Home › Police pay › New York › Syracuse Police Department
Syracuse 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.
Syracuse Police Department starts at $58,675 a year — about $28.21 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $9,715 below the median of the 1,681 agencies on this list, and $12,589 below the median for municipal agencies.
Cost of livingPrices in Syracuse, NY run about 4% below the national average, so this goes about as far as $61,284 would somewhere at average prices — $2,609 more than the headline figure. Most of that is utilities, at 133 against a national average of 100, where goods are 100. 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 isSyracuse Police Department reported 375 sworn officers and 74 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025. That is 2.6 officers per 1,000 residents, over a population of 145,890.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 Syracuse says about itself
It is the mission of the Syracuse Police Department to prevent crime, enforce the laws, and understand the needs of the community while providing professional service with ethical treatment for everyone.
What Syracuse does
Syracuse Police Department provides municipal police services for Syracuse and appoints sworn members through a competitive civil-service process. The department reports more than 375 members serving approximately 143,000 residents.
Where the figure comes from
Checked 10 August 2026. City of Syracuse FY2027 Adopted Budget and Police Officer Application — open the source document
Their source is effective 2 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.
How this level compares
Where Syracuse 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. Syracuse starts at $58,675, so $12,612 below the municipal middle.
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 it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Syracuse Police Department officer make?
Syracuse Police Department starts a new officer on $58,675 a year, about $28.21 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 Syracuse FY2027 Adopted Budget and Police Officer Application.
Is that good pay for a police officer in New York?
It ranks #16 of 23 agencies we have verified in New York — 7 pay less, 15 pay more in the state — and #1,298 of 1,681 nationally. Against the national median it is $9,715 below, and against other municipal agencies $12,589 below.
Compare with another department
Put Syracuse 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 NY
| # | Agency | Level | Sworn # | Entry pay | Vs Syracuse | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New York State Department of Financial Services — Investigations | State | — | $86,681 | +$28,006 | #269 |
| 2 | New York State Police | State | 5,373 | $85,292 | +$26,617 | #288 |
| 3 | New York State Park Police | State | 269 | $73,796 | +$15,121 | #602 |
| 4 | Onondaga County Sheriff's Office | County | 217 | $71,764 | +$13,089 | #681 |
| 5 | Yonkers Police Department | Municipal | 625 | $70,229 | +$11,554 | #755 |
| 6 | Erie County Sheriff's Office | County | 175 | $69,274 | +$10,599 | #800 |
| 7 | Livingston County Sheriff's Office | County | 66 | $67,808 | +$9,133 | #871 |
| 8 | New York State Department of Environmental Conservation — Forest Rangers | State | — | $67,796 | +$9,121 | #872 |
| 9 | Yates County Sheriff's Office | County | 27 | $66,389 | +$7,714 | #956 |
| 10 | Albany Police Department | Municipal | 269 | $65,066 | +$6,391 | #1,017 |
| 11 | Rochester Police Department | Municipal | 622 | $63,812 | +$5,137 | #1,068 |
| 12 | Nassau County Sheriff's Department | County | 2,591 | $62,657 | +$3,982 | #1,123 |
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.
Scan to install
