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Department profile · Ocean County

Surf City Police Department

Reported as: Surf City PDMunicipal police

Jurisdiction context

Not a civil service jurisdiction

This department is not among the NJCSC Appendix A jurisdictions, so major discipline here follows a different statutory track (generally N.J.S.A. 40A:14 for municipal police), with appeals that usually go to the Superior Court rather than the Civil Service Commission.

See the context on non-civil-service departments.

Reflects the NJCSC Appendix A roster as of 2026-07-04. Context only, not legal advice.

Officers named in IA cases, 2025

1[1]

Distinct officers in that year's IA investigations, not total staffing

IA investigations, 2025

1[1]

Incidents, 2025

1[1]

Major discipline records

0

All years, 2020-2025

Staffing

As reported by the department to the FBI's Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) census, full-time personnel as of October 31 each year. This is a different measurement from the "officers named in IA cases" figure above; see the methodology.

Sworn officers, 2025

11[6]

58 years reported

11 sworn officers in 2025, up from 6 in 1968 (+83%).
Yearsworn officers
19686
19697
19707
19717
19727
19737
19748
19758
19768
19778
19788
19798
19808
19818
19828
19838
19849
19857
198610
198710
198811
198910
199010
199111
199211
199310
199411
199512
199610
199711
199812
199912
200010
20019
20029
20039
200411
20058
200610
200711
200810
200910
201010
201110
201210
201310
201410
201510
201610
201710
201810
201910
202010
202111
202211
202311
202412
202511

Civilian employees, 2025

0[7]

0 per sworn officer

Female sworn officers, 2025

1[8]

9.1% of sworn officers

Officers per 1,000 residents, 2025

8.38[9]

Municipal departments only

AnalysisComputed by this site from LEE reported totals; not an official statistic.

How Surf City Police Department's sworn staffing compares with its real peer group (same agency type, similar size band), not an assumed bell curve.

Peer group: Municipal police, 1-14 officers (n=100)

Sworn officers: Municipal police, 1-14 officers
RangeAgencies
0–213
2–43
4–61
6–817
8–1011
10–1214
12–1441

Surf City Police Department: 11 sworn officers: 56th percentile among Municipal police, 1-14 officers (n=100).

The match between this FBI record and this department is this site's inference, not a certified mapping. If it is wrong, we will remove it: corrections.

Officer pay and school-staff pay

County comparison

A separate dataset from the discipline records above: NJ Treasury pension salaries as of March 31, 2026, for the 11 active Surf City Police Department officers in the file.

Median officer salary

$123,229[3]

11 active officers

Median school staff

$80,170

Ocean County, all TPAF members

Against the county

1.54x

Median officer to Ocean County school-staff median

AnalysisEvery ratio here is computed by this site from as-reported pensionable salaries. A pay comparison is not a statement about either budget. The full county comparison, including the distribution and the tenure-adjusted figure, is on the Ocean County pay page.

Military surplus equipment (1033 program)

In brief

Written by this site from the figures below.

Surf City Police Department received two recorded line items of surplus military equipment in 2016 through the federal military surplus program, both under Trucks and truck tractors, wheeled and both in a category this site classes as tactical. The recorded value is $152,527, which is original Department of Defense acquisition cost rather than current or market value. Relative to 89 agencies in the same size band, this site's Militarization Index puts the department at the 96th percentile, an analysis by this site rather than an official measure: the index reflects participation in the program rather than equipment on hand today, so a higher figure is not automatically worse. The department received these transfers, and the file is not a current inventory, since non-controlled items may be disposed of after one year. Receiving surplus equipment through the program is not misconduct, and this federal data is separate in origin from the Attorney General discipline records on this page.

Surplus military equipment transferred to this agency under the Defense Department's 1033 program, as recorded by the Defense Logistics Agency.

Total recorded value

$152,527[2]

Original DoD cost, not market value

Tactical equipment value

$152,527[2]

2 of 2 line items classed tactical

Transfer window

2016[2]

Earliest to latest recorded ship date

Quantities received, by unit of issue: 2 items (Each). Units of issue differ (an item and a kit are not the same thing), so no single combined item count exists.

