Changing Demographics article review

International Journal of Police Science & Management Volume 16 Number 2

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International Journal of Police Science and Management, Vol. 16 No. 2, 2014, pp. 155–167. DOI: 10.1350/ijps.2014.16.2.335

Workforce diversity: downsizing in the NYPD and its effect on minority integration

Salomon Alcocer Guajardo Department of Public Management, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City University of New York, 445 West 59th Street, Room 3536, New York, NY 10019, USA. Tel: +1 646 557 4783; email: [email protected]

Submitted 21 February, 2013; resubmitted 18 February 2014; accepted 25 February 2014 Keywords: demographic analysis, ethnic diversity, minority integration, Simpson index, workforce diversity, workforce downsizing

Salomon Alcocer Guajardo is associate profes- sor of public management at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City University of New York. He serves as the coordinator for the undergradu- ate Criminal Justice Management Program. His research on workforce diversity has appeared in Public Administration Review, Public Personnel Management and the Review of Public Personnel Administration.

AbstrAct Workforce downsizing (ie, the reduction or elimi- nation of positions) may have a significant posi- tive or negative impact on minority employment and the level of diversity that exists within a public agency. This study examines the impact that downsizing has had on the employment of minority police officers and civilians, and levels of diversity in the New York City Police Depart- ment (NYDP) from 2000 to 2012 as the agency has reduced its workforce. The findings show that minority integration has increased despite the workforce downsizing. As the NYPD reduced the number of police and civilian positions since 2000, the number of minorities the agency hired increased, while the number of White employees declined, contributing to an increase in the level of workforce diversity.

INTRODUCTION Although much has been written about minority integration and its impact on workforce diversity in federal, state and local agencies, how well minorities fair in public agencies in the presence of workforce down- sizing remains an area in need of research. The lack of available longitudinal employ- ment data may be one reason why the impact that downsizing (ie, reduction or elimination of positions) has on minority integration and workforce diversity in public agencies as they reduce or eliminate positions has not been researched more extensively. This study examines White and minority employment trends in the New York City Police Depart- ment (NYPD) to assess how the level of workforce diversity changed from 2000 to 2012. Special emphasis is placed on minority hiring trends as the NYPD has faced issues of downsizing its police and civilian workforces to reduce operating expenditures. Although the focus of this study is placed exclusively on the NYPD, the findings may apply to public safety and non-public safety public agencies that provide direct services to residents.

The NYPD has been downsizing its police workforce during the past decade. It has done so as a result of harsh regional and local

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economic conditions that have reduced city and departmental revenue. The impact that the reduction in force has had on minority integration into the NYPD’s police and civil- ian workforces has not been examined. As a consequence, the extent to which minor- ity integration has increased or decreased as a result of the downsizing in not readily known. In addition, it is not known whether the downsizing has had a more drastic impact on either the police or civilian workforces, or whether female integration has been impacted more in comparison with the inte- gration of minority males within the NYPD. On a more global scale, the research question that needs to be addressed is whether work- force downsizing necessarily leads to a reduc- tion in minority integration and workforce diversity. This study addresses this question in the context of workforce downsizing in the NYPD.

LITERATURE RESEARCH When examining the level of ethnic and racial diversity within a large urban police department, the integration of minority males and females becomes an important human resources policy question, because it has implications regarding issues of public safety and citizen trust and confidence in the department with respect to the level of police protection that they receive. Black and Kari (2010), Smith (2003), Walker, Spohn, and DeLone (2004) and other scholars note that minorities base their confidence and trust in police departments on the quality of the interactions that they have with police offic- ers. In addition, citizens’ level of confidence and trust in a police department may be influenced further by the ethnicity or race of the police officers they encounter generally on the street or when commuting on a road. As Carter (1986), Flowers (1988), McCluskey and McCluskey (2004) and Walker et al. (2004) have observed, the lack of minority police officers in police departments contributes

to the division among police and minor- ity communities. By increasing the number of minority police officers within a police department, the department is improving its public image to some extent and potentially enhancing its quality of police services to the overall community and to minority residents, in particular (McCluskey & McCluskey).

