By MADDY VITALE
Ocean City Police Chief Jay Prettyman is getting his department ready for summer. He anticipates it will be a busy one. Like every summer, the resort is packed with throngs of visitors who come for a vacation, for the day, or call the shore town home year-round.
And like so many summers before, Prettyman makes sure that before the start of the busy season, he has a full complement of officers. There are 68 full-time police officers that make up the department.
“We are well-staffed and we will be stronger than last year and look forward to a good season,” Prettyman said Friday in an interview with OCNJDaily.com.
Prettyman, who began his career in law enforcement as a seasonal officer, also makes sure that enough summer officers are hired to help with crowd control, traffic and parking among other police duties — namely being an important presence on the Boardwalk, downtown and throughout the resort where needed.
“We will have 65 seasonal officers this summer. It is an increase from last year when we were at 60,” he said. “There is just more of a need overall, and we want to make sure to meet the needs of the community.”
Ocean City is still looking to hire some more seasonal officers, he noted.
“We are definitely still hiring. It appears that we have enough applicants to fill the spots, but we are still sorting through the applications to see who the best applicants may be,” he explained.
Unlike some other coastal towns this year, Prettyman said that his department isn’t having difficulty finding officers for the summer season.
Prettyman, who is president of the Cape May County Chiefs of Police Association, explained, “Virtually every other town is having an issue getting seasonal officers. The one thing I can say is, we have fewer applicants than in the past, but we feel we will be able to fill the spots.”
He also said that some police departments have increased the pay and are even advertising that retired police officers could fill the temporary positions.
“I can say as president that, from what I hear from my colleagues, is that applicants for seasonal employment at police departments are down overall,” Prettyman noted. “And some agencies are having a difficult time filling the desired positions. Some of the municipalities are trying to use some unorthodox ways to hire seasonal officers by either increasing the pay or looking to hire retired officers.”
He said in his experience he has known only a few retired police officers who have returned to departments to work as seasonal officers.
Seasonal officers in Ocean City start at $16 an hour. The department hires its summer help earlier than other departments in the county, and the seasonal officers also stay on longer, Prettyman pointed out.
“We start them at the very beginning of April and then they are done at the end of October,” he said.
He also said that each officer is hired for a length of time that they can do. For example, several seasonal officers go back to college in August.
The department has hired officers who began as seasonal officers over the years.
The chief noted that Ocean City has a good working relationship with the area colleges, specifically Stockton University and Rowan University.
“We are prepared to do internships with both of those colleges,” he said.
And being a seasonal officer has advantages for the temporary hires.
“I began as a seasonal officer. Becoming a seasonal officer is a good track to becoming a police officer,” Prettyman said.
It also helps the department when it comes time to hire full-time officers.
“It definitely gives us an opportunity to get to know more of the applicants than what you see on paper and get through a 45-minute interview,” Prettyman said.
