West Coast Exodus: Police seek refuge in state where ‘they can enjoy their career’

Idaho is a migration magnet, is growing out of breaknecks. Idaho as a whole continues to grow. People are moving out of Washington, followed by California, pushed out of their newest population growth in the last decade, Agricultural land law fueled by population growth. Who are the people moving here? Based on my own experience and how many people I meet that come from that background, it's, I will say it, Someone proved me wrong that it is the largest concentration of former and current first responders anywhere in the USI don't think I'm wrong. And Idaho's population growth has been growing, you know, pretty steady for the last decade or so. And a lot of those folks are retired law enforcement from out of state and you know, they've come here because our state is is beautiful. It's a great place to to be and, you know, lots of resources and outdoors and all those kinds of things. In the 70s, LAPD officers started coming up here, like moving up here after retirement. But I have met a few people who are like, oh, yeah, you know, my dad moved up here in the 70s after he retired now and established this place. So I think that kind of put it on the map. And I don't know where it started. It must have been a random guy who's like, hey, man, I found this paradise up north, like we got to go. And that just kind of has become a thing. So there's a ton of officers from LAPD, you know, San Diego County Sheriff's Department, San Diego City, all of that that have found their way up here. But then you have other groups too. I mean you've got a whole group from Seattle. And I know this because I'm tied into a few retiree groups up here and there's a group of 40 Seattle PD that are, yeah, that are retired and that are you know, have their monthly coffee group and they get together CHP. So the department I came from, there are 40 plus CHP members that we know of that are in the area that you know and we get together monthly. I think we've seen it over the last, you know, five years or less certified officers laterally transferred to agencies from out of state to in state. I've talked to officers from out of state that that have called me and looking for looking to come to my agency and they're like in Idaho they still arrest people for illegal drugs. And that's one reason I want to come to your state. You know, I I I want to be able to to do my job and make a difference. And and it's from states that used to be able to do that and they've, you know, decriminalized some things or or defunded their resources and stuff like that. And they come to Idaho, Idaho where you know, they can enjoy their career and make a difference there. There definitely are some that are unhappy where they're working right now. So these are younger people love the job. They find that whatever state or city they're working in now, they can't do the job that they sign up for, right, For, you know, the District Attorney doesn't back them. They there's too much liability. So their department won't let them enforce the law, which is their job and that bugs a lot of people because that's, you know, they come out of this job to help. So what we found here in North Idaho is that these departments still very much want that and that's why North Idaho is the way it is. So a lot of these guys and gals, they they know that and they come up here, they get a job up here, often times taking a huge pay cut because the pay here does not compare to a lot of other states. But it's worth it to them to raise their families in a in a place that is safe and has those old school values.