Within a police department, the level of diversity within the police and civilian ranks is important for a number of reasons. Hir- ing and integrating minorities into a police department help the organisation change its management style and policing culture. Spe- cifically, McCluskey and McCluskey (2004) and Smith (2003) observe that the inclusion of minorities within a police department has an added value with regard to changing police culture and attitudes toward the minority community. According to these researchers, police culture and management are changed by the frequent interactions among minor- ity and White police officers. Further, police departments also benefit from the inclusion of minorities, because minority officers are more apt to adapt non-traditional policing strategies vis-à-vis their White counterparts (Black & Kari, 2010). By adapting non- traditional policing strategies, minority police officers help the agency improve its commu- nity relations with minority organisations and members.

From an organisational and human resources perspective, the level of diversity within the upper ranks of the police depart- ment may influence the interpersonal and managerial dynamics of minority police officers with respect to their perceptions of receiving equal, fair and unbiased treatment in relation to officers of different ethnic and racial backgrounds. If minority police officers perceive being treated unequally in assign- ments and promotions in comparison with White police officers, this perceived unequal treatment may bring legal challenges regard- ing assignments and promotions. In short, a police department’s inclusion and promotion

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of ethnic and racial minorities within its ranks has internal and external implications in which it is perceived either unfavourably or favourably by citizens, police officers and key stakeholders alike with respect to the department’s treatment of minorities.

Because the level of diversity within a police department influences and shapes internal and external perceptions of its fair and unbiased treatment of minorities, this study examines how well ethnic and racial minorities are integrated within the NYPD police and civilian workforces as the agency downsizes. In analysing the level of diver- sity within the NYPD’s workforce, special emphasis is given to how well males and females are integrated in the police and civil- ian workforces. This is of particular inter- est because previous research has focused primarily on whether police departments are representative of minorities of a par- ticular community, rather than assessing the level of diversity within police departments and their police and civilian rank structures. Because previous research on minority police employment has focused exclusively on over- all minority representation and integration, this study examines the overall level of diver- sity of the NYPD as its downsizes and analy- ses the impact that downsizing has had on minority employment and integration.

LITERATURE REVIEW The current literature on workforce diversity falls into one of five types of research. They are the following:

●● descriptive studies; ●● explanatory studies; ●● homogeneity and diversity index con- struction and validation;

●● theoretical model building and application of research designs; and

●● organisational performance and outcomes studies.

Each type of study is presented below.

With respect to descriptive studies that focus on assessing or measuring levels of work- force diversity within the workplace, these studies of minority employment and work- force diversity analyse primarily whether public agencies have adequate levels of minor- ity employment and subsequently workforce diversity. Grabosky and Rosenbloom (1975), Guajardo (1999), Meier (1973), Rosenbloom and Featherstonehaugh (1977) and Starks (2009) are a few examples of cross-sectional descriptive studies that assess the integration and representation of minority members into the public workforce. From a methodologi- cal standpoint, Kerr and Mladenka (1994) observe that these types of studies rely on cross-sectional data that do not adequately capture changes in minority employment over time. With respect to assessing minority employment integration and diversity, Pitts (2005, p. 616) observes that these descriptive- based studies consider ‘whether a public organisation employs a bureaucracy that matches the general population on salient indicators of diversity such as race, ethnic- ity, and gender’. Although these and other descriptive studies do not assess changes in minority employment over time and its effect on an agency’s overall level of diversity, they are useful for assessing how well minori- ties are distributed within and across federal, state and local agencies.

