City Councilor Jim Stauber was stunned Tuesday evening to hear of the potential cuts. He said the 14 recommendations made in December by a council-appointed task force on the city's mounting retiree health-care liability -- estimated to be $300 million by 2014 -- made no mention of a reduction of the work force.
"I have no idea why the administration has chosen to do these cuts. I'm very shocked to hear this news," Stauber said. "I'm dismayed. It is the mayor's prerogative to do this, but why especially big cuts in public safety? We just had a tragedy (slaying) in Gary.... This is not the thing to be doing."
Councilor Stauber, No one know what the mayor is thinking. You are correct the task force would have never recommended laying off police and fire because they know that it would put yet another major problem on this city. The Mayor however does not seem to care our city.
Waller said he's losing 11 police officers, almost the equivalent of losing an entire shift -- which is made up of 12 officers.
"It's going to be a devastating blow to public safety," Waller said. "I'm concerned about response time. I'm extremely concerned about officers' safety because we have just the minimum numbers to staff the street now. I'm also concerned about the safety of each and every citizen.
"It's going to have a devastating effect on each neighborhood. It's going to impact services departmentwide, citywide. I'm extremely concerned about the impact it has on these individual employees. What a way to treat them."
Waller said one of the probationary officers involved moved from Florida to take a job here. Others left career positions with other departments to join the Duluth force. "This is going to impact our ability to attract qualified candidates in the future," he said.
I will not agree with Waller much but this time I do 100%.
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