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Parents with children who raise show
animals made an appearance at the most recent regular session of the
DeLeon City Council, Thursday, September 27.
Councilwoman Gayle Stroud was absent, but
Mayor Danny Owen, Howard Gifford, Norma Locke and Roy Dale Freeman
were present for the 6 p.m. meeting. Also present were City Secretary
Karen Wilkerson, Public Works Administrator Rob Duncan, Police Chief
Ralph Dickey, and Emergency Management Coordinator Ray Helberg.
There were no participants in the
“Citizen’s Presentation” portion of the meeting.
DeLeon resident Sandra Paul addressed the
Council regarding the animal ordinance.
After giving her address, Paul said, “I
was told a couple of times this summer by Mr. Crawford (animal control
officer) that we were not in compliance with our show animals, with
the ordinance. I didn’t realize that. I knew kids were allowed to have
FFA animals, mine have done it for nine years now. We didn’t know.
Later, it seems that our names were written down and taken to the
school and given to the high school principal and then, later on, to
the ag teacher saying we were not in compliance and if we were to get
animals, we’d get fined for it.”
Paul said she was concerned for several
reasons.
“Why didn’t he come to us and give us a
copy of the ordinance?” Paul said. After obtaining a copy of the
ordinance, Paul said she read it and discovered that an animal has to
be kept 100 feet from a neighboring property.
“Well, my own house is not 100 feet from
either one of my neighbors,” Paul said. “So I don’t know how we’re
supposed to get an FFA project 100 feet from somebody elses property.”
In response to several questions from the
council, Paul said that her family doesn’t currently have any FFA
project animals, but that the two they had last year were pigs.
“We do not get any more than two,” Paul
said. “This year, it will be one. We’ve never had a neighbor complain,
not one.”
Paul said she believed that being able to
show animals was very important for students.
“We’ve got a great group of kids to work
with,” Paul said, “and a good group of adults. We love every minute of
it.”
“If I remember correctly,” Councilman
Gifford said, “we tried to make exceptions for the FFA and 4-H (when
adopting the ordinance) so that they could have their animals. But
whether we’re talking about that, or about cats and dogs, didn’t we
say that the animal control officer doesn’t roam the town looking for
violators? We had this (the ordinance) so that if there were
complaints we would have guidelines to go by.”
“That was my intention,” Mayor Owen agreed. He then added that he’d
grown up in FFA, as had his daughter, and that he’d kept animals in
town and knew there were ways to keep the odors down. He also
discussed having adequate room in the pens.
“I would like to see a way where we could
exempt these projects,” Owen said. “Where that the kids could continue
to have their animals in town. But with an ordinance, it gives us the
power that if the parents or the child doesn’t do what they need to
do, and we get complaints, then we are able to step in and take action
if need be.” Mayor Owen then mentioned that with a town of more than
2400 citizens, that’s how many “bosses” the council has.
“So it’s hard to make everybody happy,”
Owen said. “But I’m a true believer in 4-H and FFA. I think it teaches
responsibility and showmanship. And I think that’s a good start in
life.”
Council members Roy Dale Freeman, Norma
Locke and Howard Gifford expressed similar sentiments. Gifford also
noted that Sandra Paul was fortunate to have had such good neighbors
through the years.
After a bit more discussion, Paul noted, “I think we’re very fortunate
to be able to raise our kids here, on the income that people make
around here. And I’m very thankful that we can.”
“I think if the neighbors have not
complained, then I don’t see why we should complain,” Freeman said.
When audience member Avery Carlisle asked if there had been any
complaints since Danny Owen was Mayor, Owen said he’d heard one
complaint, but he wasn’t sure of the source, and he believed it had
been in regards to how long the animals were kept in town, after the
livestock shows had concluded. “Someone had made allegations that
people show their pig, and then take forever to get rid of it,” Owen
said.
There was then a general discussion among the council and the
audience, including one of the local ag teachers, regarding medicated
feed, and the need to keep the animal 30 days after the last show,
before selling or slaughtering it.
When it was noted that Chuck Crawford had
gone to the Livestock Association meeting and handed out information
about the new ordinance, Mayor Owen said, “He told me he was going to
hand all this out, and I was hoping it would be just to the point of
letting everybody be knowledgeable about the ordinance.”
“Most of them took it as a threat,” Carlisle said.
Owen spoke again about how he believed it
was important for students in a small town, with little else to do, to
have things like FFA and 4-H.
Finally, Councilman Howard Gifford made a
motion to “Continue as usual (regarding project animals) unless there
are complaints.” Roy Dale Freeman provided the second, noting that
he’d grown up participating in FFA and 4-H type programs and found
them to be very beneficial in life. The vote to approve was unanimous.
Police Department
A discussion of hourly pay versus salary
for Chief Ralph Dickey was next on the agenda.
