be able to compete for experienced lateral officers who may already receive this benefit elsewhere while giving current officers another reason to stay.
➡️ Retain the experienced officers who already know this community. Recruiting new officers matters, but keeping seasoned officers matters just as much.
➡️ Provide sufficient staffing for proactive policing, not simply reactive policing.
Our officers sacrifice nights, weekends, holidays, and irreplaceable time with their families serving this city. After asking them to make those sacrifices year after year, Charlotte should demonstrate the same commitment to them and their futures.
This isn’t about blaming the Chief or the officers doing everything they can with what they have.
It’s about giving Chief Patterson and the men and women of CMPD the staffing, resources, compensation, and support necessary to protect a growing city facing serious public-safety challenges. Yes crime is down, but we are still plagued by daily violence.
This is bigger than pay, benefits, or vehicles.
It’s about whether an officer is immediately available when someone calls 911, not waiting an hour or more. It’s about whether officers have the manpower to saturate areas prone to violence, proactively target offenders, and work to prevent the next tragedy.
Staffing isn’t just a number.
People’s lives depend on it. 🚔
North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police National Fraternal Order of Police City of Charlotte Government
