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Three out of 37 candidates on Elgin police hiring list from Puerto Rico

A trip to Puerto Rico to recruit police officers for the city of Elgin yielded only three qualified applicants, according to data provided by the city.

Out of 143 candidates from Puerto Rico who took the police entrance test, only three made the department's hiring list of 37 names. The other 34 came from a pool of 197 candidates who took the test in Illinois, plus two out of state. One candidate recently withdrew, so the list now has 36 names, Elgin Police Deputy Chief Bill Wolf said.

Altogether, only 2 percent of candidates from Puerto Rico made the hiring list, compared to 17 percent of others, data analysis shows. The department spent about $5,200 on the recruiting trip in September, including airfare, lodging and rental of testing facilities, a move that was criticized by some city council members.

A language barrier was the main issue among candidates from Puerto Rico, Wolf said.

"Everybody spoke English, but some of the candidates, their English wasn't perfect," Wolf said. "We were hoping for better."

Still, the success or failure of the trip can only be measured in the long term, Wolf said. He also pointed out the department has hired non-native speakers in the past who had successful careers.

"If these officers (from Puerto Rico) go onto successfully complete the academy, complete their training and go on to become good officers, that's when we have a better answer," he said. "Even if we got only one officer from Puerto Rico and he has a tremendous 30-year career, I don't think that's a big investment to have a 30-year valuable officer."

Nine officers will be hired next week, but none is from Puerto Rico, Wolf said. They include six white males, one white female, one Hispanic male and one African American male. One candidate from Puerto Rico was among the top 10, but didn't make it through the next testing phase, which includes medical, psychological and fitness testing, he said.

The department employs 180 officers; new hires are selected in order from the list to replace officers who are leaving or retiring.

This year's recruiting process - which included more job fairs, community events, and a promotional message at Marcus Elgin Cinema - overall was more successful, Wolf said. The last hiring list contained only 17 names out of 50 interviewed.

"The recruiting efforts that we did amounted to having more applicants in a larger, more diverse list than we've ever had in the past," Wolf said. "We're happy about that."

Police Chief Jeff Swoboda also said it's too early to tell if the Puerto Rico trip was worth it.

"First, we have to see if we hire anybody, but that's only one portion. We went into this wanting to have a very inclusive process, and we achieved that. We got a lot of publicity out of this - everybody knew we were testing."

The recruiting team will meet in early January to evaluate all the different components of the process, he said.

Councilman John Prigge, a critic of the trip, said it's clear there are plenty of qualified candidates locally. He also acknowledged the media attention garnered by the trip might have helped spread the message that the department was hiring.

"Somewhere I'd like to have a conversation with the council to say, 'Do we want to send four of five officers down there (to Puerto Rico) to bring back three candidates, when it's now proven we can find hundreds by really not leaving the station - by putting it out there?'" he said.

Future testing in Puerto Rico could be administered without sending a recruiting team because the department now has made connections there, Wolf said.

An estimated 44 percent of Elgin's 110,000 residents are Hispanic, and about 39 percent speak Spanish at home, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Police officers are also learning Spanish in-house through 10 copies of the software Rosetta Stone, purchased at about $13,500 for unlimited usage, Wolf said.

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