Company Overview
Advocate IT is a HUBZone-certified and Disability-Owned Business Enterprise (DOBE) dedicated to delivering enterprise-level Information Technology and Professional Services. We serve a diverse range of clients, including Federal Civilian agencies, the Department of Defense, and the biotechnology and life sciences sectors, providing innovative solutions across AI/RPA, Cybersecurity, Cloud Engineering, Data Management, and Secure Application Development.
Advocate IT is seeking a highly experienced Law Enforcement Staffing Subject-Matter Expert to support a comprehensive staffing and workload analysis for the City of Frederick Police Department. The selected consultant will serve as Team Advocate’s senior law-enforcement practitioner, translating operational data into practical, defensible recommendations regarding sworn and civilian staffing, patrol deployment, supervision, specialized units, organizational structure, and future workforce requirements.
This position is ideal for a retired or former local, county, or state law-enforcement leader who has commanded personnel, managed patrol or investigative operations, developed staffing plans, and advised senior government officials on operational and workforce decisions. Preference will be given to candidates located in Maryland who understand the State’s municipal law-enforcement environment, officer recruitment and retention challenges, training requirements, mutual-aid practices, and community-policing expectations.
Key Responsibilities
The Law Enforcement Staffing Subject-Matter Expert will:
- Serve as the senior law-enforcement advisor to Team Advocate’s project manager, data analysts, workforce specialists, and organizational-leadership consultants.
- Participate in project kickoff activities, stakeholder interviews, command-staff working sessions, site visits, ride-alongs, data-validation meetings, and recommendation-development sessions.
- Assess the Frederick Police Department’s current organizational structure, operational practices, staffing model, deployment approach, and supervisory framework.
- Review 24 months of calls-for-service and workload findings to determine whether analytical results align with operational realities.
- Evaluate patrol workload by hour, day, location, priority, response requirements, service time, and number of responding units.
- Assess obligated, unobligated, and proactive time and advise on appropriate service-capacity targets for community policing, problem solving, report completion, training, and officer wellness.
- Review the Department’s five-area patrol deployment model, shift schedules, minimum staffing requirements, leave usage, training abstractions, and shift-relief factors.
- Evaluate supervisory spans of control and responsibilities across applicable ranks, including command-level oversight.
- Assess investigative caseloads, case complexity, assignment practices, clearance expectations, backlog risks, and staffing requirements.
- Evaluate staffing and operational requirements for specialized functions, including criminal investigations, canine operations, school resource officers, communications, records, body-worn-camera and evidence support, training, recruiting, and administrative services.
- Develop or validate independent staffing estimates for the proposed Traffic Safety Unit, Proactive Patrol Team, Drone First Responder capability, and expanded Crisis Response Unit.
- Assess how sworn-force growth will affect civilian staffing, supervision, training capacity, equipment, vehicles, facilities, technology, communications, records, and administrative support.
- Advise the team on anticipated attrition, recruitment timelines, academy attendance, field training, lateral hiring, vacancy management, and the time required for newly hired officers to become independently deployable.
- Support development of sworn and civilian staffing forecasts for calendar years 2027, 2028, and 2029.
- Compare findings with recognized workload-based police-staffing methodologies, professional standards, and relevant local-government practices.
- Identify operational risks, deployment inefficiencies, staffing gaps, implementation dependencies, and opportunities to improve service delivery.
- Review analytical assumptions, staffing formulas, draft findings, and recommendations for operational credibility and law-enforcement applicability.
- Help prioritize recommendations according to public-safety impact, urgency, feasibility, cost, workforce availability, and implementation readiness.
- Contribute to the final staffing study, implementation roadmap, executive briefing, and presentation to City leadership.
- Clearly communicate technical and operational findings to police executives, municipal administrators, elected officials, and other stakeholders.
Minimum Qualifications
Candidates must possess:
- Prior sworn service with a municipal, county, or state law-enforcement agency.
- Retirement or honorable separation from a local, county, or state law-enforcement organization.
- At least 15 years of progressively responsible law-enforcement experience.
- Significant command, executive, or senior supervisory experience, preferably at the lieutenant, captain, major, deputy chief, chief, or equivalent level.
- Direct experience managing patrol operations, investigations, specialized units, personnel deployment, scheduling, or organizational planning.
- Demonstrated experience evaluating staffing requirements, workload, shift coverage, leave usage, supervisory capacity, or resource allocation.
- Working knowledge of calls-for-service analysis, computer-aided dispatch data, records-management information, investigative caseloads, response-time considerations, and patrol deployment.
- Experience supporting recruitment, academy planning, field training, retention, succession planning, or workforce forecasting.
- Ability to evaluate quantitative findings and translate them into operationally practical recommendations.
- Strong interviewing, facilitation, analytical, technical-writing, and executive-presentation skills.
- Ability to work collaboratively with police personnel, civilian employees, data analysts, consultants, municipal executives, and elected officials.
- Ability to attend in-person activities in Frederick, Maryland, during the engagement.
- Ability to handle sensitive law-enforcement, personnel, and operational information with discretion.
Preferred Qualifications
Highly competitive candidates will have one or more of the following:
- Current residence in Maryland or extensive professional experience with a Maryland law-enforcement agency.
- Prior service as a police chief, deputy chief, bureau commander, patrol commander, investigations commander, administrative commander, or equivalent executive.
- Experience conducting or supporting a formal law-enforcement staffing, workload, deployment, organizational, or management study.
- Experience presenting staffing, budget, organizational, or operational recommendations to a mayor, city or county council, governing board, or public budget authority.
- Familiarity with the International Association of Chiefs of Police workload-based staffing approach, Northwestern University Center for Public Safety methodologies, or comparable recognized police-staffing practices.
- Experience evaluating traffic enforcement, proactive policing, unmanned aircraft or Drone First Responder programs, behavioral-health response, crisis intervention, school resource, canine, or investigative functions.
- Knowledge of Maryland Police and Correctional Training Commissions requirements and Maryland law-enforcement hiring and certification processes.
- Bachelor’s or master’s degree in criminal justice, public administration, organizational leadership, management, or a related field.
- Completion of an advanced law-enforcement leadership program, command college, Federal Bureau of Investigation National Academy, Southern Police Institute, Northwestern University School of Police Staff and Command, or comparable executive-development program.
Engagement Expectations
The selected consultant must be available beginning in October 2026 and capable of supporting a fast-paced, approximately 120-day engagement. Hours will vary by project phase, with greater participation expected during mobilization, interviews, ride-alongs, operational assessment, findings validation, recommendation development, and final briefing preparation. Some evening availability may be required to observe shift operations or support City meetings.
This is a 1099 independent-contractor position and does not include employee benefits. Compensation will be established as a competitive hourly consulting rate based on the candidate’s command experience, staffing-study expertise, Maryland law-enforcement knowledge, and anticipated level of project participation. Travel requirements and reimbursable expenses will be addressed in the independent-contractor agreement.
Pay: $85.00 - $100.00 per hour
Work Location: Hybrid remote in Frederick, MD 21701