Top categories by recorded value

Top 1033 equipment categories received by Surf City Police Department, by recorded value (original DoD acquisition cost, dollars)
Trucks and truck tractors, wheeled152,527 tactical

Categories received: tactical vs mundane

Each category is classed tactical or mundane by this site's published classification of its Federal Supply Class. Much of what moves through the program is mundane surplus (tools, office and medical equipment); the tactical rows are what the Militarization Index below measures.

1033 equipment categories received by Surf City Police Department, grouped tactical vs mundane
CategoryClassLine itemsQuantity receivedRecorded value (original cost)
Trucks and truck tractors, wheeledMilitary trucks · FSC 2320Tactical22 items (Each)$152,527

Every recorded transfer

Equipment class

Sort

Filtering only hides rows; every recorded transfer stays in the table below it.

Scroll sideways for more columns →

1033 program transfers recorded for Surf City Police Department, as recorded by the Defense Logistics Agency
ItemCategoryQtyRecorded valueOriginal DoD cost
TRUCK,UTILITYNSN 2320-01-371-9584Shipped 2016-02-08 · DEMIL CTrucks and truck tractors, wheeled Tactical1 Each$62,627
TRUCK,UTILITYNSN 2320-01-380-8604Shipped 2016-02-02 · DEMIL QTrucks and truck tractors, wheeled Tactical1 Each$89,900

2 of 2 recorded transfers shown. Quantities are per unit of issue and are never summed across units. DEMIL code A: non-controlled property, may be disposed of after one year (so a listed item is not necessarily still held). Codes such as C, D, F, and Q: controlled property with federal return or demilitarization requirements.

AnalysisMilitarization Index: computed by this site, not an official statistic.

Surf City Police Department received $13,866 of tactical 1033 equipment value per sworn officer (original cost, divided by its latest FBI-reported staffing): the 96th percentile among municipal police agencies of similar size (1-14 officers, n=89).

Peer group: Municipal police, 1-14 officers (n=89)

Tactical 1033 value per sworn officer: Municipal police, 1-14 officers
RangeAgencies
0–1000082
10000–200005
20000–300000
30000–400000
40000–500001

Surf City Police Department: 13,866 dollars of tactical 1033 acquisition value per sworn officer: 96th percentile among Municipal police, 1-14 officers (n=89).

A higher index is not automatically worse. It divides cumulative transfers over the covered window by current staffing, so it measures how intensively an agency has participated in the program, not what it holds today. See the methodology.

Statewide totals, per-county rollups, and the top categories across all of New Jersey are on the 1033 program overview.

Internal affairs investigations by year

counts

Internal affairs investigations reported by Surf City Police Department, by year
Categorycounts
20211
20231
20251

Incidents

1 in 2025

Internal affairs incidents reported by Surf City Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20211
20231
20251
Analysis

Computed by this site from the two figures the agency reports each year. Not a misconduct rate: it describes how an agency resolved what it investigated.

share of total · 3 reported years

Share of internal affairs investigations sustained by Surf City Police Department, by year
Yearshare of total
20210
20230
20250

Statewide, 19.5 percent of investigations reported a sustained complaint in 2025. How dispositions break down statewide.

Complaint mix, 2025

Most serious allegation per investigation, as categorized by the reporting agency. Officer-level rows list 1 officers involved.

Most serious allegation

Most serious allegations reported by Surf City Police Department, 2025
not provided1
AdministrativeConduct / dutyRights / integrityViolence / criminal

Internal disposition

Internal dispositions reported by Surf City Police Department, 2025
not provided1

Allegations by year, 2021 to 2025

AnalysisRanked and folded by this site. The counts inside each panel are as reported.

