Looking into crossing over. Just a little backstory first.

I'm currently a PT FF/EMT. Everything is good so far but most of my experience comes from the PD side of things as i was a volly there for about 8 years. Frankly i kind of miss being involved in the law enforcement side of things. The fire side is interesting sure but i just don't make enough to justify the hr long drive every day. I also end up spending half of what i make just running around town . I'm looking to drop down to 1 or 2 days a wk if i can get hired on elsewhere.

My local S.O is hiring for both jailers and Pt/FT dispatchers. Now I did take the test for dispatching last year and passed it well enough but they didn't want to hire me while i attended the fire academy. So my question to ya'll is what are the pro & cons of both as career standpoint?  Locally dispatch pays better and has better training. I'm good with computers and can type decently fast. The jail's salary is pretty low but in a year you supposedly can get sent to the police academy. I really wouldn't mind being a deputy for the county afterwards so there's that.  Thanks..

i work for the bop(fed corrections)...so maybe a bit different.  The salary is meh but not bad by any means, the nice thing is great bennies, and also preferential hiring to other fed agencies and your pension starts with the first agency you start with.

so say i lateral to cbp or DOD police my pension date is still when i started with the bop.  




oh btw if your corrections you get LEOSA as well

The starting salary for my county jail is $12. Which is about $3-5/hr lower then surrounding counties. The benefits are pretty decent. I haven't considered BOP really but i do have facility about 30-40 mins from my house. I'm mainly looking to get my feet wet and a couple years make the jump to patrol work.

As far BOP goes what is it like to work at  a min security with a female only pop? Do they even hire males at all? I'm pretty new to this side of things as you can tell .

ETA: Forgot to add the closest FPC/BOP facility to me is female only camp. I think deep south TX has a few more BOP prisons but i'm not sure.

I'm a deputy who worked in dispatch early on in my career so here's my take on it.

If you like to stay active and doing stuff dispatch will probably get pretty boring pretty quick depending on the population size of your county/jurisdictional area and call volume. I worked for a small county dispatch where we were responsible for LEO, EMS, and FD. We typically had two on shift and it was never really a big deal unless the crap hit the fan with a major incident.

I've never worked as a corrections officer so I can't comment on that. However if you are wanting to eventually transfer to a patrol deputy position, it seems like it is easier to transfer into it from a CO rather than dispatch.

All of the county dispatch centers near me are LEO/Fire/EMS but your probably right. I would get bored fast especially on the overnight shift.  Doing it it PT might be better in that case. As far as being a corrections officer goes I did put my application in the yesterday for my neighboring county. They start their CO's at $16/hr and supposedly send those who want to be a deputy to the academy in as little as 6 months.  I have been told however to not bring that up in an interview which makes sense but at least it's an option.

If you are thinking of getting into corrections, Id pick the BOP over state/local. Better pay/benefits and not as much BS from the inmates, especially at the lower security levels. If you are close to the DFW area, there are three facilities there. Two are Low men, one is a Female Medical Center.

I went ahead and applied to the opening on USA jobs. There's 2 units near me. One is low female and the other is low men. Kind of confusing in a way trying to figure out which GS grade i'm qualified for. The NOR said I was highly qualified for GS-5 and qualified for GS-6. Do you know what types of shifts they work? Starting pay was $40k which pretty good for this area. I'm in East/Central TX .

As a CO youll most likely bid on a post each quarter based on seniority. So being that youd be last... well I dont know! If you have more specific questions, feel free to PM me.

Only if you have statutory arrest powers. Most state DOCs do not. Counties depend on how they structure their workforce.

I despise working with females. It is the last kind of joint I would ever choose. They are a major PITA! Imagine 100+ hormonal women whose times of month all coincide with each other.

If you get on with the feds, you'll get tossed around for your first 15 months, then you can bid on posts and shifts.