Veteran LEO Looking into FL LEO Opportunity

[Starsky53]

Need some suggestions from my Florida brothers on possibly heading down to finish my career up in Florida. I am a certified officer from another state. Worked in narcotics units, and task forces in Kansas also. Certified in two states in the midwest. Investigations is specialty, have 5 yrs experience with that also.

My concern would be that being 42, may or may not hurt me in seeking to end my career in another agency. I am looking either at Miami Gardens, or somewhere, which will give me a good retirement package that I can start building, as my agency up here, really has little or no retirement benefits, and I need to look at this as a father of four, instead of the young guy who didn't care about pay and benefits when he started, and just wanted do the job.

Anyone in Florida that can throw an old dawg a bone, I would love to hear you suggestions.

Just to fend off any questions that might be asked. I have a good background, and nothing in my work history that would be a bad mark, just a few credit ticks as the pay and four kids have taken a toll after a few yrs, and a few medical accidents have done to it, other than that, I should be able to get a job, unless they figure I am an old timer.....thanks in advance.

[cgh6366]

Don't know how good it is, but....

Look at Miami Gardens PD - they are starting up new department from scratch - only hiring laterals to start. Supposed to be a pretty rough area, but they have an excellent package.

http://miamigardenspolice.org/

Good luck

[kc12]

Being form the Tampa area, I have to throw my $.0002 in. There are many agencies in that area and if you chose your agency well enough you can live out a bit and save a bunch on housing and not get killed by the price of gas. Clearwater PD has a good city retirement with 20 and out. The counties have a state retirement that requires, for you, to have six years service and be 55 years old and doesn't cost anything. see http://www.rol.frs.state.fl.us/myfrs.../pdf/srisk.pdf for more information about state retirement. Many deputies I knew in Pinellas County lived in Pasco County, the next county north, and commuted to work. The house prices in Pasco were still reasonable away from the coast, when compared to Pinellas and Hillsborough. The only bad part was they had to leave their cruisers at the border, because the Sheriff didn't want to pay the extra gas. My suggestion would be Clearwater, Pinellas or Hillsborough County (for their retirement), or Tampa PD. Tampa did require a "new" officer to work 5 years on the road before being considered for anything. It didn't matter if you had 20 years experience, you are new to them.

[Starsky53]

thanks for those two suggestions guys....I need to pick the right one as I am wanting to just take on that last dept., and then maybe do the PI thing if I need to after retiring......good solid suggestions and info, I appreciate it.

Question: would it be better for me to go and get take the cross over two week training, and then look for a job? I heard most want you FL certified.

[PhilipCal]

LEO Opportunity

thanks for those two suggestions guys....I need to pick the right one as I am wanting to just take on that last dept., and then maybe do the PI thing if I need to after retiring......good solid suggestions and info, I appreciate it.

Question: would it be better for me to go and get take the cross over two week training, and then look for a job? I heard most want you FL certified.

Take a look at some departments in the Central Florida area. Seminole, Volusia, Orange Counties come to mind. The Seminole County Sheriff's Dept is an excellent agency. You can access a whole lot of agency websites through Officer.com. Best of luck in your search.

[kc12]

When I was down there, the agencies in Pinellas County I listed required you to put yourself through the crossover. You also had to go through a central BI for Clearwater PD, so your cleared for most of the smaller agencies in Pinellas. The BI website is http://www.policestandards.org/ If I remember correctly my BI took about two months. I had the administrative interview scheduled toward the end of the crossover and my BI was finished about the time I had my certification results back.