The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) faces several pressing and interrelated challenges, with low staffing levels affecting how the LAPD responds to such challenges. In this report, the authors make more than 50 recommendations to the LAPD to help the Department improve staffing levels, the complaint and discipline system, and morale and simplify its organizational structure.

Organizational Assessment of the Los Angeles Police Department

Richard H. Donohue, Samuel Peterson, Bob Harrison, Shawn Hill, Danielle Sobol, Alejandro Roa Contreras

ResearchPublished Aug 20, 2025

The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) faces several pressing and interrelated challenges, with low staffing levels affecting how the Department responds to such challenges. The decline in staff levels is affecting the Department’s mission and the community’s expectations while producing internal strain. There are significant concerns in terms of Department morale; these issues are affected by a variety of internal and external pressures, including staffing, the complaint system, the operational tempo, perceptions of leadership, and the political and social atmosphere. The complaint system is cumbersome and overburdened. The Department is also working to refine and reorganize its structure to operate efficiently and effectively. The authors of this report evaluated multiple aspects of the LAPD to provide guidance for the future.

In this report, the authors provide more than 50 recommendations for the LAPD to help the Department improve staffing levels, the complaint and discipline system, and morale and simplify its organizational structure. Some recommendations require additional funding to implement, while others can be accomplished through policy or culture change. The Department should actively pursue City of Los Angeles and external funding sources to accomplish the recommendations that require monetary investments.

Key Findings

  • Overall, LAPD sworn staffing has declined steadily since 2018. Sworn attrition has increased, and hiring has not been able to keep pace with the personnel losses. At the same time, there is sustained—and increasing—interest in Department jobs, according to recruitment data.
  • The LAPD needs to prioritize changes to hiring, recruitment, and the academy to increase the number of sworn officers.
  • The complaint system is a significant point of contention in the Department. Many sworn officers report that it is stressful and discourages proactive police activity, saying that it hampers their career progress. The sheer volume of complaints combined with the time to adjudicate each of them is burdensome and inefficient.
  • Overall Department morale is low and has been affected by a variety of factors.
  • The Office of Operations faces significant challenges in deploying adequate numbers of officers. There is also a significant desire from sworn personnel in the Department to focus on the LAPD’s core policing mission. This work is centered on increasing staffing in the Office of Operations rather than in administrative roles.
  • There is also an openness to fill certain roles in the Department with civilian personnel and to reorganize certain units (e.g., offices, bureaus, groups).

Recommendations

  • Increase class sizes to 60 or more recruits per class.
  • Hire civilian personnel to fill critical positions currently staffed by sworn officers.
  • Use data and analytics to identify the greatest return on investment for recruitment activities, and modify activities accordingly.
  • Improve supervisors’ ability to handle nondisciplinary cases through guidance and training.
  • Improve how supervisors and command staff communicate with the subjects of complaints and those who are being disciplined.
  • Implement culture and policy shifts to improve in-person communication by command staff.
  • Recognize the importance of civilian staff and their work.
  • Reinforce the practice of recognizing high-ranking civilian staff as the Department would for equivalent sworn staff.
  • Identify sworn officers in administrative positions who can be moved to patrol or consider limiting tenure in administrative roles for sworn officers.

Topics

Document Details

  • Copyright: Los Angeles Police Foundation
  • Publisher: RAND Corporation
  • Availability: Web-Only
  • Year: 2025
  • Pages: 112
  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.7249/RRA3827-1
  • Document Number: RR-A3827-1

Citation

Chicago Manual of Style

Donohue, Richard H., Samuel Peterson, Bob Harrison, Shawn Hill, Danielle Sobol, and Alejandro Roa Contreras, Organizational Assessment of the Los Angeles Police Department. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2025. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA3827-1.html.
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This research was conducted in the Justice Policy Program within RAND Social and Economic Well-Being.

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