Studies examining specifically the level of minority police officers in police depart- ments show that these agencies have made some progress in hiring minorities (Hoch- stedler, Regoli, & Poole, 1984; McCluskey & McCluskey, 2004; Stokes 1997; Stokes & Scott, 1996; Walker, 1983; Walker & Turner, 1992; Winters, 1991). These studies, however, have found that minorities continue to be under-represented in many police depart- ments. Hochstedler et al. (1984) found that Blacks remained grossly under-represented in the 20 policy departments randomly selected, despite efforts to increase their representation from 1967 to 1981. With respect to Hispanics

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in police departments, Winters found that both the Chicago and Cook County police departments had made slow but steady pro- gress in hiring Hispanic officers; however, the number of male and female Hispanic police officers in the Chicago and Cook County police departments were ‘not comparable to the number of Hispanics in Cook County, IL’ (Winters, p. 75). With respect to the employ- ment of Hispanics and Asians in other police departments, Stokes and Scott found similar results. Specifically, they found that Hispanics and Asian were under-represented in the 15 police departments that were studied. More recently, McCluskey and McCluskey (p. 75) found that in ‘cities with high levels of Latino population growth … the odds of municipal law enforcement agencies increasing repre- sentation were nearly [five] times less than those departments that did not experience such rapid growth …’. Despite hiring more minority police officers over time, police departments generally do not have well- integrated and diverse workforces (Hochst- edler et al.; McCluskey & McCluskey; Stokes; Stokes & Scott; Walker; Walker & Turner; Winters).

Although the majority of the descrip- tive studies use cross-sectional data to assess gains in minority employment and work- force diversity, some researchers have taken a longitudinal approach to assessing changes in minority employment and diversity over time. Kerr and Mladenka (1994) collected time-series data to assess changes in Black and Hispanic employment in the public sector; however, they assessed Black and Hispanic employment separately and did not assess changes in the overall level of workforce diversity. Guajardo (1996) used summary racial employment data of 52 federal agen- cies for 1982 and 1990 to assess whether the percentage of agencies with representative workforces had increased over time. He found that the proportion of federal agencies with representative workforces had not changed

significantly since 1982. This study, however, did not assess directly whether the overall level of workforce diversity had changed sig- nificantly during the same period. In another study, McCabe and Stream (2000) examined the change in diversity in state and local governments from 1980 to 1995. McCabe and Stream claim that state and local gov- ernments have become more diverse since 1980. However, they did not use an index of diversity to measure and assess whether sig- nificant changes in diversity occurred as the percentage of White males in state and local government employment decreased over time. More recently, Charles (2003) used time-series data to assess whether the num- ber and percentage of minority employees in New Jersey State government has increased significantly since 1975. Similar to McCabe and Stream, this study did not use an index of diversity to assess whether the overall level of workforce diversity increased concomi- tantly with increases in minority employ- ment. Despite attempting to assess changes in minority employment and diversity over time, these longitudinal studies neglected to assess the impact of the increases in minor- ity employment on actual levels of workforce diversity. This is because a diversity index was not used to measure diversity concomitantly with changes in the ethnic and racial makeup that were occurring within federal, state and local governments and agencies. These stud- ies also did not examine specifically whether downsizing was taking place in the agencies included in the studies so that its impact on workforce diversity could be assessed.

The second type of research pertaining to diversity is explanatory studies that attempt to identify significant predictors of minor- ity employment and workforce diversity. Specifically, these studies examine the role of politics, unionisation and other factors with respect to predicting minority employ- ment and workforce integration in the pub- lic sector. Kellough (1990), Kim (1993) and

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Mladenka (1989a, 1989b, 1991) are examples of this line of research. Of the studies cited, Mladenka examined Black and Hispanic employment within local governments and found that their employment is influenced by the percentage of Blacks and Hispanics in the general population. With respect to minority employment in the federal government, Kel- lough examined whether minority integra- tion was influenced by agency size and other contextual variables. Similarly, Kim examined the factors that influenced the employment of Asian Americans by federal agencies. Because these studies focused on identifying signifi- cant predictors or determinants of minor- ity employment in local or federal agencies, they did not necessarily examine whether employment gains made by minorities from prior years affected the overall level of work- force diversity. Despite not examining how prior levels of minority integration and rep- resentation influence current and future lev- els of minority employment and workforce diversity, these studies provide the foundation for examining the explanatory power of pre- dictors with regard to workforce diversity.

