CLEVELAND — Mayor Justin Bibb proposed a legislation that would increase the age that someone can become a police officer.

Currently, the age is 40, and Bibb and his administration want to increase it to 55. Karrie Howard, the chief director of the Cleveland Department of Public Safety, expressed that this would add more people into the force.

What You Need To Know

  • Cleveland Mayor proposed a new legislation to increase the maximum age of police officer by 15 years

  • Currently, the age is 40 and Bibb and his administration want to change it to 55

  • This could increase the number of people on the force 

  • The next step for the proposed legislation is for it to go to city council's safety committee

“We’re going to take the initiatives to attract more talent,” he said.

For anyone who has thoughts that this could be a bad idea, Howard said they have a process.

“We still have the application process. We still have the psychological assessment. We still have the behavioral-based interviews, you still have to (have) references and previous employers are going to be contacted and then we still have the academy,” he said.

Howard called it a significant filtering process and expressed that it should make people feel better about increasing the maximum age.

“To make sure that we do not sacrifice quality for quantity and that we are putting the best people in uniform to serve the people of Cleveland,” he said.

Howard explained his high hopes for what this could do for the police force.

“By raising age limit to 55 we can capture people who have a different level of maturity, a different life experience and someone looking for a second opportunity to serve and we want to attract those people to the city of Cleveland,” he said.

The next step is for the proposal to go to the city council’s safety committee and if it passed there, it would go to city council as a whole.

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