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The long arm of the law on state highways has a shorter reach than it once did.

As thousands of Marylanders hit the road this weekend for the trip home from the Thanksgiving holiday, they may find fewer patrol cars monitoring their speed or on the lookout for dangerous drivers.

Maryland is one of a dozen states where the number of highway patrol officers has either shrunk or failed to keep pace with population growth since 1995, according to a USA Today analysis of federal and state data.

But Maryland State Police officials said they have been able to avoid major gaps in coverage by reallocating their personnel to highly traveled areas and making difficult, but necessary, cost-containment decisions in a tight budget climate.

The agency, which serves as the primary law enforcement unit in some areas of the state, had 1,539 sworn officers and administrative duty workers in fiscal year 1996. After reaching a high of 1,613 in fiscal 2000, the force is now down to 1,449 officers and civilian staff, said state police spokeswoman Elena Russo.

"We still are able to put our uniforms where we need them," she said.

Budget cuts last year forced the closure of the state police's Annapolis barracks.

Other states also facing major deficits have had to take far more drastic actions.

Oregon has cut down on round-the-clock patrolling, while Michigan has restricted the number of miles a trooper can log per day, according to the USA Today analysis.

Both states have seen population increases and declining police forces since 1995, according to the newspaper's report.

Maryland has avoided laying off any uniformed officers, said Russo, who noted that the dropping numbers are a result of attrition when officers resign or retire and are not replaced. The state was also able to avert cutting the size of police academy classes in recent years, as had been floated, she said.

Maryland is the only mid-Atlantic state to have smaller highway patrols now than in 1995, according to USA Today's findings.

The state police force isn't the only Maryland law enforcement unit to see its numbers shrink.

The state Department of Natural Resources Police has been cut almost in half since 1995, said Sgt. Arthur A. Windemuth, DNR police spokesman.

Even with the consolidation in 2005 of the Maryland Park Service's law enforcement division, the DNR police force currently has 247 officers, compared with around 440 in fiscal 1996, he said.

The agency, which enforces boating and conservation laws and has primary responsibility for state waterways, parks and forests, saw 33 positions cut in the current budget year, Windemuth said. Its aviation division, which consisted of two pilots, was eliminated, and its two helicopters and one airplane were sold.

At that size, the agency no longer can provide 24-hour, seven-day-a-week coverage, so officials used historical data to assess peak time for calls and assign officers accordingly. The reduction in manpower has caused an increase in overtime hours per officer, even though overall overtime use is down, Windemuth said.

The Maryland Legislative Sportsmen's Caucus is scheduled to meet Dec. 5 to discuss the impact that the personnel reduction has had on conservation law enforcement.