A third line of research deals with devel- oping, proposing or validating a particular homogeneity or diversity index that is to be used or is used in the assessment and meas- urement of workforce diversity in public agencies. Nachmias and Rosenbloom (1973) illustrated the use of the measure of varia- tion (MV) to assess the degree of ethnic or racial integration in federal agencies. With regard to validating the use of the measure of variation, Guajardo (1996) correlated the index against the Subramaniam (1967) index of representation and the Hellriegel and Short (1972) index. Guajardo found that the measure of variation is statistically correlated with the Subramaniam and Hellriegel and Short indices. In 1975, Meier used the Gini index of concentration to assess the extent to which the federal bureaucracy was repre- sentative of the US population. In so doing,

Meier (1975) applied the Gini index of con- centration to the departments of Agriculture, Defense, Treasury, and others. More recently, Choi (2010) utilised the Shannon index (ie, entropy index of diversity) to examine what factors contribute to the variation in eth- nic/race and gender diversity between and within US federal agencies. Briefly, Choi’s findings were consistent with those of prior studies that used either the MV (Kellough, 1990; Kim, 1993) or Blau index (Blau, 1977; Pitts, 2005). Although these and other stud- ies use a particular index to quantify minor- ity integration and/or workforce diversity, they make a significant contribution to the assessment and measurement of workforce diversity in public agencies in that they focus on the process of quantifying and verifying integration and diversity scores obtained by particular indices in different or similar pub- lic settings.

The fourth type of research that focuses on diversity applies research designs and theoretical frameworks to assess workforce diversity. With respect to developing theo- retical frameworks for assessing workforce diversity and its impact on organisational performance, Pitts (2006) proposed a model that takes into account the interactions among organisational mission, recruitment and outreach, organisational integration, and other agency- and work-related pro- cesses on organisational results. Along with this theoretical model, Pitts proposed a sta- tistical model for assessing how the various input variables (eg, organisational mission, recruitment) affect organisational outputs and outcomes (ie, performance). In terms of applying research designs to the assess- ment of workforce diversity, Guajardo (1999) illustrated how repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) designs may be used to assess workforce diversity over time. Specifi- cally, Guajardo showed how repeated meas- ures ANOVAs with one within-subjects and repeated measures ANOVAs with one

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within- and one between-subjects designs allow human resources managers and special- ists to assess shifts in workforce diversity over time. These studies provide a theoretical and analytical framework for assessing the extent to which federal, state and local agencies and their workforces are integrated and diverse, as well as for specifying the factors that contrib- ute to gains or losses in diversity.

An emerging area of study focuses on the impact that workforce diversity and manage- ment have on an organisation’s performance and its ability to achieve programmatic out- comes. Pitts (2005) examined whether the level of workforce diversity in Texas public school districts affected organisational per- formance. In this study, Pitts found mixed results with respect to workforce diversity and organisational performance. More recently, Pitts (2009) examined whether the manage- ment of workforce diversity led to higher group work performance and found that that the effective management of workforce diversity influenced perceptions of group performance. With respect to examining the effect of the level of diversity among execu- tive boards of community mediation agen- cies on organisational performance, Gazley, Chang, and Bingham (2010) found that the number of case loads opened tends to increase as stakeholder diversity increases; however, the level of racial diversity within the execu- tive boards was not a significant predictor of organisational performance. Since these stud- ies examined the effect of workforce diver- sity and management from a cross- sectional perspective, the question of whether organi- sational performance changes as levels of work - force diversity changes over time remains unaddressed.

DATA AND METHOD For this study, annual NYPD EEOC em ployment data for the police and civilian workforces from 2000 to 2012 are used (see Tables 1 and 4). The EEOC reports detail

the number of police officers and civilian employees by ethnic and racial categories (ie, White, Black, Hispanic, Asian and Native American). In addition, the annual EEOC report contains employment data by police rank (eg, detective, sergeant, lieutenant) and civilian job classification (eg, clerical, tech- nician, administrator). The annual EEOC police and civilian employment reports also provide data by gender, by rank and by job classification, respectively (see Tables 3 and 5). Although homogeneity or diversity scores may be calculated for the police and civilian employment data by rank or job classifica- tion dating back to 2000, this study focuses on how downsizing impacts each workforce at the macro level from 2000 to 2012.

