New Castle County Executive Marcus Henry signed an ordinance on Monday, August 4, 2025, that increases the mandatory retirement age for New Castle County police officers from 55 to 57.<\/p>\n
Henry promised in his budget address to raise the age as part of an effort to get the police department up to fully authorized strength.<\/p>\n
“It’s about keeping our neighborhoods safe, maintaining strong community relationships, and insuring that our officers are supported with the experience and leadership they need on the force,” said Henry.<\/p>\n
New Castle County Police Chief Colonel Jaime Leonard said it might only be a two year increase, but right now it’s an important two years.<\/p>\n
“It will stop the mass exodus of people that we have that want to keep working,” said Leonard. “You know the 55 of today is not the 55 of twenty-five\u00a0 years ago when that particular piece of legislation was put in.”<\/p>\n
Leonard said there are plenty of examples of officers who would have stayed on the force, and in some cases left for other law enforcement jobs that didn’t have a retirement cap.<\/p>\n
“We were seeing that institutional knowledge, that commitment, just walking out the door because of a piece of paper,” said Leonard who gave several examples like Senior Sergeant Charles “Bucky” Sayers who retired in 2020. “And is just as active and probably just as proactive as he was when he worked here, but the only reason he left here was because he hit the 55 mark.”<\/p>\n
Just last week the county graduated over two dozen new police officers as part of the 53rd Recruit Academy. The combination of new recruits and the expanded retirement age will bring the force up to its fully authorized strength for the first time in eight years.<\/p>\n
Get WDEL’s top stories sent right to your email.\u00a0\u00a0Click here<\/a>\u00a0to signup for WDEL’s Afternoon Edition.<\/p>\n