The Greensboro City Council has been patting itself on the back for giving police officers a 7 percent raise in the 2022-2023 budget.
The Police Department is currently short about 100 officers from its authorized force of 689 sworn officers. The last several Greensboro Police Academy classes have not graduated enough officers to keep pace with the average attrition rate of about 60 officers a year, which means the number of vacancies will continue increase.
In a static environment, the 7 percent raise for Greensboro police officers would help with the recruitment issues. However, the environment is far from static. Cities across the state and nation are experiencing similar problems with police staffing and taking action.
Considering what other cities did in 2022 and in their 2022-2023 budgets, it appears the 7 percent raise for Greensboro police officers is likely to make Greensboro even less attractive as a place to start a law enforcement career.
In its 2022-2023 budget, Winston-Salem gave police officers a 14 percent salary increase. Raleigh in its 2022-2023 budget raised the starting salaries for police officers by 19 percent. Charlotte increased the starting pay for police officers by 10.5 percent in its budget.
Durham jumped the gun on police raises giving police officers a 15 percent raise in January 2022. It is worth noting that Durham, the fourth largest city in North Carolina, had a tax increase this year of 0.6 cents compared to the tax increase in Greensboro that is equivalent to 8.69 cents or 8.09 cents higher than Durham’s.
Fayetteville also took action before the budget raising the starting salaries for police officers by 14.5 percent in January. Fayetteville has a property tax rate of 49.95 cents and didn’t raise property taxes this year.
Greensboro has a property tax rate of 63.25 cents.
Another major recruitment issue for the Greensboro Police Department is that Greensboro does not provide take home cars for patrol officers. Winston-Salem, Raleigh, Charlotte, Durham and Fayetteville as well as just about every jurisdiction of any size in the state do provide take home cars for their patrol officers.
The Greensboro City Council did launch a five year plan this year to provide take-home police cars, but for police recruits five years is a long time to wait for a benefit that is available immediately in other cities.
Time for police robots like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24jufNhuUSI
Great article…the current academy in session right now has 13 candidates and about half of them have already made it known to staff they have applied to other police departments….dozens of current Officers have applications in at Graham PD, Winston-Salem PD, Chapel Hill PD and are just waiting for the call….what you are going to see very soon is the Greensboro Police Department will not have the manpower to respond to certain calls and emergency call response time will double
What we have here is a “duh” moment.
Democrat Playbook: defund the Police BAMN.
You can rest assured that the city council is well aware that their “efforts” have done nothing to help the police department. That is exactly what they want. They can tell the low information voters that they raised police pay, which is technically true. At the same time, they still know it’s not going to help, thereby defunding the poloce department through attrition.
So the dummies out there will end up voting these other dummies back into office because they buy into the council’s “pro police” charade. Then the council can keep their circular back slapping going. There will be plenty of money for their pet projects and a little more money for the cops, but not enough to matter.
Let’s here it for the 13 cadets about to graduate police academy. Council, when you shake their hands at graduation, go ahead and add “goodbye”. That’s because at least a few of them will be leaving for better offers as soon they’re certified. Let’s also here it for the 8 to 10 new cadets about to start the next academy. Go ahead and shake their hands too becase they won’t be here by next spring because they will be either too smart to stay here or too dumb to graduate.
Summed it up succinctly. The city council are frauds. Most of this “raise” does not take affect until May 2023. Also it is buried in pay ranges, control points, and market rates. No one knows what the “raise” will be. I have come to the conclusion that the city council does not want a full GPD. They have defunded the police by making it the least desirable place to work. People count the days like they are getting out of prison. And if the officer lives in the city limits their “raise”’is wiped out by the new tax rate. I know council reads these comments as evidenced by Marikay’s half hearted attempt to say GPD is getting raises, that they didn’t subtract $1 million from the police budget (lie), and that she has always supported the police. I call BS.
Ask around and find out how they lost another officer this week.
Is anyone REALLY surprised ?? They can’t find the money to give the police a decent raise…but they can find $1,800,000 to overpay a contractor by 25% for a fractional increase in WBE participation on a city contract. The council and the city manager should be ashamed of how they treat the police as well as the taxpayers.
It’s time to get rid of all women on the city council. The downfall of Greensboro started several years back when we had a
tree hugger for a mayor
Outling and Holston (males) both voted for the same (lack of) raise that the ladies did. It’s not their gender. It’s their political persuasion. Way to make yourself look like a chauvinist instead of calling them out for what they are: liberals who do not care about the taxpayers they are bilking.
Time to get rid of the entire council and mayor, including mayor candidate Outling. All voted not to support our police department and took away hundreds of thousands of dollars ( 1 million) from the police department but did give money to present and former councilwoman with no accountability. They complain about the rise in crime with no solution or support, just constant anti-police comments.
This city council only likes police when they provide security for them. Otherwise, they’re considered a necessary evil which reduces the amounts the council wants to give to community groups, some of whom are on the council.
Mr. Hammer, you need to do some investigating to see which members of the council are benefitting (directly or indirectly) from the “non-profits” which get City (our) money. And, which of those council members have children, in-laws, or other family connected members who are getting part of the City’s money.
Greensboro has the best police training in the state. Look at the number of recruits that are trained, certified and leave for higher pay, council that supports them and a council & mayor that let them do their job! Keeping this anti- police council will only allow the violence to increase. All people of Greensboro need to wake up and see your councilwoman and councilman are not helping to reduce crime but are continuing to support the criminals. It is time to vote these anti-police, self serving, racist council people and mayor out of office! How many of the senseless deaths to our youths could have been prevented if more support was provided to our police department? How many more have to die? Vote the current council and mayor out of office. We the citizens of Greensboro need a new beginning!
Council can find money for the nonprofits and other businesses council members run but not the police. Keep voting for the same old clowns…you get what you vote for.
Ask for the true sworn number of officers (no trainiees, no field training) on January 1, 2020, 2021, now, and check back in December and see what this “raise” has done for that…..
There are 15 year veterans contemplating leaving (and I mean actually talking to a recruiter and getting an application) because of the pay differences. It’s gonna be bad, I recommend moving at least into the County.
Who would not want a police car parked in their neighborhood at night?
the City is awash in taxpayer money. Pay the officers well, and leave them alone to do their job.
5 years for recruits to get cars? The way it’s structured it’ll take 5 years for the veteran officers to get cars! Brand new recruits fresh out of the academy that live in the city will get permanent cars before any officer 5-20 years in that live outside the city! That’s atrocious when those same officers can move to another department, get a permanent car, AND make 10-15k more starting day one!
They’re de facto defunding the department and nobody is holding them accountable. They hold the bag for the spike in violent crime and need to be held accountable for that.
Good job city council! That’s a helluva accolade to put on your resumé. The constituents that continue to vote for you are getting EXACTLY what they voted for: Lies, violent crime, and debt.
Ummm… they aren’t getting 7%, they are getting an average of 5.7%. Based on this, veteran officers will get a lower then 5.7% raise.
They seem to be eliminating the standard cost of living raise and this “raise” is an “instead of.” It is fancy city of Greensboro math where it looks like they are doing something but they are not. I know one officer who with the new “raise” thinks he may get an extra $140 a month before taxes, insurance, and the required contributions to the state pension. Thanks a lot.