To assess the annual levels of homogeneity (or diversity) in the NYPD police and civil- ian workforces, the following index is used to be consistent with Blau (1977), Guajardo (1999), Lieberson (1969), Pitts (2005), Simp- son (1949) and Starks (2009): D = 1 – Σp2. As Simpson (p. 688) and Lieberson state, D = 1 – Σp2 obtains ‘the probability that two indi- viduals chosen at random and independently from the population will be found to belong to the same group’. In so doing, this provides an index of the level of homogeneity (or diversity) that exists within an organisation. The index has a range from 0 to 1, where 0 indicates a lack of diversity (ie, homoge- neity) and 1 indicates maximum diversity (ie, heterogeneity) (Blau; Guajardo; Lieber- son; Pitts; Starks). As illustrated below, when D = 1 – Σp2 is applied to the NYPD EEOC police workforce employment data for 2012, a diversity coefficient of 0.631 is obtained, indicating a moderately high level of ethnic and racial diversity.

FINDINGS Table 1 shows that the level of diversity for the total NYPD police workforce increased from 0.513 in 2000 to 0.613 in 2012, as the workforce decreased annually. Demographic

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analysis reveals that the increase in diversity is the result of a decrease in the numbers of White officers and an increase in Hispanic and Asian officers. Specifically, the employ- ment of White officers has declined from

26,192 to 17,949 during the past 12 years, a change of –31 per cent. By contrast, the employment of Hispanic officers increased has from 7,366 in 2000 to 8,990 in 2012, a 22 per cent increase. With regard to the

Ethnicity or race Frequency (n) n2 p p2

White 17,949 322,166,601 0.521 0.272

Black 5,556 30,869,136 0.161 0.026

Hispanic 8,990 80,820,100 0.261 0.068

Asian 1,884 3,549,456 0.055 0.003

Native American 41 1,681 0.001 0.000

Total (Σ) 34,420 437,406,974 1.000 0.369

D = 1 – Σn 2

n2 D = 1 – Σp2

D = 1 – 437,406,974 1,184,736,400

D = 1 – 0.369 D = 1 – 0.369

D = 0.631 D = 0.631

Table 1: Historical police workforce and diversity data for the NYPD from 2000 to 2012

Year White Black Hispanic Asian Native American

Total Simpson Index

2000 26,192 5,456 7,366 707 56 39,777 0.513

2001 25,073 5,440 7,431 742 56 38,742 0.524

2002 23,379 5,462 7,522 819 57 37,239 0.543

2003 22,176 5,377 7,492 873 55 35,973 0.554

2004 21,116 5,404 7,676 997 50 35,243 0.569

2005 20,509 5,645 8,188 1,198 52 35,592 0.589

2006 19,722 5,772 8,512 1,369 50 35,425 0.604

2007 19,147 5,730 8,667 1,458 47 35,049 0.612

2008 19,083 5,836 9,005 1,564 50 35,538 0.619

2009 18,620 5,722 8,937 1,585 50 34,914 0.621

2010 18,248 5,681 8,906 1,644 47 34,526 0.625

2011 17,925 5,623 8,922 1,750 46 34,266 0.629

2012 17,949 5,556 8,990 1,884 41 34,420 0.631

Change from 2000 -8,243 100 1,624 1,177 -15 -5,357 0.118

% Change from 2000 -31.5 1.8 22.0 166.5 -26.8 -13.5 23.0

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employment of Asian officers, Table 1 shows that the number of Asian officers has increased by 166 per cent during the past 12 years. In 2000, the NYPD had 707 Asian officers; in 2012, the number of Asian officers was 1,884. The analysis shows that the signifi- cant decline in the numbers of White offic- ers and significant increase in Hispanic and Asian officers increased the level of diversity for the total police workforce despite work- force downsizing.

