RCIPS $54M budget to grow despite 2022 savings
(CNS): The Office of the Police Commissioner (OPC), which runs the annual budget for both the RCIPS and the Cayman Islands Coast Guard, had more than CI$1.8 million left over from last year’s budget of $54 million. But according to the 2022 annual report, this is unlikely to be the case in future years, as spending across the police service continues to grow.
At the end of 2022, there were 533 men and women working as police officers of all ranks, coastguard officers or support staff. The personnel expenditure for the RCIPS and the CICG was just under CI$40 million for the year — almost 75% of the entire budget. But largely due to recruitment problems, the OPC spent CI$2.4 million less on staff than budgeted for.
“The shortfall was the result of the challenges of recruiting and retaining quality employees,” officials stated in the annual report. “The OCP was able to absorb the additional increments instituted by central government, the personnel costs of tropical storm Ian and the measures put in place to combat escalating gun violence.”
But the PCO warned that such a variance is not expected to reoccur in 2023, as the headcount at the RCIPS had grown by the end of 2022 and healthcare costs had increased. In addition, the full impact of the cumulative 4.5% increase in the cost of living allowance (COLA) will need to be taken into account for the whole of this year.
It costs the public purse around CI$4.4M to $5M per month to run the RCIPS and the CICG, most of which is personnel costs. While 19 of the 22 coastguard officers are Caymanian, among the 404 police officers, there are more from overseas than recruited locally. However, 67 of the 107 support staff (62%) at the RCIPS are Caymanian.
At the end of 2022, the RCIPS employed 205 non-Caymanian police officers from 16 different countries. 135 officers are Jamaican, which is over 65% of non-Caymanians and one third of all police officers, while 26 officers (6% of police officers) are from the UK.
Most of the money the RCIPS spends other than on personnel goes on equipment, including patrol cars and boats, as well as weapons and ammunition. Last year it spent over $500,000 on modernising the fleet of vehicles. But the report indicated that a reduction in engine sizes and the acquisition of hybrid vehicles will lead to a lower carbon footprint and savings on fuel.
It also acquired two new boats for the coastguard but it is not clear from the report how much they cost. The report does state that around $110,000 was spent on “establishing a weapons platform” for the CICG.
The RCIPS is funded almost exclusively from the public purse, but did collect some money through selling vehicles and other equipment, as well as from fees. The biggest revenue generator for the police is money it receives directly from the public for police clearance certificates, which are essential for immigration-related applications and various other transactions with the government. Last year the RCIPS collected over $1 million for these certificates.
See the full annual report in the CNS Library.
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Category: Local News
Most Caymanians have Jamaicans in their family tree, share the same traits as Jamaicans, yet hate them.
Defund the RCIPS! Increased budget every year, more crime but less crime detection, outrageous driving offences evident to drivers every day but not to Police!
Allegation of corruption and ineptness against police officers and staff continue to rise!!
Defund RCIPS budget this year!!
Yes, that will work. What then?
Holding to account is just too hard?
Since traffic is a chronic issue, and since it is actually a revenue generating aspect of RCIPS, can we start with getting more officers and unmarked vehicles to patrol the roads?
Make money, and take idiots off the roads. Win-win.
Wish in one hand and s**t in the other. Same result.
RCIPS is a waste of money and will never be efficient until they get rid of half of the Jamaicans. Half of them cannot even read and write. Plain and simple!
Perhaps now they’ll have the resources to breathalyze everyone who crashes in to stationary light poles?
Legge, Lodge, Laughs
Our library of Gazetted laws are often paired with Regulations specifying catalogs of punishable offences supposed to serve as (a) a compliance deterrent, and (b) contribute to general revenue via fines. We have 533 officers that aren’t writing nearly enough tickets to justify their full-time salaries and benefits. Many have so much free time that they are running businesses on the side. The public has all-time low confidence in the RCIPS, that might be improved by sensibly writing more of the tickets that need to be written – and not just speeding tickets. Is Kurt Walton listening?
If we are putting more than $5 into running the traffic dept. per annum we are being severely ripped off. YOU ARE USELESS!!! Was undertaken on the hard shoulder again this morning by some d1ck doing 80. I hope the new CoP wakes up and does something about this sh1t but I won’t hold my breath.
Why? Biggest waste of money along with the turtle farm.
Government spending as a percentage of GDP is a mystery because the Cayman Islands refuses to adhere to requisite accounting standards on outflow amounts and recipients. If they ever achieve the full transparency the voting public deserves, one suspects it would rank the Cayman Islands in the top 5 on the planet. Not just by girth of payroll, but in volume of wasted dollars on nonsense. $1bln in spending equates to >$40k per voter (25,000), per year.
maybe they’ll start fining people for driving in the wrong lane on a dual carriageway, parking on double yellow lines outside the booze shop at Fosters Airport, failing to signal. aghhhh I give up – the list goes on!
saw someone reversing back up the inside lane of the high way, to go back to Lakeview the other day.
Probably texting at the same time
That’s a mild day for the driving madness here.
Having 533 officers makes us one of the most policed states in the world per capita, with a cost per police officer of over CI$100k.
Does anyone think we are getting good service and value for money in this deal?!
There are countless times you can drive from end to end here and the only RCIPS vehicles you will see are parked at the stations.
#WorldClass
404 officers*
All without any auditable department reporting, employee utilization rates, or transparent performance criteria. They’re officers shaming our courts. Our choppers are going on international safari and shuttling corrupt politicians to Jamaican funerals. Our borders are so permeable that violent handgun crime has become common. No Caymanian gang leaders arrested in a generation. Barely visible off season traffic presence. Response time measured in 1/3 hour increments. On and on non-delivery in every normal crime fighting category. Sad that we need to pay more for this “service”.
Police could make a ton of money writing tickets to their own staff for having illegal tints on vehicles. I paid my fine, why don’t they ticket their own staff parking lot. 90% of vehicles illegal!
Saw a massive truck with blacked out windows way beyond anything legal the other day. The sticker on the back window was the crest with the words “entitled” caymanian. Yes, with the quotes on it. The irony.
Bahamas here we come.
dont bite the hand that feeds
police farce…the prime example of civil service waste, overstaffing, underperformance….
How many of the Caymanian Police Officers are Jamaican? It is a serious question, and one that should be answered.
Never will as the Jamaican power brokers are to well entrenched in high spots. Thank you McKeeva Bush!
The judicial admin is also stacked to the hilt with them.
“ At the end of 2022, the RCIPS employed 205 non-Caymanian police officers from 16 different countries. 135 officers are Jamaican, which is over 65% of non-Caymanians and one third of all police officers, while 26 officers (6% of police officers) are from the UK”
Sixth paragraph in.
Evidently your “serious question” didn’t warrant the effort of reading the article.
You plainly misunderstand the point. Let me try again. How many of the Caymanians WERE Jamaicans when they became Caymanian?
Ask Mac…he granted status to 3000 Jamaicans…
you’d have to go back through the family trees, but probably nearly all will have some Jamaican relative in the past, like a grandparent or great grandparent.
No. Not if they came to Cayman 20 years ago with a Jamaican passport. No need to check the family tree.
yet when my business had more than 50% of a nationality, my permits were denied…..lol
Only because that is a legal expectation. An expectation the government, including the police, seem to be able to ignore.
They all have their wife and children here too…lots of Jamaicans accompanied by many Jamaican dependants..
And for an increasing number of them, some of their children are not with their wife. You reap what you sow, Cayman.
How many Caymanians have Jamaican bloodlines in their family tree, yet blame the Jamaicans for all their ills when not blaming expats?