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Montgomery County Sheriff's Office 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.
Montgomery County Sheriff's Office starts at $45,989 a year — about $22.11 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $22,401 below the median of the 1,681 agencies on this list, and $19,386 below the median for county agencies.
Cost of livingPrices in Montgomery, AL run about 10% below the national average, so this goes about as far as $51,280 would somewhere at average prices — $5,291 more than the headline figure. Most of that is rent, at 64 against a national average of 100, where goods are 96. 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 isMontgomery County Sheriff's Office reported 135 sworn officers and 49 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025.No rate is shown: this agency does not police a single population the FBI publishes a figure for. 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 Montgomery County says about itself
The Mission of the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office is to provide the best law enforcement protection and service for Montgomery County.
What Montgomery County does
The Montgomery County Sheriff's Office provides law enforcement, court security and detention services for Montgomery County, Alabama.
Where the figure comes from
Checked 15 August 2026. Montgomery City-County Personnel Board — Deputy Sheriff Trainee announcement 24-CO0430-19, jurisdiction Montgomery County — open the source document
Montgomery County publishes one rate for entry to the Sheriff's Office: $22.11 an hour, $45,988.80 a year, for a Deputy Sheriff Trainee. **The salary after the academy is not published.** An applicant who is not Alabama POST certified is appointed provisionally as a Trainee and works a desk assignment until sent to the academy; on completing it the Sheriff may appoint them to the Deputy Sheriff classification, when a six-month probationary period begins. At that point the Personnel Board states that "a starting salary may be negotiated and will be commensurate with education, training and experience", so what a newly sworn deputy earns depends on the individual rather than a published step. An already POST-certified applicant skips the academy and is appointed directly to Deputy Sheriff, with the office advertising up to $73,080 for certified lateral officers.
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 Montgomery County 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. Montgomery County starts at $45,989, so $19,385 below the county middle.
How it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Montgomery County Sheriff's Office officer make?
Montgomery County Sheriff's Office starts a new officer on $45,989 a year, about $22.11 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 Montgomery City-County Personnel Board — Deputy Sheriff Trainee announcement 24-CO0430-19, jurisdiction Montgomery County.
Is that good pay for a police officer in Alabama?
It ranks #14 of 21 agencies we have verified in Alabama — 7 pay less, 13 pay more in the state — and #1,615 of 1,681 nationally. Against the national median it is $22,401 below, and against other county agencies $19,386 below.
Compare with another department
Put Montgomery County Sheriff's Office 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 AL
| # | Agency | Level | Sworn # | Entry pay | Vs Montgomery | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Madison Police Department | Municipal | 88 | $60,195 | +$14,206 | #1,226 |
| 2 | Huntsville Police Department | Municipal | 432 | $58,614 | +$12,626 | #1,300 |
| 3 | Shelby County Sheriff's Office | County | 147 | $57,408 | +$11,419 | #1,362 |
| 4 | Alabama Highway Patrol | State | — | $56,726 | +$10,738 | #1,376 |
| 5 | Madison County Sheriff's Office | County | 184 | $55,390 | +$9,402 | #1,415 |
| 6 | Montgomery Police Department | Municipal | 259 | $55,168 | +$9,179 | #1,420 |
| 7 | Baldwin County Sheriff's Office | County | 174 | $53,768 | +$7,779 | #1,476 |
| 8 | Tuscaloosa County Sheriff's Office | County | 112 | $51,888 | +$5,899 | #1,521 |
| 9 | Prattville Police Department | Municipal | 96 | $50,679 | +$4,691 | #1,544 |
| 10 | Mobile County Sheriff's Office | County | 236 | $50,526 | +$4,537 | #1,551 |
| 11 | University of Alabama at Birmingham Police Department | Special jurisdiction | — | $49,920 | +$3,931 | #1,577 |
| 12 | Fairhope Police Department | Municipal | 44 | $47,840 | +$1,851 | #1,601 |
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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