![]() On Tuesday, Maddox suggested the council approve a near-immediate $10,000 retention bonus for existing non-probationary police officers. The city has already OK'd sign-on bonuses, voted to allow officers to take home TPD vehicles and committed to the RSA conversion. He said cutting corners on the officers you hire or how they are trained is "how you end up on CNN." "If I can have a base salary that's higher and get more time off, that's a tough dynamic to compete against for the city of Tuscaloosa," Maddox said.Ĭomplicating matters, TPD has exacting standards for its officers, who must pass physical and mental aptitude tests, background checks, drug tests and polygraph psychological exams and then train for a full year before they become non-probationary.īlankley said those hiring and training standards are non-negotiable. Even just locally, the Tuscaloosa County Sheriff's Office pays more and the University of Alabama Police Department just announced the highest police pay in the region by far. 8 in the state for average police salary. According to a presentation from Tuscaloosa Mayor Walt Maddox Tuesday, TPD ranks No. The city has committed to converting police and fire into the RSA by 2026, but that's hardly a solution to a current crisis.įinally, there's officer pay. It's hard to draw police away from RSA enrollment, and hard to keep officers away from it as agencies across the state try to draw them away from Tuscaloosa. Tuscaloosa Police and Fire employees are instead enrolled into a plan created locally in 1959. ![]() ![]() The most sought-after perk of almost any government job in the state is enrollment into the Retirement Systems of Alabama. That's one head of the beast - another is the police department's retirement plan. Maddox and others have long pushed for Tuscaloosa to further develop its experience economy, but those experiences have to be kept safe, which requires officers working mandatory overtime shifts to police football games, Amphitheater concerts, crowded bar districts and much more. With each unfilled vacancy, the remaining officers must do more to cover those unmet responsibilities. ![]()
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