City Council's response to the Police/Fire Initiative

Ok, I haven't had a whole lot to blog on lately where my comments haven't already been stated by others.  Thanks to our City Council, now I have something.

This is in response to an AZStarnet article which an be read at http://www.azstarnet.com/metro/298334

They are talking about the Police and Fire Initiative. Oh, where to start. I think I will just work my way through the article. 

"The City Council warned Tuesday that it will need to ask voters for massive tax increases if a ballot initiative mandating much higher police and fire staffing levels is approved by voters in November."

With any budget you should first pay for essentials and if you have money left over you can pay for luxuries or in the council's case not-for-profit organizations or pet projects, heck even art in projects around the city.  Instead, the council has funded such items in the reverse order. Cut the fat. These groups and projects can find their own funding or fail. God forbid they have to do a little foot work to get their money. If the people of the community agree with their cause they will get support. Or maybe some of these groups can partner with groups who have the same goals and cut their own costs. My point is that they have not even begun to cut unnecessary expenditures.  Lets get our priorities right. We keep annexing to grow our city, but the numbers of Police remain the same. The number of Fire Fighters stay the same. They build more stations for the Fire Fighters to respond to the new areas, but just spread their numbers. With the annexed land the city gets more property taxes. A portion of those property taxes are supposed to go to public safety. The numbers stay the same. Where has that money gone? Lets start getting our priorities straight.

"Police and fire union officials warned the council that any move to put a competing initiative or a tax increase to pay for the extra officers on the same November ballot would show bad faith toward the city's police and firefighters — and indicate council members oppose those groups."

First, the above is not a direct quote, you will notice the lack of quotation marks, it is paraphrased. I didn't write the response and do not represent the unions, but I will give the correct interpretation a shot.  They don't want the Council coming up with their own ballot initiative to take away the public attention to this initiative.  They do not want tax increases imposed to pay for Officer's because they believe the money is already in the budget and has been allocated poorly. They are warning that the public will watch their responses and make up their own minds on who they support.

"Council members and the city staff spent much of the study session lamenting the $50 million more per year it would cost to pay the 350 additional police officers the initiative requires and make sure the Fire Department meets its minimum response times."

Besides trying to figure out how hiring police increases the Fire Department's response time,$50 million more? Ok, first lets do some quick math with those numbers.  $50,000,000/350 cops =$142,857/cop. Really?  Wow! Does anyone buy that number.  Lets put the average cost for a new officer with benefits around $55,000/ year ( a number I estimated and is not based on any statistics, but should be pretty close or even high) $55,000 * 350 cops =$19,250,000  Even if they bought a new police car to go with each of those officer's,and they won't, it wouldn't even be close to $50 million. Add the training and hiring costs,still not close.

Ok, that is the problem with the math.  Lets also look at the fact that it would not be possible to train 350 Officers in the next year.   If we hired feverishly the expense would spread out over a period of three to four years.  Each year the training and hiring costs (a one time expense) would be spread out also not to reoccur.   Let us also look at the timing.  Hire now and we will get more applicants due to the currents problems with job security.  More applicants, means more people to choose from.  More choices means we can find people that exceed the minimum standards instead of meet them.  Want to hear more about the numbers needed? read the link on the TPOA web site.  Additional to that article is that at the end of this fiscal year we will see a large number of Officers retiring.  Anyone who retires after the beginning of the 2010 fiscal year will be subject to the new retirement restrictions.  The restrictions dramatically reduce the insurance coverage for them and their families.  They keep the current coverage if they submit their retirement before the end of this fiscal year.  This means, most eligible to retire before the end of the year will retire rather than stay on.  And who could blame them.  These folks will also need to be replaced.  We lose their experience though, which can not be replaced.

"Deputy City Manager Richard Miranda said there is also $60 million in construction costs for a new police station, a new fire station, and two fire stations that would need to be relocated. Miranda said there would be millions in equipment costs, additional court costs, and the city's bill for the Pima County jail as well."

Our ex-Police Chief is a moron.  He wants you to think these thing will only be needed with this bill.  The addition of a new police station to split the geography on the east side of town was a proposal Miranda had presented to us all when he was Chief.  The east side boundaries are vast especially from north to south.  It stretches from the area of Sabino canyon and Tanque Verde to the Prisons on Wilmot south of the Interstate. The response times of officers from north to south are extended by geography and traffic.  He had been talking about the need for this station for some time.  Now it's only going to happen because of the new proposed standards?  Relocating Fire Stations is another Item that has been on the agenda for some time.  Additional court costs?  Do you see that court costs are the cost of reduced crime.  The increased court costs mean more people would have to be caught violating crimes to get them there in the first place. Does anyone see anything wrong with violators of law being caught?  Increased jail costs?  Yeah if we arrest more, we have to house more.  TPD has already put steps in place to reduce the numbers of criminals housed by taking criminals directly to their initial appearances to determine if housing is necessary in the first place or if they can be bonded or released with a promise to appear at their court date.  Many are also being field released.  The costs billed to the City by the county to pay for the housing are also extremely overpriced.  It may be time to negotiate a more fair cost or open their own jail at a much lower operation cost.

The rest of the article is information on the initiative.  it is worth the read.  

So, cut unnecessary spending.  Fund the necessities. Hire the Cops and Firefighters.  Let us also not forget that lower crime rates and faster response times will entice new residents in Tucson.  It will help the housing market and increase our tax base.  Why do you think the Tucson Association of Realtors are behind this.