Due to the department being shorthanded
(Officer Waverly Inman was injured in a motorcycle accident and Cpl.
Robert Kluge recently resigned) the overtime pay for the three
remaining officers has been high.
“Ralph had asked me about this,” Mayor
Owen said, “and due to being short-handed and the hours that he’s been
putting in, and not really being able to take any kind of comp time
due to being so short-handed, he was asking if we could extend the
period where he’s staying hourly until more staff is available. I told
him we had to discuss this in council. He and his officers are working
quite a bit of overtime and I can understand his concern.”
“I have some questions,” Councilman
Gifford said to Chief Dickey. “Have you been able to utilize the
Sheriff’s Department, the deputies, to cover some of the shifts for
you? I know in the past, when we got short-handed, that the Sheriff’s
Department was willing to send a deputy over sometimes to help cover a
shift to give you a chance to give your officers some time off – when
you all were going to school. Have you been able to utilize them any?”
“I talked to the Sheriff today,” Dickey
said. “Every now and then, like when we went to school…he doesn’t
mind. But if we want him to send somebody over to cover a shift, it’s
time and a half for his deputy, plus mileage.”
Gifford said he thought that since DeLeon
was part of the County, and they were a County Sheriff’s office, that
they didn’t mind coming and help covering the town.
Dickey repeated that every now and then
wasn’t a problem, but that on a regular basis there would be a charge.
“Is there a possibility that you could
rotate the use of them in that capacity, and maybe rotate some shifts,
where they’re not in for a full shift?” Gifford said.
“I don’t know,” Dickey said. “Trying to
work a schedule around something like that, and the only ones who
could do it are the ones who are off (duty). And they’ve got to want
to do it.”
“We can only use deputies who are off
duty?” Gifford said. “Don’t they cover DeLeon on a regular basis
because we’re part of Comanche County?”
“They cover the county, not the city,
unless we need back-up,” Dickey said. “If we need help, if we need
back-up, they’ll come and help us, just like we do with them.”
“It was my understanding that we had a
good working relationship with them,” Gifford said.
“We still do,” Dickey said.
At that point, Gifford asked how the
search was going for a new officer.
“I haven’t received a single application
back,” Dickey said.
When Gifford asked where the city was
advertising for an officer, Karen Wilkerson noted that ads had been
placed on the TML (Texas Municipal League) website, and in the Free
Press.
Gifford said he thought the city was
going to advertise in locations where there were police academies,
just before their scheduled graduations.
Chief Dickey said the academies were in
Brownwood and Weatherford, and that he didn’t know the exact date of
graduation. Further discussion revealed that Dickey and Wilkerson had
investigated the cost of advertising in these cities, and at almost
$400 for two weeks, found it to be cost prohibitive. Dickey also
mentioned that Brownwood offers a starting salary of $25 per hour for
new officers.
“Do they usually have 100 percent hire at
graduation?” Gifford said.
Dickey said that depended on several
factors, including the size of the graduating class.
After a brief discussion on police
academies in general, the conversation shifted to perhaps reaching out
to students through career day programs, or recruiting locally and
offering to help pay for someone to go to the academy -- and the pros
and cons of such an idea. Gifford acknowledged that that would be
starting from “ground zero.”
Gifford then asked Dickey if he’d been
able to locate any (unpaid) reserve officers.
“I can’t find any who want to reserve,”
Dickey said. He then added that the Sheriff’s Department was also
having trouble finding officers.
“I know there’s a shortage of police
officers everywhere,” Gifford said. “Everybody’s talking about not
having enough officers on the street. And I know how much money you
can make in big cities. But I also know there are a lot of people,
whether it’s in police work or other kinds of work, who would rather
make a lot less money and live in DeLeon and have the security and
comfort of living in a city like this as opposed to living in a big
city like Dallas and Austin.”
Dickey agreed that there were people who
would probably prefer to live in DeLeon, but that the money just
wasn’t there to attract them. And not just in DeLeon, but in the whole
county.
“If we don’t get some industry in here,
and put people to work and produce some tax money,” Dickey said,
“before long you’re not going to have any police officers. Simply
because Brownwood’s only 40 miles from here. And Early pays like $16
an hour. Well here, we’re starting out at $10.50. And if you’ve got a
person with two or three kids, and he can do the same job in Early or
Brownwood for...more money, where are they going to go? It’s nothing
against us, it’s everywhere. All of our smaller towns who do not have
the industry...we’re going to have to do something, because we can’t
compete.”
“What is your current plan on getting the
positions filled?” Gifford then asked. “Do you have a strategy, or a
plan of action to take? Or are you just going to leave that out there
until somebody applies?”
“If you’ve got any suggestions I’d be
more than happy to hear them,” Dickey said.
