Speak Out 05/30/04

Time for a raise

I HAVE been a police officer for 14 years. I came to this city seven years ago from a smaller community of 5,000 where I was a police officer. After seven years, I have still not met the salary that I was making while in the small community 75 miles north of here. We do not sign up for the job trying to get rich. It's something that is in your blood. It's something that you enjoy doing. However, we would like to get pay raises. Everything around us goes up in price, but our pay stays the same. I disagree with the comment that we are unprofessional at because of our pay. We would just like to be competitive with other places our size and would like to get some sort of a raise. If you don't support your police, how can you expect to be supported by them? I think we deserve something, like the rest of the people out there who get their raises. I hope everybody votes for the tax to pass so we can have adequate equipment and officers.

Losing your license

YES, REFUSAL to take a blood-alcohol test can result in the loss of your driver's license for one year. That is an administrative proceeding through the Department of Revenue. The criminal charges for driving while intoxicated are something completely different. A person can be prosecuted for DWI and still win an administrative hearing and keep his license. Or a person can lose his license administratively but not be prosecuted for DWI for a variety of reasons, including lack of evidence.

It's not a dump

I'D LIKE for people to quit dumping their trash in the alley of the 500 block of Jefferson.

Catch real crooks

LAST SUMMER I was legally parked on a Jackson street when a car struck my rear view mirror and continued on without stopping. I wrote down the license number. Another motorist followed the car and returned to give me the address. The police did nothing. I was treated with indifference and borderline rudeness by the officer who took the report. Doesn't anyone else see something wrong when Jackson's finest have time to hang around the school to write teenagers tickets for smoking but will not take the time to help someone who has the license number, address and witnesses to a real lawbreaker?

Setting a new tone

I HAVE to respond to David Broder's May 26 column complaining that President Bush promised but did not deliver on a new tone in Washington. Broder suggests that John Kerry could do better by appointing people from all parties to important posts. Bush tried to change the tone. An example is Ted Kennedy. The president bent over backward to work with him. He compromised and gave credit to Kennedy for the education bill. Now Kennedy is the most outrageous of Bush's critics. And how about Paul O'Neal, a Democrat President Bush retained as Treasury secretary? He constantly criticized the administration. When he was replaced he wrote a cutthroat book that the liberal media hyped to the max. Come on, Mr. Broder, some of us are paying attention and remember things past yesterday.