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Medford 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.
Medford Police Department starts at $78,870 a year — about $37.92 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $10,480 above the median of the 1,681 agencies on this list, and $7,606 above the median for municipal agencies.
Cost of livingPrices in Medford, OR run about 1% above the national average, so this is worth roughly $77,756 somewhere at average prices — $1,114 less than the headline figure. 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 isMedford Police Department reported 115 sworn officers and 41 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025. That is 1.3 officers per 1,000 residents, over a population of 86,298.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 Medford says about itself
The Medford Police Department serves approximately 82,000 residents. The department is dedicated to providing the highest level of professional service to our citizens, businesses and the visitors we serve.
What Medford does
Medford Police Department serves around 82,000 residents in southern Oregon's Rogue Valley. Its patrol division is the department's first line and everything else supports it: officers are deployed on 12-hour shifts, three days a week, and are assigned to one of seven patrol teams each with a sergeant and seven or eight officers, formed for a year at a time. The teams split evenly between nights and days, with two carrying flexible hours to overlap at times of peak activity. Every officer also works an eight-hour training day and an eight-hour payback day each month, used to supplement patrol, work on community policing projects or take further training. Alongside patrol the department runs a traffic team of five motorcycle officers and a sergeant, a Community Engagement Division covering code enforcement, community service officers, a livability team and school resource officers, and investigations including high-tech crimes and the MADGE drug enforcement division.
Shifts at Medford
Medford patrol officers work 12-hour shifts three days a week in one of seven teams, each formed for a year, split evenly between nights and days — and every officer also works an eight-hour training day and an eight-hour payback day each month.
A three-day week of twelves plus two extra eight-hour days a month is not a pattern any paper calendar handles well. BlueShifts builds the rotation and records the training and payback days alongside it, so the month adds up properly.
Where the figure comes from
Checked 8 August 2026. City of Medford of — open the source document
Opened 29 June 2026; official Police Officer minimum $78,869.99; entry applicants are accepted under the city'
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.
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How this level compares
Where Medford 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 | $35,006 | $71,287 | $163,619 | 1046 |
| County | $36,492 | $65,374 | $132,263 | 416 |
| Special jurisdiction | $31,200 | $60,195 | $107,954 | 69 |
| State | $33,994 | $64,998 | $102,692 | 143 |
| 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 $2,200 more than the middle municipal agency and about $8,100 more than the middle county agency and about $13,300 more than the middle special jurisdiction agency and about $8,500 more than the middle state agency and about $45,300 more than the middle territory agency. Medford starts at $78,870, so $7,583 above the municipal middle.
How it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Medford Police Department officer make?
Medford Police Department starts a new officer on $78,870 a year, about $37.92 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 Medford of.
Is that good pay for a police officer in Oregon?
It ranks #17 of 46 agencies we have verified in Oregon — 29 pay less, 16 pay more in the state — and #431 of 1,681 nationally. Against the national median it is $10,480 above, and against other municipal agencies $7,606 above.
What shifts do Medford Police Department officers work?
Medford patrol officers work 12-hour shifts three days a week in one of seven teams, each formed for a year, split evenly between nights and days — and every officer also works an eight-hour training day and an eight-hour payback day each month. That is the agency's own published wording; the pattern is drawn on this page.
Compare with another department
Put Medford 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 OR
| # | Agency | Level | Sworn # | Entry pay | Vs Medford | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tigard Police Department | Municipal | 71 | $86,596 | +$7,726 | #271 |
| 2 | Bend Police Department | Municipal | 107 | $86,432 | +$7,562 | #273 |
| 3 | Washington County Sheriff's Office | County | 219 | $85,738 | +$6,868 | #280 |
| 4 | Gresham Police Department | Municipal | 123 | $84,968 | +$6,098 | #292 |
| 5 | Portland Police Bureau | Municipal | 809 | $84,000 | +$5,130 | #308 |
| 6 | Hillsboro Police Department | Municipal | 144 | $83,988 | +$5,118 | #311 |
| 7 | Corvallis Police Department | Municipal | 67 | $82,747 | +$3,877 | #337 |
| 8 | Lane County Sheriff's Office | County | 75 | $82,181 | +$3,311 | #344 |
| 9 | Multnomah County Sheriff's Office | County | 132 | $82,035 | +$3,165 | #348 |
| 10 | Tualatin Police Department | Municipal | 38 | $81,973 | +$3,103 | #349 |
| 11 | Oregon City Police Department | Municipal | 38 | $81,564 | +$2,694 | #359 |
| 12 | Salem Police Department | Municipal | 185 | $81,349 | +$2,479 | #366 |
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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