“I don’t,” Gifford said. “And I’m not
trying to be hard on you. But I don’t know if I can sit here and say
‘yeah, we’ll keep paying them all 40 hours a week in overtime.’
Definitely, we need some type of plan.”
Gifford then said that having a plan
might mean that DeLeon would need to raise it’s base salary, or
perhaps become more aggressive in its advertising.
“I can say this,” Dickey said.
“Physically and mentally, the three (officers) you have now cannot
keep this up for a long period of time.”
The Council then discussed more options
for advertising, including other websites in addition to TML.
“I’m just looking for ideas so that we can come up with a niche,”
Gifford said. “There might be an officer who’s been in Dallas for two
or three years, and they’re making the big bucks, but man they’re
ready to get their wife and kid out of that place.”
“They’re probably looking on TML,” Dickey
said, before adding, “I don’t have an answer, I just don’t know.”
“I know we got more hits on the TML
(website ad) when I didn’t put the starting pay,” Wilkerson said.
Gifford again discussed the importance of appealing to an applicant
who was interested in the other things DeLeon had to offer, and not
just money.
“I know DeLeon has a lot of problems that
the citizens don’t realize, that the police have to deal with,”
Gifford said, “and it’s getting more critical all the time.
Chief Dickey pointed out, that at times,
there are benefits to working for the bigger departments, including
the fact that those officers often work in specific “grids” and that
help is available at any given moment. If an officer needs help, other
officers can respond quickly from several nearby grids.
“Here, you’ve got to wake somebody up,”
Dickey said. “And in a large city, an officer never has to respond to
a domestic disturbance by himself. Here, we do it day in and day out.”
After still more discussion, Dickey said
that he understood that the city only has a certain amount of money to
work with.
Gifford said that was true, but if the
city was seriously “under” in what they were paying, then they might
need to make adjustments.
“And we’re going to have to find a way to
do that,” Gifford said. “If that means that we’re going to have to
take our annual budget for five officers, and somehow pay four with
it, and then somehow figure out a way to work a shift to where we can
work four officers until we can get the tax base to do it – we’ve got
to do something. Like you said, you’ve got three officers doing the
work of what five officers used to do, and the longer we put it off,
the more the risk is that we’re going to be down to two officers.”
There was still more discussion, about
the starting pay in other small towns, and everyone agreed that DeLeon
wasn’t the lowest. But with more money available near by in Brownwood
and Abilene, it was still difficult to get applicants.
“I’m more concerned with what we’re going
to do further down the road,” Gifford said, “than what we’re paying
you in the interim. I’d like to see some ideas put together as to how
we’re going to address the problem.”
Mayor Owen said he thought they needed to
get more aggressive in their advertising, and spread out to a bigger
area, and everyone agreed, despite the cost.
“My thought is, that as long as we have
three officers, on a five officer force, we need to get really
aggressive in our search until we get at least one position filled,”
Gifford said.
“I agree,” Chief Dickey said.
During still more discussion, several
more ideas were tossed around, including visiting with the counselor
at the high school to see if any seniors might be interested – for the
future, “Because,” Gifford said, “sooner or later we’ll be
short-handed again.”
Officer Dustin Paulsen arrived in the
middle of the meeting, and when asked for ideas, he said that he’d
personally contacted many past acquaintances and co-workers in law
enforcement, and that most of the law enforcement agencies were having
the same problem. “There are just not enough qualified people,”
Paulsen said.
Eventually, Gifford said, “I don’t think
it would be fair at this point, with three officers, to put you on
straight salary. And without more time to try and come up with a fair
program to pay any other way, I think we need to continue to pay
hourly.” He added that he wanted to start the aggressive advertising
campaign, and have a chance to sit down and work up another pay
proposal.
Councilman Freeman said he thought that
in order to keep from having to jump back and forth between hourly and
salary, the council needed to come up with a base salary and then
hourly for overtime.
Gifford and Freeman agreed that more time
was needed, regardless of the formula used.
“I go ahead and make a motion that we continue with Chief Dickey on an
hourly basis until we come up with a better plan,” Gifford said.
Freeman provided the second, and the vote to approve was unanimous.
In other business, Council members:
• Agreed to write a letter of support, to
several officials including Rep. Sid Miller, on behalf of a group of
concerned citizens who would like to see a boat ramp open on the
“DeLeon side” of Lake Proctor.
• Approved the second reading of
Ordinance # 013-07; adoption of the 2007-08 fiscal year budget.
• Approved the second reading of
Ordinance #014-07; adopting the tax rate for the levying of taxes for
the fiscal year beginning October 1, 2007, and ending September 30,
2008.
• Approved payroll.
• Approved accounts payable.
• Passed on an agenda item described as
“Cross Timbers Health Clinic building expansion” because no one from
the clinic was at the meeting. |
