Labor Relations
LEGAL DEFENSE BENEFIT AT WORK FOR MEMBER
FOP LEGAL DEFENSE PLAN ATTORNEY AND LODGE #16 GENERAL COUSEL RICHARD HELFAND GETS TWO DAY SUSPENSION OF HOLDEN OFFICER OVERTURNED AFTER CONTESTED CASE HEARING.
MARSHALL PD MEMBERS FEEL THE CHILL WHEN THEIR FREE SPEECH RIGHTS ARE COOLED!
Below is the letter authored and signed by 22 members of the Marshall, Missouri Police Department regarding their working conditions. This letter was sent to the Marshall Newspaper in their capacity as taxpaying citizens of the City of Marshall. Instead of the letter being published it made it's way to City Hall and then ALL HECK BROKE LOOSE!
In 2004, after severely cutting the city employees’ benefits the city bought the former Marshall Lumber Company. They bragged in the paper about how secure the budget was.
Now three years later the city is spending $375,000, around $42,000 an acre, for the property near the airport. They say it will come out of the city’s General Fund Unbudgeted Reserve Account, adding the “money has accumulated in the account over several years”.
We are greatly saddened at this because we know first hand why the money has accumulated. City’s employees, not just the police department, have endured cuts in their benefits constantly over the past few years. Each time the city justifies this by stating there is a lack of funds.
Over the past few years most of the employees at the Police Department have lost money by continuing to work for the city. For many the cost of living adjustments the city has given has not even off set the cost of the changes they have made in our health insurance. Much less me the true cost of living increases.
The promised pay scale programs have never come to light. Currently a 2 year employee makes the same pay as a 15 year employee. The average employee at the police department is making thousands less than if they were working at places like Higginsville, Moberly, Fulton and Mexico. Under the system we have now there is no reason for an employee to stay after their second year, as they will never get another pay raise as long as they work here.
We have seen a very large number of employees quit, not quitting this profession, just quitting the City of Marshall. Most have stayed in the Law Enforcement Industry, but have moved on to places, which provide better pay and benefits.
Basic supplies like pens, paper clips, evidence computer discs and boxes of staples are given out one at a time from city offices. For items such as computer printers we have to have three bids before we can request to purchase the item, yet City Offices doesn't have to get even two bids for our health insurance. This is at least what we can tell because we have asked the city to see the bids but never have been allowed to see them.
Two years ago we were promised to have representatives present during the health insurance decision making process; we have yet to see that happen too. Insurance is a budgeted item, but the allocation of this fund is done months before anyone knows how much the insurance is going to cost.
Do not misunderstand; we are not opposed to having items like museums, Frisbee Golf Courses, skateboard parks, and dog statutes. But what is the cost of these items? Currently, at least to some degree the cost is the city employee health benefits and competitive wages. Toe cost to the community is the best city employees leave Marshall for better treatment and wages elsewhere.
Each one of us id dedicated to our community. We are not asking for anything more than competitive wages and benefits. We promise forever how long each of us chooses to work at the Police Department we will perform our duties to the best of our abilities, without regards to how we thing we are being treated by the City Government. Cutting city employee’s benefits, and denying them a fair wage, should not be a means of funding city improvements.
Signed in alphabetical order only BY 22 EMPLOYEES OF THE MARSHALL MISSOURI POLICE DEPARTMENT
Click here to read the letter sent by FOP president Marc Moore to the Honorable Mayor Connie Lattimer of Marshall, Missouri in response to comments made by the Marshall Police Chief and Assistant Chief that an INTERNAL INVESTIGATIION was to be soon underway!
