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Porterville 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.
Porterville Police Department starts at $67,140 a year — about $32.28 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $455 above the median of the 2,288 agencies on this list, and $1,000 below the median for municipal agencies.
Cost of livingPrices in California run about 11% above the national average, so this is worth roughly $60,639 somewhere at average prices — $6,501 less than the headline figure. Most of that is utilities, at 159 against a national average of 100, where goods are 106. Based on state-wide price levels, because this agency is not tied to a single metro 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 isPorterville Police Department reported 74 sworn officers and 34 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025. That is 1.2 officers per 1,000 residents, over a population of 63,646.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 Porterville says about itself
The members of the Porterville Police Department are committed to the safety and security of the community while providing quality service with excellence, honesty, and integrity.
What Porterville does
The Porterville Police Department serves the City of Porterville in Tulare County, California.
Porterville’s rotation, in BlueShifts
"A Police Officer working under the 3-12 Plan will ordinarily have alternating work week cycles as follows: 1. One 12-hour shift each day for three consecutive days, followed by four consecutive days off; then 2. Three 12-hour shifts and one 8-hour shift, and thereafter followed by three consecutive days off; or 3. The reverse of 1. and 2. above." The watches are named Day Watch (0600-1800), Night Watch (1800-0600) and Relief Shift (1400-0200).
The rotation template screen — enter the cycle and the start date, and you are done.
DayNight24 hrsOff
Every month, already filled in — no typing, however far ahead you look.
September 2026
The agency publishes the shift length but not a named cycle. These are the 12-hour rotations departments most often build on it: Pitman, 4 on, 4 off, DuPont, Panama, 3-4-4-3.
Three on and four off one week, four on and three off the next: eighty hours a fortnight and a different weekend free each time round. BlueShifts builds the fortnight once and fills in every month ahead.
Where the figure comes from
Checked 20 September 2026. City of Porterville and Porterville Police Officers Association MOU 2025-2027, Compensation Plan, Police Officer range 215 Step A — open the source document
Salary ranges as of 1 October 2025, after the 7% increase; $5,595 a month at Step A to $6,828 at Step E, annualised here at twelve months. A separate Police Officer Trainee class sits at range 169. A further 3% is due 1 July 2026.
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 Porterville 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. Porterville starts at $67,140, so $1,000 below the municipal middle.
How it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Porterville Police Department officer make?
Porterville Police Department starts a new officer on $67,140 a year, about $32.28 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 Porterville and Porterville Police Officers Association MOU 2025-2027, Compensation Plan, Police Officer range 215 Step A.
Is that good pay for a police officer in California?
It ranks #261 of 278 agencies we have verified in California — 17 pay less, 260 pay more in the state — and #1,113 of 2,288 nationally. Against the national median it is $455 above, and against other municipal agencies $1,000 below.
What shifts do Porterville Police Department officers work?
"A Police Officer working under the 3-12 Plan will ordinarily have alternating work week cycles as follows: 1. One 12-hour shift each day for three consecutive days, followed by four consecutive days off; then 2. Three 12-hour shifts and one 8-hour shift, and thereafter followed by three consecutive days off; or 3. The reverse of 1. and 2. above." The watches are named Day Watch (0600-1800), Night Watch (1800-0600) and Relief Shift (1400-0200). That is the agency's own published wording; the pattern is drawn on this page.
Compare with another department
Put Porterville 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 CA
| # | Agency | Level | Sworn # | Entry pay | Vs Porterville | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Santa Clara Police Department | Municipal | 141 | $163,619 | +$96,479 | #1 |
| 2 | Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety | Municipal | 227 | $149,443 | +$82,303 | #2 |
| 3 | Redwood City Police Department | Municipal | 83 | $147,942 | +$80,802 | #3 |
| 4 | San Jose Police Department | Municipal | 1,065 | $144,003 | +$76,863 | #4 |
| 5 | Mountain View Police Department | Municipal | 90 | $143,096 | +$75,956 | #5 |
| 6 | San Mateo Police Department | Municipal | 111 | $141,024 | +$73,884 | #6 |
| 7 | Los Altos Police Department | Municipal | 31 | $139,740 | +$72,600 | #7 |
| 8 | Hayward Police Department | Municipal | 171 | $138,965 | +$71,825 | #8 |
| 9 | Milpitas Police Department | Municipal | 84 | $138,261 | +$71,121 | #9 |
| 10 | Los Gatos Police Department | Municipal | 34 | $132,394 | +$65,254 | #10 |
| 11 | Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office | County | 1,071 | $132,263 | +$65,123 | #11 |
| 12 | Menlo Park Police Department | Municipal | 43 | $132,036 | +$64,896 | #12 |
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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