Nashville and secondary employment

Two channels, and the car decides which

A business in Nashville that wants a police officer has two routes, and the department states the difference between them in one sentence: contracting with the Secondary Employment Unit is the only hiring method to obtain a Metropolitan Nashville Police Department police officer with a police vehicle.

The other route runs outside the department entirely. A business registered with the State of Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance as a Proprietary Security Organization may employ MNPD officers directly, and may employ them in uniform — but those officers are not permitted to drive or use MNPD police vehicles.

So the uniform crosses over and the car does not. That is a cleaner split than most agencies manage. New York runs two systems and reserves the uniform to the departmental one; Los Angeles County runs two and divides them by what the deputy is allowed to do. Nashville divides them by the vehicle.

On a unit job you are on duty

The sentence that changes what the rest of this page means: officers scheduled through the Secondary Employment Unit are considered to be working in an on-duty status and are paid through the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department.

That is not how most off-duty work is arranged. In most of this section the officer is off duty, paid by the business, and the department's interest is limited to permission and conduct. Here the department schedules the officer, pays the officer, and bills the client.

Los Angeles County reaches the same place by a different name — its private entity contract work is county overtime, with the entity billed afterwards. Philadelphia goes further and bans the private route altogether. Nashville keeps both, and the on-duty status belongs to only one of them.

This agency1,510

Median of the 48682

Largest here33,721

One of 48 city departments here with a traced figure. Each number is what that agency itself publishes, so some are authorized strength and some are actual headcount — useful for scale, not an exact comparison.

What it costs, as at July 2025

These are the contract rates, effective 1 July 2025. They are hourly, and they are what the client is charged.

Every job carries a four-hour minimum, whatever the work actually takes.

The department reserves the right to require additional personnel, including supervisors, to staff an event or assignment — so a client asking for two officers may be told the assignment needs a sergeant on it as well, at the sergeant's rate.

The car is $9 an hour, whatever it is and whatever day it is

The vehicle is billed separately from the officer, on its own short schedule.

Two things stand out. Every vehicle costs the same — a marked car, an unmarked car and a motorcycle are all nine dollars an hour. Orlando prices its by type, from a dollar an hour for a motorcycle to seventy-five for a marine vessel; Nashville does not distinguish.

And the holiday column does not move. The officer's rate rises by roughly a fifth on a holiday; the car stays at nine dollars. It is the clearest statement anywhere in this section that the vehicle charge is cost recovery on a piece of equipment rather than anything to do with what the day is worth to the person driving it.

“No vehicle” is a line on the schedule at $0.00, which means the client chooses. Miami-Dade prices its cars at four dollars an hour or 5.65 cents a mile, whichever is greater; Nashville charges a flat rate and does not count the miles at all.

How a job gets booked

The client applies to the unit, not to an officer. Depending on the assignment the application has to carry a copy of any lane or road closure permit from the Public Works Permits Office, a copy of the Special Event Permit application, and a copy of the Parade Permit application required by the department itself.

The number of officers and vehicles requested should be supported by an incident action plan provided by the MNPD Special Events Coordinator — so the headcount is arrived at with the department rather than asserted by the client.

Once the request is approved the client signs a notarised contract with the department, which is then reviewed for approval by the appropriate Metropolitan Government office. Only after that does the work reach officers at all.

The unit advertises the assignment to every eligible officer and schedules on a first come basis. No coordinator picking a crew, no seniority list — the same mechanism New York's Paid Detail Unit built its rules around, arrived at from the other direction.

What this page cannot tell you

Everything above comes from the department's own published programme pages, which are written for the customer. They say what the work costs and how it is arranged.

They do not say what the rules are for the officer — who approves the work, whether there is an hour cap, what kinds of employer are prohibited, who carries the liability, or what happens on an injury. That sits in the department's own manual, and this page has not read it.

So take this as the rate card and the booking process, and nothing more. The department publishes a Department Manual, and if you are an MNPD officer, that is the document that governs you.

Vehicles

The vehicle is what separates Nashville's two hiring channels: the Secondary Employment Unit is the only route that comes with a police vehicle, and officers employed directly by a registered Proprietary Security Organization may work in uniform but may not drive or use MNPD vehicles. Every vehicle type costs the same, and unlike the officer's rate the vehicle rate does not rise on a holiday.

• Marked car, unmarked car or motorcycle — $9.00 an hour, and the same $9.00 on a holiday
• No vehicle — $0.00, which is a line on the schedule, so the client chooses

Every agency here, side by side on vehicles →

Common questions

Can a Nashville officer work off duty in a police car?

Only through the Secondary Employment Unit. It is the only hiring method that comes with a police vehicle — officers employed directly by a registered Proprietary Security Organization may work in uniform but may not use MNPD vehicles.

What does an off-duty Nashville officer cost?

As at 1 July 2025, $77 an hour for a police officer, $87 for a sergeant and $97 for a lieutenant, rising to $92, $104 and $116 on a holiday, with a four-hour minimum. A police vehicle adds $9 an hour.

Is an officer working a secondary employment job on duty?

On a Secondary Employment Unit assignment, yes — the department treats those officers as working in an on-duty status and pays them through its own payroll.