When the employment data for male police officers is analysed, it shows that the decrease in White officers and the increase in Black, Hispanic and Asian officers increased the level of diversity as well (Table 2). In 2000, the level of diversity among the male police officers was 0.465; in 2012, the level of diversity was 0.599. As shown in Table 2, the number of White male officers fell from 23,565 in 2002 to 16,245 in 2012, a decrease of 7,320. During the same time, the number

of Black officers increased by 143. More sig- nificant increases in minority employment occurred in the Hispanic and Asian male cohort. From 2000 to 2012, the number of Hispanic male officers increased from 5,760 to 6,896, an overall increase of 19 per cent since 2000. Similarly, the number of Asian male officers increased from 629 in 2000 to 1,743 in 2013, an overall increase of 177 per cent. As a result of the demographic changes among the male police officers, the level of diversity of among this cohort increased by 28 per cent over the past 12 years.

Table 3 summarises the diversity analysis of the employment data for the female police officer workforce. The analysis shows that the decrease in the total female police workforce from 6,243 in 2000 to 5,822 in 2012 had a small impact on the level of diversity. In 2000, the level of diversity among the female police workforce was 0.662; in 2012, the level of diversity was 0.680. This small change in the

Table 2: Historical police workforce and diversity data for male employment for the NYPD from 2000 to 2012

Year White Black Hispanic Asian Native American

Total Simpson Index

2000 23,565 3,536 5,760 629 45 33,535 0.465

2001 22,550 3,526 5,767 669 46 32,558 0.477

2002 21,003 3,527 5,797 737 46 31,110 0.496

2003 19,910 3,487 5,786 785 45 30,013 0.509

2004 18,943 3,505 5,914 905 41 29,308 0.526

2005 18,399 3,655 6,291 1,095 43 29,483 0.548

2006 17,736 3,731 6,504 1,260 42 29,273 0.565

2007 17,235 3,718 6,592 1,346 42 28,933 0.575

2008 17,173 3,816 6,853 1,444 44 29,330 0.583

2009 16,765 3,734 6,810 1,463 44 28,816 0.586

2010 16,476 3,727 6,786 1,517 41 28,547 0.591

2011 16,220 3,723 6,828 1,614 39 28,424 0.596

2012 16,245 3,679 6,896 1,743 35 28,598 0.599

Change from 2000 -7,320 143 1,136 1,114 -10 -4,937 0.134

% Change from 2000 -31.1 4.0 19.7 177.1 -22.2 -14.7 28.7

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level of diversity is the result of fewer White and Black female officers and more Hispanic and Asian female officers being hired by the NYPD.

Prior to 2006, the NYPD civilian work- force and the level of diversity were increasing annually (Table 4). In 2000, the total civilian workforce consisted of 15,629 employees and the level of diversity was 0.597. By 2007, the civilian workforce had reached 18,600 and the level of diversity had increased to 0.605. At the end 2008, the total civilian workforce began to decline annually, but the level of diversity continued to increase, despite the downsiz- ing. As of 2012, the level of diversity for the civilian workforce stands at 0.613. As shown in Table 4, the increase in the level of diver- sity in the civilian workforce is the result of a decrease in White employment and increases in Black, Hispanic and Asian employment.

Table 5 presents the analysis for the male civilian workforce. It shows that the level

of diversity has continued to increase since 2000. In 2000, the total male civilian work- force numbered 4,962 and the level of diver- sity was 0.682; in 2012, the total workforce was 5,124, with a level of diversity of 0.715. This increase in the level of diversity is the result of an increase in the number of Asian employees as the number of White, Black and Hispanic employees decreased. In fact, Table 5 shows that Asian employment increased by 509 as the employment of Whites, Blacks and Hispanics decreased from 2000 to 2012.

