Forty-eight Jacksonville police officers are being laid off as the Sheriff’s Office cuts payroll to handle a shrunken 2012 budget, Nelson Cuba, the police union's president, told The Times-Union this afternoon.

Cuba said he learned the number of layoffs from a letter sent to the union from the city's human resources department. Another 23 vacancies have been eliminated, along with an uncertain number of civilian employees, Cuba said.

The police layoffs, from the last two police academy classes, occurred Monday and today.

Numerous ranks have also been reduced as jobs have been eliminated. At least some holding appointed posts as administrators are entitled under civil service rules to revert to lower ranks.

The Sheriff's Office has declined comment until Wednesday, when Sheriff John Rutherford expects layoffs to be completed. Rutherford has not returned a message left by the Times-Union today on his cell phone.

Cuba blamed the cuts on Mayor Alvin Brown and the City Council for a budget shortfall and Rutherford for not compensating for the potential loss of positions by cutting his budget in other spots.

“This is a blow to public safety,” Cuba said. “We going back to the number of positions we had 3 or 4 years ago, when we were the murder capital of Florida. Do we want to be number one again?”

Rutherford has been repeatedly critical of the police union opposing a two percent salary cut, which the sheriff said would allow him to fund the positions. Cuba call that argument “smoke and mirrors.”