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<br />To: City Council <br />From: Steve Deardorff <br />Re: Police Department Pay <br />Date: January 8, 2007 <br /> <br />Good evening, my name is Steve Deardorff. I reside at 4222 Arboretum <br /> <br />Drive, Pasadena, Texas and have been employed with the City of La Porte <br /> <br />for almost 25 years. As you might have guessed, I am here tonight to talk about <br /> <br />Police Department pay. <br /> <br />Recently, the city spent thousands of dollars on a compensation/classification <br /> <br />survey which is now being discarded. I question the need for the survey. Some <br /> <br />department employees have not received a raise since 2003. Who would think we <br /> <br />wouldn't fall behind? The failure ofthe city to make appropriate adjustments in <br /> <br />our salary scale has put the police department employees way behind their counterparts <br /> <br />in neighboring cities. <br /> <br />We recently lost 3 police officers to the petro/chemical industry and their primary <br /> <br />reason for leaving was pay and benefits. The city had a great deal of money and time <br /> <br />invested in these officers and we cannot replace them overnight. In addition to their <br /> <br />patrol duties, these officers had very specialized training. Jason Wilbanks was a highly <br /> <br />trained SWAT operator with numerous training hours in tactical operations and <br /> <br />he also served as a Field Training Officer. Shawn Boznango was a highly trained <br /> <br />Crime Scene Unit Specialist. One cannot gain the level of expertise either of these <br /> <br />former officers had overnight---it takes formal training and many hours of on-the- <br /> <br />job training. Plants are actively recruiting our police officers to come to work for them <br /> <br />because they know they will be able to employ someone who is a bit more mature, <br />