SUPPORT LIBERTY'S LAW!

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

The Milton Peoples Forum...Online: Question 1 / District 6.


Courtesy Accessmilton.com & The Milton Herald


As referenced this past week on Accessmilton.com, the Milton Herald and Accessmilton.com are continuing the Milton Peoples Forum online. The focus
is to ask questions that time did not allow us to address at this past week's event.


In order to insure equal visibility for both districts, District 2 candidates answers will be posted on Tuesday and Thursday evenings while District 6 candidates answers will be listed on Wednesdays and Fridays.


Candidates are limited to a maximum of 200 words per answer and are listed alphabetically.


Our first question is:


Milton currently has excellent fire and police department personnel. How does our compensation package for these individuals compare to what is being offered in adjacent communities and how would you suggest that Milton ensure it retains these good people?

DISTRICT 6 CANDIDATE LANCE LARGE=>


"I recently had the privilege of doing “rides along” with our police and fire departments. Our officers are clearly highly skilled and well trained. Their compensation is comparable to that of Alpharetta. In fact, several officers from Alpharetta chose to work for the Milton Police Department. Unlike in other cities; our police officers do not share cars. This increases the sense of ownership and reduces taxpayer costs due to repairs, wear and replacements.

We are a growing community with new challenges and demands in the areas of public safety. I am committed to working with our police and fire departments to meet these challenges head on. As your Councilman, I will work on two aspects of retention. First, I will work to develop additional incentives, particularly for housing-related expenses, to make living in Milton more affordable. Studies have shown that having police and fire personnel living in the community reduces crime and helps maintain property values. In short, we all would benefit by having more officers living in Milton. Second, I will work on facilitating on-going professional development opportunities. To this end, I will support additional paid time off for advanced training."


DISTRICT 6 CANDIDATE ALAN TART=>


"Our police officers and firefighters are without a doubt among the most professional, highly trained, and best equipped in the state. Our citizens are safer than when we first incorporated as evidenced by the drastic reduction in response times. I have consistently supported increases in staffing with each annual budget cycle to keep morale high, manage burnout, decrease response times, and increase the level of service we provide. For example, I supported hiring an additional fire fighter and four new police officers in the 2012 budget. This will allow us to add an additional police officer to each shift. Our police and fire departments have a very high retention rate due in part to the compensation package we provide including a highly competitive salary, health/dental/life insurance, pension plan, tuition reimbursement, matching 401(k), and a health and wellness program. As a result of our strong financial footing, we have also been able to provide annual cost of living increases that help to keep morale within the departments high. I remain committed to ensuring our police officers and firefighters are recognized, paid competitively, and are provided with the state-of-the-art equipment and training they need to keep themselves and our citizens safe. "

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

So, let me get this straight...Large wants to lower housing costs to make it easier for everyone to live here and he wants to give our fire and police paid time off for more training...the same teams that are already some of the best trained anywhere in the state. Hmmm...guess again Mr Large. Your answers are nothing more than bad guesses about what this community wants or needs.

Anonymous said...

I don't see how Mr. Large has done his homework. Alpharetta cops make between 40 and 48K a year and Milton is 35 -40k a year. Sargeants make 45k in Milton where in Alpharetta they make 60k. That hardly seems right especially when we have twice the amount of money in reserves (7.8 million) that the state of georgia requires. We need to adjust our fire/police officers salaries to those counties that surrond us at not to those like Bartow. Why do I pay such high taxes? So that we can have a cushy bank account?

Anonymous said...

Wait - Large wants to make Milton Housing affordable to all and lower everyone's taxes by increasing business taxes? Hmmm. Sounds a lot like our President, and makes as much sense.

Anonymous said...

If you actually took the time to read what he was saying, you would see that he was proposing housing incentives for public safety officers so that they can actually live in our community and not in, say, Lumpkin County...

Anonymous said...

2:03: I know what your community wants! A BIG WALL SO YOU CAN HIDE FROM THE REST OF THE WORLD.

And your public safety is some of the worst trained, under staffed, and with some of the worst moral.

It is not your fault 2:03...IT'S YOUR'S, THE COUNCIL, THE MAYOR, CITY DEPARTMENT HEADS, AND ALL THE RICH INFLUENCES SCREWING WITH YOUR SERVANTS!




AN EX EMPLOYEE! (who didn't get fired) and yes I love my new job....haven't missed a mortgage payment since I left!