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Tucson 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.
Tucson Police Department starts at $65,499 a year — about $31.49 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $1,186 below the median of the 2,288 agencies on this list, and $2,641 below the median for municipal agencies.
How big the department isTucson Police Department reported 755 sworn officers and 443 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025. That is 1.4 officers per 1,000 residents, over a population of 556,898.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 Tucson says about itself
The mission of the Tucson Police Department is to serve the public in partnership with our community, to protect life and property, prevent crime, and resolve problems.
What Tucson does
The Tucson Police Department is the largest law enforcement agency in southern Arizona and the municipal force for Arizona's second city, covering more than 200 square miles and over 540,000 residents. It is organised into five bureaus, of which Patrol Services is the largest, and is led by a chief with a deputy chief and four assistant chiefs; the department publishes its organisational chart and its annual reports openly, including a machine-readable version of the chart. Sworn members are commissioned as Arizona peace officers by the AZPOST board and recruits train at the Southern Arizona Law Enforcement Training Center. ITS PUBLISHED VALUES INCLUDE ONE MOST AGENCIES DO NOT NAME AT ALL - RESILIENCE, written in the department's own words around repeated exposure to trauma: checking in with each other, encouraging regular physical and mental health checkups, seeking help without stigma, and approaching discipline generally as a restorative measure. The other seven are leadership, service orientation, integrity, excellence, fairness, teamwork and personal responsibility, each set out with what the value means in practice.
Where the figure comes from
Checked 27 August 2026. Starting salary, Tucson Police Department recruiting site, pay and benefits page. — open the source document
Their source is effective 1 October 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.
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How this level compares
Where Tucson 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. Tucson starts at $65,499, so $2,641 below the municipal middle.
How it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Tucson Police Department officer make?
Tucson Police Department starts a new officer on $65,499 a year, about $31.49 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 Starting salary, Tucson Police Department recruiting site, pay and benefits page..
Is that good pay for a police officer in Arizona?
It ranks #25 of 36 agencies we have verified in Arizona — 11 pay less, 24 pay more in the state — and #1,221 of 2,288 nationally. Against the national median it is $1,186 below, and against other municipal agencies $2,641 below.
Compare with another department
Put Tucson 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 AZ
| # | Agency | Level | Sworn # | Entry pay | Vs Tucson | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Scottsdale Police Department | Municipal | 391 | $81,474 | +$15,974 | #440 |
| 2 | Tempe Police Department | Municipal | 353 | $79,977 | +$14,478 | #497 |
| 3 | Goodyear Police Department | Municipal | 174 | $77,147 | +$11,648 | #580 |
| 4 | Buckeye Police Department | Municipal | 133 | $76,003 | +$10,504 | #626 |
| 5 | Phoenix Police Department | Municipal | 2,490 | $75,847 | +$10,348 | #637 |
| 6 | Queen Creek Police Department | Municipal | 132 | $74,693 | +$9,194 | #689 |
| 7 | Chandler Police Department | Municipal | 348 | $74,610 | +$9,110 | #693 |
| 8 | Surprise Police Department | Municipal | 179 | $74,214 | +$8,715 | #707 |
| 9 | Peoria Police Department | Municipal | 234 | $74,194 | +$8,694 | #708 |
| 10 | Mesa Police Department | Municipal | 885 | $73,972 | +$8,473 | #720 |
| 11 | Glendale Police Department | Municipal | 406 | $73,389 | +$7,890 | #742 |
| 12 | Casa Grande Police Department | Municipal | 82 | $72,860 | +$7,361 | #768 |
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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