Columbus City Council requires officers to commit 3 years on patrol
COLUMBUS, Miss. (WCBI) – Columbus City Council took a vote on implementing a policy that would tackle low retention rates within the police department.
The Columbus City Council is requiring its officers to make a three-year commitment to the Friendly City.
Once the officer has been hired and gone through training, that officer must remain with the Columbus police department for three years before leaving for another law enforcement agency.
It’s the latest policy approved by the city council during Tuesday night’s meeting.
“What we want to do is build our department,” said Columbus Police Chief Joseph Daughtry.
If the officer breaks that contract, he or she will be required to pay back any fees associated with education and training.
Daughtry said he doesn’t want the taxpayers’ money to be wasted on outfitting an officer with weapons, gear, weapons, training, and overtime hours that are accrued when they are in the academy without a return on investment.
“We don’t want to be a training ground. We don’t want to just dump money into training someone and within less than a year, they’re already gone somewhere else. It’s just not fair to the citizens of Columbus, our taxpayers, for us to pay and train people and they up and leave,” said Daughtry.
The chief understands why agencies across the state choose Columbus for recruiting.
“It’s flattering that they want to recruit from us because they want the best. That’s why they come to Columbus to recruit the best. Our officers have been put in the fire. They have been tested, battle-tested. We answer more calls for service than most agencies around here,” said Daughtry.
Daughtry plans on proposing other incentives to increase retention rates among his officers like a salary increase.
“We are also gonna ask the board to look at possibly raising our salaries up to be compatible. I know we just recently got a raise but we have to be competitive,” said Daughtry.
Columbus Mayor Keith Gaskin believes this policy is the remedy to hiring and retention.
“This is a very difficult time to recruit officers. We all know this, we’ve seen the data and the statistics, not just here in Columbus but nationally. So what we’re trying to do is not be punitive but to just encourage folks that are interested in being a part of the Columbus Police Department that they have a commitment to us as we’re investing in them,” said Gaskin.
The new policy will only affect incoming officers who have not had formal training from the police academy.
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