Bogo: Well, I feel it's rather straight forward in terms of simplicity, but most civilians have a hard time grappling exactly what each rank means. First and foremost, you have your officers. At some stations in other cities there is a rank below this called a police technician, who handles traffic violations and things of that nature. However, in Zootopia we've simply lumped the role over onto the officers as well to simplify the structure.
Then you have a corporal, which admittedly is just our designation for an officer chosen to be in charge of a small team of officers or special units. Essentially it's a role differed to the head officer working on a case with multiple officers.
Then we have our Sergeants, which are sort of out internal officers. They help interpret ordinances, train other officers, and handle internal complaints.
After that you have Lieutenant's, like Hopps. Aside from handling general officer duties, they also play the role of civic ambassadors. Think going to schools to talk to calf's, civic meetings and the like. They play a bigger role in the overall community and image of the ZPD. But they also help in taking broad direction from their superior officers and creating a plan of action around them to disseminate to the lower ranking officers.
Our Police Captains are another largely internal department, largely revolving around budgetary and department policy work. Depending on your outlook on paperwork, this could be considered to be a fairly undesirable condition.
After that, depending on the department, you can either run up to the Deputy Chief of Police, or just the Chief. It largely depends on the size of the department or need. Here in District one, it may surprise you to find that we don't actually have a deputy police chief.
Nick: *Whispers* Because no one can stand working directly under old buffalo butt for more than five minutes.
Bogo: What was that Wilde?!
Nick: Nothing Sir, please continue with this fascinating educational lecture.
Bogo: *Grumbling* Basically a deputy would be subordinate to me. They largely perform the same duties I would, and act as a back up or second in command should the Chief be in disposed. As for my role as police chief, I largely oversee everything here at District one. I make the call on what law enforcement programs to implement, I dole out cases, and study existing cases to try to discover patterns if there are indeed any. Chief of police is a role doled out by elected official generally, which in this case would be 'The Police Commissioner”, who oversees all of Zootopia's departments. As for roles like 'Sheriff', in Zootopia the role is seen as equal to that of chief....although why the North Meadowlands and Alpine Glade holds steadfast to the rural nomenclature I haven't the foggiest.
