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Santa Monica 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.
Santa Monica Police Department starts at $126,672 a year — about $60.90 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $58,282 above the median of the 1,681 agencies on this list, and $55,408 above the median for municipal agencies.
Cost of livingPrices in Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA run about 14% above the national average, so this is worth roughly $111,540 somewhere at average prices — $15,132 less than the headline figure. Most of that is rent, at 170 against a national average of 100, where goods are 107. 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 isSanta Monica Police Department reported 234 sworn officers and 142 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025. That is 2.6 officers per 1,000 residents, over a population of 90,193.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 Santa Monica says about itself
We are dedicated to safeguarding our community by improving quality of life and upholding public trust.
What Santa Monica does
The Santa Monica Police Department says its mission is to safeguard the community by improving quality of life and upholding public trust. Its vision is to serve as a benchmark for law-enforcement excellence while working with community partners to eliminate crime and social disorder. The department describes its work as including crime prevention, community-oriented policing and outreach, traffic enforcement, animal services, transparency, and other public-safety functions, with an emphasis on accountability, integrity, respect, and collaboration with the community
Where the figure comes from
Checked 8 August 2026. City of Santa Monica official P — open the source document
Opened 6 July 2026; source explicitly states advancement to Police Officer after academy and Step 1 base salary $126,672
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 Santa Monica 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. Santa Monica starts at $126,672, so $55,385 above the municipal middle.
How it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Santa Monica Police Department officer make?
Santa Monica Police Department starts a new officer on $126,672 a year, about $60.90 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 Santa Monica official P.
Is that good pay for a police officer in California?
It ranks #19 of 222 agencies we have verified in California — 203 pay less, 18 pay more in the state — and #19 of 1,681 nationally. Against the national median it is $58,282 above, and against other municipal agencies $55,408 above.
Compare with another department
Put Santa Monica 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 Santa | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Santa Clara Police Department | Municipal | 141 | $163,619 | +$36,947 | #1 |
| 2 | Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety | Municipal | 227 | $149,443 | +$22,771 | #2 |
| 3 | Redwood City Police Department | Municipal | 83 | $147,942 | +$21,270 | #3 |
| 4 | San Jose Police Department | Municipal | 1,065 | $144,003 | +$17,331 | #4 |
| 5 | Mountain View Police Department | Municipal | 90 | $143,096 | +$16,424 | #5 |
| 6 | San Mateo Police Department | Municipal | 111 | $141,024 | +$14,352 | #6 |
| 7 | Los Altos Police Department | Municipal | 31 | $139,740 | +$13,068 | #7 |
| 8 | Hayward Police Department | Municipal | 171 | $138,965 | +$12,293 | #8 |
| 9 | Milpitas Police Department | Municipal | 84 | $138,261 | +$11,589 | #9 |
| 10 | Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office | County | 1,071 | $132,263 | +$5,591 | #10 |
| 11 | Menlo Park Police Department | Municipal | 43 | $132,036 | +$5,364 | #11 |
| 12 | Campbell Police Department | Municipal | 44 | $131,747 | +$5,075 | #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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