SIKESTON -- How much does the Sikeston need to offer entry-level public safety officers to keep them here? And can the city come up with that money?
The Sikeston City Council must again find answers to those questions while drafting the operating budget for the city's next fiscal year which begins July 1.
"When we passed the public safety sales tax many years ago, we went along for number of years and didn't have any issues," said Drew Juden, director of the Sikeston Department of Public Safety. "What has happened is sales tax has been flat -- it hasn't had any growth over the 12 years that sales tax has been in place. Therefore it is difficult to keep up with cost of living, increasing health insurance costs and the market for hiring police officers."
And Sikeston isn't the only community that rallied to address a public safety hiring issue.
"Other cities around us followed in our footsteps and also passed sales taxes and either passed a higher sales tax rate or had better growth than us," Juden said. "Most of the agencies that surround us that we compete with for officers now generally pay from $5,000 to $7,000 more per year than we offer for starting pay. So we've become a training ground for other agencies."
For the full story, see today's e-edition.