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Chesapeake Police Department entry pay
What this agency pays a new officer to start, and how that compares with the rest of the country.
Entry pay onlyEvery salary here is what an officer is paid on day one, out of the academy — base pay on a 40-hour week, with no overtime, shift differential, specialty or education pay counted. Nobody stays on it.
Chesapeake Police Department starts at $59,000 a year — about $28.37 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $7,685 below the median of the 2,288 agencies on this list, and $9,140 below the median for municipal agencies.
Cost of livingPrices in Virginia Beach-Chesapeake-Norfolk, VA-NC run about 2% below the national average, so this goes about as far as $60,240 would somewhere at average prices — $1,240 more than the headline figure. That average hides a wide spread: utilities at 90, where goods are 97. Based on price levels for this metropolitan area, from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, 2024. The salary above is what the employer publishes; this line is our arithmetic on it, and nothing on this site is ranked on it.
How big the department isChesapeake Police Department reported 361 sworn officers and 213 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025. That is 1.4 officers per 1,000 residents, over a population of 257,012.A rate is only meaningful for a city department, where the population served is the city’s own. Reporting to the FBI is voluntary, so a count can reflect a partial return as easily as a small agency, and the FBI asks that agencies not be compared on staffing. Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, Full-time Law Enforcement Employees, 2025.
What Chesapeake says about itself
In partnership with the community and other City agencies, promote safety within the city through the delivery of fair, impartial, and professional police services.
What Chesapeake does
Chesapeake Police Department recruits and trains Police Officer trainees for municipal patrol and law-enforcement service.
Shifts at Chesapeake
The City's own recruitment FAQ states that uniform patrol officers work PERMANENT 10-hour shifts for four months at a time, with every other weekend off.
The agency publishes the shift length but not a named cycle. These are the 10-hour rotations departments most often build on it: 4/10.
A tour that is fixed for four months and then changes is a schedule with a date on it, and the every-other-weekend rhythm underneath it repeats on a fortnight, not a week. BlueShifts holds both - the block you are in now and the weekends it gives you - on the same month view.
Where the figure comes from
Checked 15 August 2026. City of Chesapeake — Job Classification List, fiscal year 2025-2026, effective 1 July 2025 — open the source document
The City's own job classification list, effective 1 July 2025, sets Police Officer at pay grade PS02 with an annual minimum of $59,000 ($28.3654 an hour on a 40-hour week), a midpoint of $75,525 and a maximum of $89,775. Police Officer Trainee sits below it at PS01, minimum $55,266. Officers receive a yearly salary increase for the first ten years, then an increase every other year.
Entry-level base salary only. Overtime, bonuses, education incentives, shift
differentials, locality pay and lateral rates are excluded, so most officers earn more
than this.
BlueShifts. Plan Your Year. Own Your Time.
The shift calendar built for your rotation, off-duty work, and life on and off the clock.
Save your shift schedule once and BlueShifts fills the rest of the year in.
How this level compares
Where Chesapeake sits is partly about the agency and partly about which level of policing it belongs to. The three levels do not pay the same.
| Level | Lowest | Median | Highest | Agencies |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Municipal | $33,280 | $68,140 | $163,619 | 1549 |
| County | $35,000 | $63,565 | $132,263 | 516 |
| Special jurisdiction | $31,200 | $60,204 | $107,954 | 71 |
| State | $33,994 | $65,166 | $110,916 | 145 |
| Federal | $70,477 | $73,502 | $86,530 | 5 |
| Territory | $16,640 | $28,236 | $43,354 | 9 |
Federal agencies pay the most to start
The middle federal agency starts at $73,502 — about $5,400 more than the middle municipal agency and about $9,900 more than the middle county agency and about $13,300 more than the middle special jurisdiction agency and about $8,300 more than the middle state agency and about $45,300 more than the middle territory agency. Chesapeake starts at $59,000, so $9,140 below the municipal middle.
How it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Chesapeake Police Department officer make?
Chesapeake Police Department starts a new officer on $59,000 a year, about $28.37 an hour on a 2,080-hour year. That is base salary before overtime, bonuses, education incentives, shift differentials and locality pay, so most serving officers earn more. The figure comes from City of Chesapeake — Job Classification List, fiscal year 2025-2026, effective 1 July 2025.
Is that good pay for a police officer in Virginia?
It ranks #24 of 42 agencies we have verified in Virginia — 18 pay less, 23 pay more in the state — and #1,626 of 2,288 nationally. Against the national median it is $7,685 below, and against other municipal agencies $9,140 below.
What shifts do Chesapeake Police Department officers work?
The City's own recruitment FAQ states that uniform patrol officers work PERMANENT 10-hour shifts for four months at a time, with every other weekend off. That is the agency's own published wording; the pattern is drawn on this page.
Compare with another department
Put Chesapeake Police Department side by side with any other agency on the site — the two salaries, what each is worth once local prices are counted, and which comes out ahead.
The agencies either side of it
Other agencies in VA
| # | Agency | Level | Sworn # | Entry pay | Vs Chesapeake | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Arlington County Police Department | County | 299 | $90,012 | +$31,012 | #269 |
| 2 | Falls Church Police Department | Municipal | 32 | $76,400 | +$17,400 | #605 |
| 3 | Alexandria Police Department | Municipal | 264 | $75,000 | +$16,000 | #677 |
| 4 | Fairfax County Police Department | County | 1,390 | $74,035 | +$15,035 | #716 |
| 5 | Prince William County Police Department | County | 656 | $74,000 | +$15,000 | #718 |
| 6 | Loudoun County Sheriff's Office | County | 648 | $70,955 | +$11,955 | #884 |
| 7 | Leesburg Police Department | Municipal | 74 | $68,500 | +$9,500 | #1,017 |
| 8 | Manassas Police Department | Municipal | 99 | $68,453 | +$9,453 | #1,024 |
| 9 | Prince William County Sheriff's Office | County | — | $66,596 | +$7,596 | #1,151 |
| 10 | Henrico County Police Division | County | 628 | $65,959 | +$6,959 | #1,188 |
| 11 | Fairfax County Sheriff's Office | County | 433 | $64,997 | +$5,997 | #1,263 |
| 12 | Fredericksburg Police Department | Municipal | 71 | $64,000 | +$5,000 | #1,319 |
Base pay is only part of the year
Whatever the figure above, the rotation is what decides your year — which weekends you lose, when the changeovers land, what you can plan around. Save yours once and BlueShifts shows it a year ahead, with the off-duty jobs you take and what each one paid.
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