Wake County Sheriff's Office Hosts Hiring Event, Offers Deputies $5,000 Bonus

With 41 deputy positions sitting vacant, Sheriff Willie L. Rowe is bringing interviews directly to job seekers Thursday morning at 330 S. Salisbury Street in Raleigh.

The Wake County Sheriff's Office will host a career fair and on-site hiring event April 9 at the Wake County Public Safety Center, running from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. The agency is recruiting deputies, detention officers, and registered nurses for the county jail and detention system. Applicants can interview on the spot, get help with applications, and speak directly with current staff. Attendees should bring valid identification.

The biggest draw for detention officer candidates is a tiered sign-on bonus totaling $5,000: $2,000 paid at hire, $2,000 at the one-year mark, and $1,000 at two years. The structure is deliberately retention-oriented, designed to keep officers through the early attrition window when turnover runs highest. Starting pay for detention officer cadets is $25.96 per hour during the Detention Officer Certification Course, with a 5% raise upon graduation. Fully certified deputies and detention officers earn a base salary of $56,700 annually. Officers transferring laterally from other agencies can earn up to $34.19 per hour, or $71,115 annually, depending on experience.

The staffing gaps driving Thursday's event are substantial. A March 2026 survey by WCNC Charlotte of seven North Carolina counties found Wake County had 41 open deputy positions out of 422 authorized, a vacancy rate of roughly 10% and the second-worst among those counties. Only Mecklenburg County ranked lower, with 56 open positions out of 313 authorized, a rate approaching 18%. Officials across surveyed counties cited retirements, resignations, and lateral transfers to competing agencies as the primary drivers.

Rowe has been direct about the consequences of understaffing. "We want to get the staffing levels to a point where people do not have to come in and work on their days off," he said. The overtime dependency the agency is working to break has already prompted aggressive salary increases: starting cadet pay was raised from $50,540 to $54,000, a 6.85% increase that took effect August 1, 2023. Those efforts have shown some results. WRAL previously reported that one WCSO intake drew a record number of applicants, producing what the outlet described as "the largest class of its kind in close to a decade."

Rowe, a 30-year WCSO veteran who started as a deputy in 1985 after serving in the U.S. Army as a sergeant, was elected Wake County's first Democratic sheriff in decades in November 2022, defeating Republican incumbent Donnie Harrison. Thursday's event represents the latest step in his push to close the gap between authorized and filled positions before chronic overtime becomes structural.

Candidates who cannot attend in person can apply at joinwakesheriff.org or reach a recruiter at 919-856-6983 or Sheriff.Recruiting@wake.gov.