Magnolia aldermen may vote to increase pay for full-time and part-time police officers Tuesday.
At this week’s work session, Mayor Tammy Witherspoon presented the current police salaries to board members and proposed salaries of $15 per hour for full-time officers and $13 per hour for part-time officers.
City Clerk Tasha Dillon said the city’s lowest existing police salaries are $10.81 for a part-time officer and $13.47 for a full-time officer.
The city does not have a salary schedule for yearly or otherwise regular raises, she said, but raises are considered after annual evaluations, when feasible.
“We look forward to establishing the new pay system,” Dillon said Thursday.
Witherspoon said the city has the money in its budget to provide raises to the proposed new levels, even though providing those raises was not discussed for this budget when it was adopted in September and went into effect in October.
The mayor and Police Chief Sonya Woodall said they did not intend to appoint an assistant chief to replace Ray Reynolds, who retired in January, which will save the city a supervisory-level salary.
Witherspoon added that two officers have left the police department recently, and higher salaries would help to replace them.
Alderman Joe Cornacchione questioned the wisdom of implementing raises in the middle of the budget year at previous meetings, but was amenable to the idea if the city’s budget could sustain it.
“Our officers definitely deserve it,” Cornacchione said.
Alderman Clarence Burton Jr. said the city needs to do what it can to keep officers on the force.
“If they’re leaving for a dollar or two more (an hour), maybe we should do something,” he said.
