Tulsa Police Chief Talks About Cuts

[rwarn17588]

I don't know the details, I don't know if everyone is lying and in spite of a massive drop in revenue the city really does have money and is just out to screw people, I don't know if the bok center profit statements are lies...

What I know is that this ordeal has caused most tulsans I talk with to feel the slogan "to protect and serve" refers to senior fop member's bank accounts. A lot of goodwill was lost holding onto company cars and now this fiasco.  The union has really played its hand too strong, they won all the battles but lost the pr war and failed to serve the people of tulsa or their junior members.

Enjoy your ~$5k in severance.

Between firefighter unions campaigning for people that won't look into fraud, teachers fighting tooth and nail any method to messure effectiveness, and now cops protecting and serving the union over citizens; a have a real sour taste in my mouth for "civil servants" banding together for the common good.  Can't wait for tsa to get their union up and going.  Your free to look out for your interest above the tax payers, but you should anticipate to lose some respect for doing so.

+1

[shadows]

I see no reason why the Cherokees....Creeks and Osage could not kick in some monies to save these jobs....

We are in the fields of dreams as we ask the American Indian tribes to contribute to our failures to maintain the land taken back because some thought it was a mistake for them to have it.  We stole for them their mineral rights, placed them on reservation and shot them in the back when they sought to leave.  Have they not already contributed enough as the land we now stand on was traded for the plantations they developed in the east?  Now we are talking about them picking up the shambles of our way of self-government we have made such a gross failure with.  Next we will want to place parking meters in the casinos parking lots and send our parking maids out to collect the monies from them.

The solution to the layoff would become a reality if the city issued the payroll checks to the officers and the bank notified the officer that the account was overdrawn, leaving no funds to pay the check.  It happened in the great depression and it well on its was of happening again. This is not a bank failure but a failure in the educating of people that a diploma is merely a embossed sheet of paper requiring many other facets of learning.

[Conan71]

We are in the fields of dreams as we ask the American Indian tribes to contribute to our failures to maintain the land taken back because some thought it was a mistake for them to have it.  We stole for them their mineral rights, placed them on reservation and shot them in the back when they sought to leave.  Have they not already contributed enough as the land we now stand on was traded for the plantations they developed in the east?  Now we are talking about them picking up the shambles of our way of self-government we have made such a gross failure with.  Next we will want to place parking meters in the casinos parking lots and send our parking maids out to collect the monies from them.

The solution to the layoff would become a reality if the city issued the payroll checks to the officers and the bank notified the officer that the account was overdrawn, leaving no funds to pay the check.  It happened in the great depression and it well on its was of happening again. This is not a bank failure but a failure in the educating of people that a diploma is merely a embossed sheet of paper requiring many other facets of learning.

It was a tongue in cheek suggestion, I think, Shadows.  Though my post about Casinos being part of our sales tax revenue problem was dead serious.

[FOTD]

Indian karhma?

City center arena a future drain? Not an asset? P+L statements, balance sh!ts that lie?

Sticking up for the new union busting rethugs in city orfice?

FOTD might be amused if he wasn't so familiar with one hard working rookie black officer turning in his badge this morning.

Screwy and Dewey, Heckle and Jeckle, whatever you call those two idiots running our sh!ty, just hurt economic development. So let's not hear their drumbeat about that....all it will result in is throwing good money after bad.

Why wasn't getting rid of our police and fire unions part of their platform? Deceivers. Their political tribe continues to devastate our country...

[Conan71]

Indian karhma?

City center arena a future drain? Not an asset? P+L statements, balance sh!ts that lie?

Sticking up for the new union busting rethugs in city orfice?

FOTD might be amused if he wasn't so familiar with one hard working rookie black officer turning in his badge this morning.

Screwy and Dewey, Heckle and Jeckle, whatever you call those two idiots running our sh!ty, just hurt economic development. So let's not hear their drumbeat about that....all it will result in is throwing good money after bad.

Why wasn't getting rid of our police and fire unions part of their platform? Deceivers. Their political tribe continues to devastate our country...

Just who did you wind up voting for in the last city election?  It sounded as if you were leaning toward Bartlet (sic) at one point after dooshing him up as a drug addict.  I know you thought Perkins was too much of a lush and you were beating up on Tommy some for his hystrionics.

[Wilbur]

What I know is that this ordeal has caused most tulsans I talk with to feel the slogan "to protect and serve" refers to senior fop member's bank accounts.

Many officers felt like this:  They've been promised for more than a quarter of a century that this city wants to pay them the average wage of the other 10 market-peer cities, which has NEVER happened.  Its never happened in the good finacial years and its never happened in the bad financial years.  They are currently paid 9th out of the 11 cities and are 22% below the average.  To accept another 13+% decrease in compensation puts those officers in absolute last place and even further behind the average.

When you see at least two-thirds of the officers who face layoff vote for layoff, and 90% of the membership voting for layoffs, those officers were in the same boat at AFSCME employees, which is "enough is enough."  To ask these "senior FOP members" to give up way into the six figures in pension benefits for the rest of their lives is not acceptable.

