The City of Bossier has taken the first step in moving to a centralized communications department for the Fire and Police Departments. That move involves increasing the pay of police communications officers by about $600 per month and beginning a training process that will bring them up to the certification of their fire department counterparts.
I am told that there are openings and that anyone in the department may apply and if accepted will enter the job at the rank of Lieutenant.
The Police Department is also in the process of converting to e-ticketing. The system, called the Thinkstream Mobile Suite, will allow traffic officers to fill out citations electronically, write crash and incident reports, and send information to the city's clerks system with the touch of a button.
The $680,000 cost for the Thinkstream system was budgeted into the 2010 capital budget.
I thought they were laying people off.
ReplyDeleteGreat point... But then again the city council just advised they "suddenly" have a 6 mil. surplus already this year... Disgusting...
ReplyDeleteWow...it's a bossier miracle. Miraculously have money to give raises?? Really? Thought pay was cut?
ReplyDeleteThey bypass the men and women who are patrolmen or patrolwomen, corporals, and sergeants all the way to lieutenant? Not bad for a broke city who just laid off police and firefighters.
ReplyDeleteI thought the city council business plan was to lay off police and fire personnel, build parking garages for private developers, build and maintain an over priced CIC, raise sewer rates for the citizens, and spend over a million bucks on tennis courts. Now we are hiring folks STARTING at the rank of Lieutenant?
ReplyDeleteOfficers were laid off. Officers lost incentative pay and those over 23 years their longeviety pay.
ReplyDeleteAt the very least this should be restored before any raise. Something is very, very wrong here.
Interesting, Jim. I'm just commenting so that I can subscribe to the comments. I want to read what others think about this.
ReplyDeleteWe need to start thinking about this at election time. All of them need to go from the mayor to the city council. The problem is with the election being so far away people tend to forget what has happened. Remember all this outrage people when election time comes, and then send a message to these idiots. I just hope all these guys dont run un opposed, and we have some people out there that are not scared to run against these clowns.
ReplyDeleteAndy, good idea. If anyone hasn't noticed, you can get followups on commments by checking the 'Email follow-up comments' box.
ReplyDeleteJim, I almost always subscribe to follow-up comments. Especially on issues like this.
ReplyDeleteWhat officers were laid - off? As I recall there were new hires that were not allowed.
ReplyDeleteIt is obvious that most of these post come from people that have no clue of Civil Service Laws.
ReplyDeleteAgain the media has been mis-informed by someone. Please check your source s. This is proposed but not approved. Dispatch definately has a problem and several people have been laid off. Again, this is not a done deal and I personally don't see it happening.
ReplyDeleteI didn't get it from the 'media'. It is being done. I'll stick with my source.
ReplyDelete@ Anon.2:09
ReplyDeleteIt's already done; the new hire is in place and at work. The raises are done, although it's more like $900 a month rather than $600. Police officers have already had pay cuts - again, a done deal.
This is what you get when you let the the good ol' boys club run things. Stomp on the honest guy doing his job and take care of your friends.
The fact is this is what is going to happen. Communications officers within the police department will go to the same pay as fire department communications officers. The fire department communicatons offices make the pay of a fire captain, which is the same as a police lieutenant. The police department dispatchers will be raised to the pay of a police lieutenant. That is fact. The question I have is members of the police department lost their education pay and some lost their longevity pay due to a "loop hole" in the law. Now the city goes from a 6 million dollar budget in the red to being in the black for 6 million. It is time to give back what you took from them. That won't happen because it's the correct thing to do.
ReplyDeleteThe new "chief of communications" recently hired is making major pay. Check into the political connections as to why all this is going on. Until the citizens of Bossier clean house at city hall, this city will never reach its potential. Good ole boy politics must die in this town.
ReplyDeleteBossier City Police Communications has been horrible for years, I am happy to see a step forward for an improvement.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, where's the money coming from? Better give your police officers a raise, Mr. Mayor, or you'll have even more of a mutiny on your hands.
SBTPtips@hotmail.com
ReplyDeletePlease sent any tips about wasteful spending or any other area you want looked into about CITY HALL business to the following:
Finally a group standing up for the tax payers.
and they support police and fire which is great too -
City Hall, stop wasting money on silly things and support your police fire and other city employees
The Mayor and City Council HAVE to be replaced... DO NOT FORGET! 2 years is a long time from now.
ReplyDeleteThe mayor, city council, and EVERY department head are all part of the same cancer (research this!). They need to be replaced with honest people who want the best for Bossier. Bossier has alot of potential and is at a crossroads.
ReplyDeleteAnon @ 4:00, I hope you are referring to replacing department head with non Shriners. The Shriner clowns have created a lot of the problems Bossier City is facing.
ReplyDeleteAnon at 0459. WOW!!! Glad somebody said it, bravo!
ReplyDeleteSeems to me that every officer who got screwed out of a promotion and all those that were undergoing training but had to go to another force because of the budget shortfall ought to be screaming right now. That's a huge raise for a dispatcher. Something stinks here.
ReplyDeleteAnon @ 8:37,
ReplyDeleteSounds like money was taken away from a few to come up with them money to fund the pay raises for others and to pay the salaries for a coule of cronies.
Jim, how about a blog about civil service laws? I am curious as to how one division can get a raise and not the other. Especially when the communications department is not risking their lives on a daily basis.
ReplyDeleteAs far as I know, the city is upgrading the positions to the rank of Lieutenant. They can't arbitrarily pay more money, so they are increasing rank for those positions, which keeps it kosher with civil service. I will check to see if I'm correct.
ReplyDeleteCan't wait! I will be checking in for your response.
ReplyDelete