Demeanor

1 of 3

Demeanor allegations reported by Surf City Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20211
2022not reported
20230
2024not reported
20250

not provided

1 of 3

not provided allegations reported by Surf City Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20210
2022not reported
20230
2024not reported
20251

Other Criminal Violation

1 of 3

Other Criminal Violation allegations reported by Surf City Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20210
2022not reported
20231
2024not reported
20250

Against peers, 2025

How this grade was built →
Internal affairs investigations per 100 IA-investigated officers, 2025 (investigations per 100 IA-investigated officers)
Surf City Police Department100.0
County median, municipal police (29)100.0
NJ median, municipal police (445)125.9

Investigations per 100 officers named in that year's IA investigations (the Attorney General's own "Number of Officers" field, a distinct-officer count drawn from the IA case data itself, not a department headcount). A higher number is ambiguous on its own: it can reflect more misconduct, or a stronger internal reporting culture. Medians are computed within the same agency type only.

AnalysisA second, independent rate using FBI-reported staffing instead.

1 investigations reported for 2025[1] ÷ 11 sworn officers the department reported to the FBI for 2025[17] = 9.1 per 100 FBI-reported sworn officers. This is a genuinely different denominator from the rate above, not a correction of it; the two should not be added or averaged together. See the methodology for why these two officer counts diverge.

Report card

Grade A: Lowest fifth of peers

On reported IA volume and discipline severity; see methodology

Combined standing
17th percentile of 100 peers
Confidence
Medium confidence
  • small agency; per-officer rates swing widely on a handful of cases

Where this agency falls among its peers

The actual spread of discipline severity across Surf City Police Department's real peer group, not an assumed bell curve. If the group is skewed, it is shown skewed.

Peer group: Municipal police, 1-14 officers (n=100)

Discipline severity: Municipal police, 1-14 officers
RangeAgencies
0–5074
50–1006
100–1508
150–2002
200–2504
250–3002
300–3504

Surf City Police Department: 0 severity-weighted discipline per 100 IA-investigated officers: 34th percentile among Municipal police, 1-14 officers (n=100).

How the grade is built

Three components, each a percentile within the peer group. The combined standing is their weighted mean, re-ranked among peers; the grade is the fifth of the peer group it lands in.

IA volumeweight 40%

1st percentileof 100 peers

83.3 investigations per 100 officers (multi-year mean)

Internal affairs investigations per 100 reported officers, averaged over the years where the agency reported both figures.

Discipline severityweight 40%

34th percentileof 100 peers

0.0 severity-weighted discipline per 100 officers, 2020-2025

Major discipline records weighted by sanction (termination 4, demotion 3, suspension 2, other 1) per 100 officers.

Allegation severityweight 20%

95th percentileof 100 peers

3.00 mean severity tier (1 low - 4 critical)

Mean severity tier of IA allegations across 2021-2025, using the published tier map; unknown values excluded.

What this grade can and can't tell you

  • The underlying data is self-reported by agencies, one yearly snapshot at a time.
  • Allegations are not findings; many complaints end unfounded, exonerated, or not sustained.
  • There is no arrest or call-volume denominator in this data, so nothing here is a per-capita misconduct rate. A genuinely independent staffing-based rate, sourced from the FBI rather than this grade's own data, appears above when available. It is a different measurement, not a more accurate version of the grade.
  • A higher internal affairs volume is ambiguous: it can indicate more misconduct, or a more robust oversight and reporting culture. The grade weighs it anyway, because volume is what the record offers; that choice is published, not hidden.
  • The grade is one lens. The records it reads are on this page above.

Where this agency ranks

AnalysisRankings compare agencies of the same type only, on figures as reported. A high rank is reported volume, not a verdict.[18] How each metric is defined.
This agency's rank on each metric, among agencies of the same type
MetricValueRank
IA per 100 investigated officers2025100.0322nd of 445 municipal police
IA investigations20251410th of 445 municipal police
IA incidents20251405th of 445 municipal police
Militarization Indexas of 2026-06-30$13,86612th of 163 municipal police
Sworn per 1,000 residentslatest reported census year8.3817th of 460 municipal police
Police pay vs school paypension snapshot 2026-03-311.54x121st of 415 municipal police
OPRA requests recordedOPRAmachine, 2017 to present11388th of 458 municipal police

Major discipline records

No major discipline records appear for this agency in the 2020-2025 releases. Absence of records is not a finding; see the methodology for what this data does and does not cover.

