Phoenix police officers just received their first checks since the City Council approved a structure, making department employees the highest paid law enforcement agency in Arizona. But not everyone’s impressed with the new numbers.

“It was kind of a disservice, I think, to some of the senior officers, the most experienced officers in the city,” said Darrell Kriplean, president of the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association (PLEA) and a 28-year veteran of the department.

“In the immediate rollout, it didn’t affect the most senior officers. It affected the brand new hires, people applying, their starting wage for recruits, and when they graduate from the academy. Those are the folks that realized the huge increase in salary,” he said.

The restructuring increased annual pay for recruits by $20,000 (from $48,942 to $68,661). The maximum base pay for officers is $105,539.

The new system rolled existing compensation streams — like longevity and career enhancement pay — into the hourly rate. Kriplean said he now makes 7 cents an hour more.

“The more senior officers are pretty frustrated with how this was implemented,” he said. “They like where they’re going to land, but it’s frustrating. It’s going to take 2.5 years minimum to get to that point.”

Overall, Kriplean said the restructuring is positive but found fault with the way officers were re-assigned steps in the pay plan. For example, he was a Step 9, the highest step for an officer, but was moved to Step 6 under the new system....

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