The FOP also put out numerous alternatives, none of which were accepted.  The City Council even put out alternatives, none of which were accepted.

The Mayor has an agenda, and it has NOTHING to do with money.  That's just the tool he is using.

As I've said before....  It's not about the money.  Never has been.

This city has millions of dollars sitting around in accounts other then the general fund.  It is not a single employee's fault some flunky created these other accounts and said they can't be used for salaries.  Nor is it a single employee's fault the prior administration couldn't figure out how to balance the check book and spent money like it was going out of style.

I'll never understand how this city can continue to increase taxes and increase infrastructure but say none of these tax increases can be used for salaries, when it takes the salaries of people to run and maintain the increased infrastructure.

[FOTD]

Just who did you wind up voting for in the last city election?  It sounded as if you were leaning toward Bartlet (sic) at one point after dooshing him up as a drug addict.  I know you thought Perkins was too much of a lush and you were beating up on Tommy some for his hystrionics.

Hard to recognize the fact FOTD is honest and objective. Thanks for keeping track.
You could have said hello at Riverspirit....

Wil, you are not referring to PWD when you say, "I'll never understand how this city can continue to increase taxes and increase infrastructure but say none of these tax increases can be used for salaries, when it takes the salaries of people to run and maintain the increased infrastructure."

[Conan71]

Hard to recognize the fact FOTD is honest and objective. Thanks for keeping track.
You could have said hello at Riverspirit....

You didn't feel me try to give you a reach-around? 

[rwarn17588]

Many officers felt like this:  They've been promised for more than a quarter of a century that this city wants to pay them the average wage of the other 10 market-peer cities, which has NEVER happened.  Its never happened in the good finacial years and its never happened in the bad financial years.  They are currently paid 9th out of the 11 cities and are 22% below the average.  To accept another 13+% decrease in compensation puts those officers in absolute last place and even further behind the average.

Please note that Councilor John Eagleton reported that the cost of police personnel services grew by 35.1% from FY2002 and FY2010 -- almost twice the rate of inflation and more than any other segment in the city. And it's way above the other increases in the city. It's not even close. (It's all on his Web site if you want to peruse it.)

So ... if you are truly not getting paid the way you wish, maybe it's because your department hired too many cops. Perhaps there's a lot of dead weight in the TPD?

And I think it's silly for you, Wilbur, to do a lot of finger-pointing when its your department that's been eating up the money faster than any other.

Not to mention all of the TPD PR disasters that cannonfodder and others on this board have already recounted.

[FOTD]

As crime increases, which it has done post tax cuts, it costs more money to protect and defend.

[rwarn17588]

As crime increases, which it has done post tax cuts, it costs more money to protect and defend.

I've seen the data, and there's been little change in the crime rate since the early 2004. So that explanation doesn't fly. In fact, there was an article in the World that showed it went down last year.

[FOTD]

Link if this demon stands corrected.

[rwarn17588]

Link if this demon stands corrected.

http://www.idcide.com/citydata/ok/tulsa.htm

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=11&articleid=20100127_11_A1_TulsaP62022&archive=yes

[FOTD]

http://www.idcide.com/citydata/ok/tulsa.htm

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=11&articleid=20100127_11_A1_TulsaP62022&archive=yes

How many larceny cases were moved out of Tulsa in those years?

Come now, technically FOTD stands corrected. Philosophically, trickle down did not work well enough to lower the crime rate.

[DowntownNow]

They are currently paid 9th out of the 11 cities and are 22% below the average.  

The FOP also put out numerous alternatives, none of which were accepted.  The City Council even put out alternatives, none of which were accepted.

This city has millions of dollars sitting around in accounts other then the general fund.  It is not a single employee's fault some flunky created these other accounts and said they can't be used for salaries.  Nor is it a single employee's fault the prior administration couldn't figure out how to balance the check book and spent money like it was going out of style.

I'll never understand how this city can continue to increase taxes and increase infrastructure but say none of these tax increases can be used for salaries, when it takes the salaries of people to run and maintain the increased infrastructure.

Wilbur is just wrong.

The average starting pay for a TPD officer is $43,744 and is ranked 8th among the 'universe of comparable cities'.  The average pay among the other 10 comparable cities is $45293...for a starting TPD, thats a difference of $1,550 or 3.5% below average, not 22%.

TPD officers maximum pay for that classification is $62,783 and also is ranked 8th.  The average maximum pay among the other 10 comparable cities is $65,232...thats a difference of $2,449.00 or 3.9%. 

So in the end, they have been crying over less than 4% in comparison to cities of larger size with funding from sources other than sales tax revenue which is limited.

Yes, the FOP put forward some concessions...the largest concessions of which addressed comp time and out of town vehicles, neither of which would have filled the budget hole or provide a long term fix to keep this from happening in FY10-11. 

They also offered raiding the TARE fund in the interim and tapping capital expenditure accounts...both of which are illegal without a vote of the TARE Board to amend the trust indenture or the people for a Brown Ordinance amendment allowing the re-allocation of voter approved capital expenditure funds for general fund expenses (wasnt going to happen before the end of FY09-10).