Finally, Table 6 presents the demographic and diversity analyses for the female civilian workforce. The results show that the number of White females has declined from 2,012 in 2002 to 1,642 in 2012, a decrease of 370 employees. By contrast, the employment of Black females increased by 803 during the same period. The employment of Hispanic females also increased from 2002 to 2012. Specifically, in 2000, the number of Hispanic

Table 3: Historical police workforce and diversity data for female employment for the NYPD from 2000 to 2012

Year White Black Hispanic Asian Native American

Total Simpson Index

2000 2,628 1,920 1,606 78 6 6,726 0.662

2001 2,523 1,914 1,664 73 7 6,611 0.665

2002 2,376 1,935 1,725 82 6 6,519 0.671

2003 2,266 1,890 1,706 88 6 6,377 0.673

2004 2,173 1,899 1,899 92 6 6,322 0.676

2005 2,110 1,990 1,807 103 5 6,283 0.678

2006 1,986 2,041 1,988 109 8 6,152 0.679

2007 2,075 1,912 2,075 112 9 6,005 0.679

2008 2,152 1,910 2,152 120 9 6,153 0.679

2009 2,127 1,855 2,127 122 10 5,820 0.679

2010 2,120 1,772 2,020 127 11 5,755 0.679

2011 2,094 1,705 2,094 136 10 5,609 0.680

2012 2,094 1,704 2,094 141 11 5,556 0.680

Change from 2000 -534 -216 488 63 5 -1,170 0.018

% Change from 2000 -20.3 -11.3 30.4 80.8 83.3 -17.4 2.7

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Table 4: Historical civilian workforce and diversity data for the NYPD from 2000 to 2012

Year White Black Hispanic Asian Native American

Total Simpson Index

2000 3,460 8,844 2,826 455 44 15,629 0.597

2001 3,481 9,748 3,329 567 49 17,174 0.598

2002 3,230 9,437 3,269 547 51 16,534 0.596

2003 3,185 9,596 3,357 637 53 16,828 0.598

2004 3,169 9,494 3,313 636 51 16,663 0.598

2005 3,229 9,671 3,502 785 47 17,234 0.607

2006 3,228 10,154 3,655 873 48 17,958 0.604

2007 3,199 10,533 3,803 1,016 49 18,600 0.605

2008 3,151 10,309 3,802 1,069 48 18,379 0.610

2009 3,081 10,208 3,776 1,155 50 18,270 0.613

2010 2,986 9,984 3,630 1,066 46 17,712 0.608

2011 2,880 9,704 3,573 1,091 45 17,293 0.611

2012 2,824 9,612 3,579 1,147 40 17,202 0.613

Change from 2000 -636 768 753 692 -4 1,573 0.016

% Change from 2000 -18.4 8.7 26.6 152.1 -9.1 10.1 2.7

Table 5: Historical civilian workforce and diversity data for male employment for the NYPD from 2000 to 2012

Year White Black Hispanic Asian Native American

Total Simpson Index

2000 1,448 2,126 1,061 309 18 4,962 0.682

2001 1,453 2,351 1,199 402 22 5,427 0.686

2002 1,313 2,149 1,114 378 22 4,976 0.688

2003 1,301 2,157 1,111 466 25 5,060 0.695

2004 1,370 2,163 1,156 559 21 5,269 0.704

2005 1,311 2,090 1,072 451 24 4,948 0.696

2006 1,363 2,259 1,155 636 21 5,434 0.705

2007 1,353 2,314 1,162 744 20 5,593 0.709

2008 1,331 2,238 1,147 772 20 5,508 0.713

2009 1,304 2,232 1,124 843 20 5,523 0.716

2010 1,253 2,180 1,069 764 18 5,284 0.712

2011 1,215 2,099 1,032 779 18 5,143 0.714

2012 1,182 2,091 1,019 818 14 5,124 0.715

Change from 2000 -266 -35 -42 509 -4 162 0.034

% Change from 2000 -18.4 -1.6 -4.0 164.7 -22.2 3.3 4.9

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female employees was 1,765; in 2012, the number of Hispanic female employees was 2,560. With respect to the employment of Asian females, the analysis reveals a moderate increase of 183 from 2000 to 2012. Cumu- latively, these changes in the demographic composition of the female civilian work- force contributed to an increase in the level of diversity from 0.540 in 2000 to 0.548 in 2012.