Public records requests

Records requests about this department filed through OPRAmachine, an independent site that files Open Public Records Act requests in public and publishes the responses.[4] This is a third-party, user-generated source, separate in origin from the Attorney General records elsewhere on this page.

Current as of 12 July 2026. These figures are a point-in-time snapshot and do not update: requests filed to OPRAmachine after that date do not appear here. For live activity, see this body on OPRAmachine.

This department has no separate listing on OPRAmachine. Records requests for it are handled through Surf City Borough, the municipal records custodian, which also fields requests about permits, property, and code enforcement. Only the 11 requests whose subject line indicates it concerns the police department are counted below. The other 61 filed to Surf City Borough are about something else and are not shown.

Police-related requests

11[4]

Identified by subject line, of 72 filed to Surf City Borough

Most recent request

December 2025[4]

First recorded October 2017

Awaiting a response

10[4]

Requests with no response recorded yet

What happened to those requests

Statuses as recorded on OPRAmachine. They are set by the person who filed the request when they classify what came back, not by the agency and not by any court. They describe the fate of a records request and nothing else.

Recorded outcomes of police-related records requests to Surf City Borough (requests)
Awaiting agency response10
Requester reported partial success1

Recent requests

The 11 most recent police-related requests to Surf City Borough, by date and recorded status. Each was written by a member of the public. A request is a question somebody asked. It is not a finding, not an allegation this site makes, and not evidence that anything happened.

  1. 2025-12-23Awaiting agency response
  2. 2025-10-09Awaiting agency response
  3. 2023-08-31Awaiting agency response
  4. 2023-08-31Awaiting agency response
  5. 2021-04-20Awaiting agency response
  6. 2020-05-28Awaiting agency response
  7. 2020-05-28Awaiting agency response
  8. 2020-05-28Awaiting agency response
  9. 2020-05-27Awaiting agency response
  10. 2020-05-27Awaiting agency response
  11. 2017-10-30Requester reported partial success
Show what each request asked for, as the requester wrote it

These titles are quoted from OPRAmachine exactly as the requester typed them. They are the requester's words, not this site's, and some describe what the requester believed or suspected. Nothing here has been established as fact.

File your own records request

Anyone can request records from this municipality under the Open Public Records Act. This link opens a request on OPRAmachine, pre-filled with a neutral starting point you can edit or replace before you send it. The request, and any response, will be published there.

File an OPRA request about this department

See every request filed to Surf City Borough on OPRAmachine.

What this section can and can't tell you

  • A request is not a finding. Every entry records what a member of the public asked for. None of it establishes that an agency did anything, and none of it is an allegation this site is making.
  • Statuses come from the requester, not the agency. On OPRAmachine the person who filed the request classifies the response they got, so “successful” means they said they got what they asked for. It is not the agency's word and not an adjudication.
  • Request volume is not a measure of misconduct. A long list usually reflects public interest, local journalism, or one determined requester. A short list usually means few people have asked.
  • This covers OPRAmachine only. Most OPRA requests in New Jersey are filed directly with agencies and never appear here, so this is a floor, not a total.
  • It is frozen at 12 July 2026. The figures come from a snapshot of OPRAmachine taken on that date and nothing refreshes them, so anything filed since is missing. Treat every number here as a lower bound that is only getting further out of date.
  • The count is an undercount, by design. Requests to Surf City Borough are sorted by subject line, because that custodian also handles permits, property, and code enforcement. A request that is genuinely about the police but carries a vague subject line, and many do read only “OPRA Request,” is not counted here. The sorting is this site's own reading of the request titles, not a fact from the source, and it is deliberately cautious: it would rather miss a police request than show you somebody's building permit.

The match between this OPRAmachine body and this department is this site's inference, not a certified mapping. If it is wrong, we will remove it: corrections.

Questions and answers

How many internal affairs investigations did Surf City Police Department report in 2025?

Surf City Police Department reported 1 internal affairs investigations in 2025, according to New Jersey Attorney General data. 1 distinct officers were named in that year's IA investigations.

How many major discipline records does Surf City Police Department have?

No major discipline records appear for Surf City Police Department in the Attorney General's 2020-2025 releases. Absence of records is not a finding; discipline is listed only after all appeals conclude.

