By Steve Plunkett
After giving new police hires a $9,000 raise in June, Gulf Stream town commissioners are penciling in substantial raises for veterans and another raise for the rookies to keep up with other area police departments.
Town Manager Greg Dunham had warned the commissioners to expect the proposed pay hikes.
“Talking about the budget back in July, and even back I think the month before when we raised the starting salary, at that point in time I told you that we weren’t done dealing with the police officers’ salaries knowing what other towns and cities were in the process of doing, and that was developing their own budgets and or completing contracts with their union regarding the police salaries,” Dunham said at the commission’s Aug. 11 meeting.
Chief Richard Jones compared Gulf Stream’s police salaries to those in 16 nearby jurisdictions on starting salaries, for three- and 10-year officers, for five- and seven-year sergeants and for three-year captains.
Gulf Stream was near the bottom at all officer and sergeant levels and below the average for captain.
Jones and Dunham proposed moving a three-year officer, for example, to $72,000 a year, up from $66,763 for a $5,237 raise, or 7.8%.
The starting salary, which was bumped to $61,250 from $52,250 in June, would rise to $66,000, also 7.8%.
The chief also proposed incentive pay for officers hired with experience, those who further their education and those who become paramedics or emergency medical technicians.
He and Dunham also recommended that they be allowed to develop a long-range salary plan with steps based on length of service.
“It seems like we have to do this, you know, every two or three years with respect to police departments, but we want to stay competitive with the other cities and it’s been a challenge,” Dunham said. “That puts us basically right in the middle.”
Jones also introduced to the commissioners his latest hire, Vincentina Nowicki, whose first day on patrol was Aug. 7, and Alan Gonzalez, who joined the force in March. Officer Assel Hassan, who started in late June, could not attend the meeting and will be introduced later.
The chief said the promise of a higher starting salary helped motivate the new hires to come to Gulf Stream.
Mayor Scott Morgan welcomed Gonzalez and Nowicki.
“It’s really important that we get to see you in this context and for you to see us,” Morgan said. “I think it brings the Police Department, town staff and the commission a little closer together, so thank you very much, thank both of you for coming.”
Commissioner Paul Lyons praised Jones for doing an “incredible” job: “very comprehensive, thoughtful, logical, persuasive — I don’t know what else to say.”
“One of the things that the last three or four years we’ve been lacking is an adequate number of police officers and you’ve done a lot to cure that problem,” Lyons said.
In other business:
• Commissioners adjusted water rates for town residents, passing along a 6.1% increase imposed by Delray Beach starting Oct. 1. Dunham continues to talk with Boynton Beach about switching water providers.
• Commissioners moved their November meeting to 9 a.m. on Nov. 9, a Thursday, instead of Nov. 10, which is the observed holiday this year for Veterans Day.
On Sept. 8 they will meet at 4 p.m. instead of the usual 9 a.m. start and follow that with a budget hearing at 5:01 p.m. The final budget hearing will be at 5:01 p.m. on Sept. 27.
• Dunham said much progress had been made landscaping the entrance to the Blue Water Cove development just north of Place Au Soleil and obscuring the construction there.
“You’ll notice when you go by that wall, the fishtail palms are about 15 feet tall — they were originally going to put 8- to 10-foot ones in there. They weren’t available so they bought the larger ones. And when you’re inside there, you don’t see Walmart,” Dunham said.
Two Place Au Soleil residents, Julie Murphy and Miguel Newmann, complained to commissioners in July that they were living in an unsightly, “eternal” construction zone.
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