DISCUSSION Although the generalisability of this study and its findings are limited in scope, it offers a number of possible reasons as to why some organisations experience gains in the level of diversity as their workforces shrink as a result of downsizing. Organisations that pro- vide emergency medical services (EMS), fire, police, sanitation and other direct services to residents may face the need to backfill a

number of vacancies to continue to provide services. They may also backfill a number of vacancies to minimise the full impact of downsizing on their operations, so that ser- vices levels are not reduced too severely. To this extent, organisations like the NYPD may be in a better position to increase their level of diversity as their total workforce shrinks.

Organisations similar to the NYPD that have annual or biannual recruitment classes may also experience increases in the level of diversity as the downsizing is implemented and remains in effect. During a period of downsizing, most public agencies eliminate unfilled vacancies or limited the number of vacancies that are backfilled. However, EMS, fire, police, sanitation and other public agen- cies that provide direct services to residents are more likely to have active recruitment periods to backfill vacant positions. In so doing, they are more likely to receive job applications that would have been submitted

Table 6: Historical civilian workforce and diversity data for female employment for the NYPD from 2000 to 2012

Year White Black Hispanic Asian Native American

Total Simpson Index

2000 2,012 6,718 1,765 146 26 10,667 0.540

2001 2,028 7,397 2,130 185 27 11,767 0.542

2002 1,917 7,288 2,155 169 29 11,558 0.540

2003 1,884 7,439 2,246 171 28 11,768 0.538

2004 1,858 7,404 2,241 185 27 11,715 0.539

2005 1,859 7,508 2,348 206 26 11,947 0.542

2006 1,866 7,895 2,500 237 27 12,525 0.540

2007 1,846 8,219 2,641 272 29 13,007 0.539

2008 1,820 8,071 2,655 297 28 12,871 0.544

2009 1,777 7,976 2,652 312 30 12,747 0.545

2010 1,733 7,804 2,561 302 28 12,428 0.543

2011 1,665 7,605 2,541 312 27 12,150 0.545

2012 1,642 7,521 2,560 329 26 12,078 0.548

Change from 2000 -370 803 795 183 0 1,411 0.008

% Change from 2000 -18.4 12.0 45.0 125.3 0.0 13.2 1.5

Workforce diversity

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to other public agencies if the downsizing were not in place. Put slightly differently, downsizing may displace the employment opportunities among agencies as they elimi- nate positions and restrict the number of vacancies that are backfilled so that active job seekers apply to agencies with advertised job openings. During a period of downsizing, EMS, fire, police, sanitation and other simi- lar public agencies may have a comparative advantage relative to other agencies in that they are able to accept job applications from minorities and females to backfill a portion of the vacant positions.

Demographic changes among job appli- cants may also benefit some organisations over others during times of downsizing. A shortage of job opportunities may encour- age more minorities to seek jobs in public agencies that have traditionally hired Whites over minorities when few public sectors jobs are available. EMS, fire, police, sanitation and other similar public agencies may attract more minority job applicants and fewer White applicants as the general minority population increases and job opportunities in other pub- lic agencies shrink. In the case of the NYPD, it appears that fewer White males and females are seeking employment as police officers in comparison with Hispanic and Asian males and females. In turn, the NYPD has expe- rienced an increase in the level of diversity among its police recruits compared with prior years. This has contributed to the addi- tion of more Hispanic and Asian police offic- ers in the NYPD despite an overall reduction in the number of police positions.

As the findings of this study suggest, down- sizing does not necessarily foster a decrease in the level of diversity at a macro- or micro- organisational level. Organisations may increase their level of diversity as vacant positions are backfilled. In order to do so, they need to have a pool of qualified minority candidates from which they can hire. They also need to have active recruitment efforts in which minority applicants are hired and placed in a portion

of the vacant positions. Because this study examined only whether downsizing impacts the level of diversity at a macro-organisational level, the question of whether downsizing impacts the promotion of minorities to super- visory or management ranks as these positions are reduced needs to be explored.

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