How many officers does Surf City Police Department have?

Surf City Police Department reported 11 full-time sworn officers to the FBI's Law Enforcement Employees census for 2025, 9.1% of them female. That is 8.38 sworn officers per 1,000 residents. This is a different measurement from the "officers named in IA cases" figure elsewhere on this page, which counts distinct officers in that year's internal affairs investigations, not total staffing.

What military surplus equipment has Surf City Police Department received through the 1033 program?

Surf City Police Department received 2 recorded line items of surplus military equipment through the Defense Department's 1033 program in 2016, with a total recorded value of $152,527 (original DoD acquisition cost, not current or market value). The largest category by recorded value was: Trucks and truck tractors, wheeled. Transfers are as recorded by the Defense Logistics Agency as of 2026-06-30; equipment acquired through the program is not necessarily still held.

What is the total recorded value of the 1033 equipment Surf City Police Department received?

The surplus equipment recorded for Surf City Police Department under the 1033 program totals $152,527 in original DoD acquisition cost, of which $152,527 is in categories this site classes as tactical (2 of 2 line items). These are original-cost figures at the time of transfer, not current or market value.

What does Surf City Police Department pay its officers compared with local school staff?

The median pensionable salary for the 11 active Surf City Police Department officers in the NJ Treasury pension file is $123,229. Against the Ocean County school-staff median the ratio is 1.54x. These are pensionable base salaries: they exclude overtime, stipends, longevity and leave payouts for both groups, and a school contract year and a police work year are different lengths. TPAF covers certificated school staff, not only classroom teachers.

Sources

  1. [1]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 2441. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  2. [2]DoD 1033 Program transfers (LESO Public Information), New Jersey sheet. Defense Logistics Agency (U.S. Department of Defense). LESO Public Information: DISP_AllStatesAndTerritories, quarterly file as of 2026-06-30; recorded ship dates 1993-2026. Retrieved 2026-07-10. https://www.dla.mil/Disposition-Services/Offers/Law-Enforcement/Public-Information/ ↩
  3. [3]YourMoney Active Pension Members (PFRS/SPRS subset) and YourMoney Active Pension Members (TPAF subset, names removed). New Jersey Department of the Treasury. Both snapshots as of March 31, 2026. Derived from the public YourMoney Active Pension Members dataset, https://www.yourmoney.nj.gov/. Figures are computed by this site from as-reported pensionable salaries; the row-by-row account of what entered each figure is published at /data/pay-comparison.json. ↩
  4. [4]Records-request activity for Surf City Borough. OPRAmachine (opramachine.com), an independent public-records platform. Publicly visible requests only. Point-in-time snapshot taken 2026-07-12 from a database export dated 2026-07-11. Not updated after that date; see opramachine.com for current activity. ↩
  5. [5]New Jersey county boundaries. New Jersey Office of Information Technology, Office of GIS (NJOGIS). NJ_Counties_3857 (FeatureServer layer 0), https://services2.arcgis.com/XVOqAjTOJ5P6ngMu/arcgis/rest/services/NJ_Counties_3857/FeatureServer/0. 2020 boundary delineation. Retrieved 2026-07-27. Boundaries are generalized for display. This data set is not a survey document and must not be used as such. The polygons do not represent legal boundaries.
  6. [6]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8535. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  7. [7]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8535. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  8. [8]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8535. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  9. [9]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8535. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  10. [10]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 404. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  11. [11]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1931. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  12. [12]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 2441. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  13. [13]New Jersey Internal Affairs Investigations, 2024-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Surf City PD row for 2025; row 1 is the header. ↩
  14. [14]New Jersey Internal Affairs Data Download, 2021-2023. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Surf City PD row for 2021. ↩
  15. [15]New Jersey Internal Affairs Data Download, 2021-2023. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Surf City PD row for 2023. ↩
  16. [16]New Jersey Internal Affairs Investigations, 2024-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Surf City PD row for 2025. ↩
  17. [17]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8535. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  18. [18]Ranks computed by this site over the Attorney General internal affairs agency totals and major discipline releases, within agency type. Each ranking page lists every agency and its source rows. ↩