Let's start with just how much does it cost the county for deputies: The average salary and benefits is $105,000 per deputy. This is compared to the average income per male worker in the county of $30,000. So the average deputy costs three times as much as the average employed person; a pretty sizable inflation of employment cost, simply because the person is a county employee.
But hey, we're talking deputies, they put their lives on the line, surely it is fair that they get a bit more..
Dispatchers pull down an average of $80,000, nearly three times average employment. Techs pull down only $80,000 as well, but most of them are half employees. Administrative services pulls down a far more respectable $45,000, but only works half the time.
You go on down the list, it is repeated time and time again - the county employees are looting the county treasury for every penny they can nab. In fact, I could find no county employee which pulled down a salary and benefits which was in line with the average earnings of the citizens of the county. The closest I could find was a full time county employee that only earned $28,000 in salary, but pulled down more than $18,000 in benefits.
Citizens, everywhere, need to re-take government from the employees and once again turn government into the servant of the people. While the department in this case refuses to offer any emergency services outside of ‘office hours’, you can bet that every one of them is enjoying well over a full month of vacation each year. Simply chopping out three vacation days from each employee would create the staff, at the same costs, to provide coverage over the weekends.
Better would be to drop all salaries, across the board, to be more in line with income of residents in the area, and hand them the full check, letting them pick and choose what benefits they want.
It took me minutes to find the budgetary solution to this issue. Which means to me that they feel no urge whatsoever from the public to correct this issue. While I am a great supporter of personal protection and security, the excuse that there's no money to have the office open is utter fiction. There is, they are simply too greedy to cede what is needed to accomplish it.
Outstanding post! Tragic as it is (and it is tragic for the lady assaulted) the reality of Josephine county is that it is rural and even a fully funded sheriffs department would take up to a half hour or more to respond to such calls. People living out of the city have to rely upon themselves even in the best of times. This article is simply using a horrific occurrence to push an agenda.
Josephine County (and several other Timber Counties in Oregon) knew for a long time that the timber subsidies were finite and had a specific expiration date. Some of the Counties chose to pursue a course of action that ignored that reality. They spent as if the subsidies were permanent and they failed to plan for when the subsidies would cease. When the subsidies stopped and the county was bankrupt, the first thing they do is try to soak homeowners for even more money to keep their bloated profligate ways going. I have no doubt that if they got what they asked for they would be coming back for more in the near future with their ways unchanged.
They have twice now tried to pass a property tax levy and the people have rejected it both times. They need to figure out what the County actually needs, rather than just trying to get back to what failed miserably.
For some reason the people of Oregon are fanatical about no sales tax. They seem to be more than happy to put their homes (or trailers) on the line via higher property taxes but god forbid they pay a 2 or 3 % sales tax. A 2 or 3 % sales tax with sunset provisions and or annual re authorization with funds to go solely for LEO should be a no brainer, but they just keep bringing back slighlty less odious versions of permanent and higher property taxes : (
You nailed it. County and city employees will continue to drain the taxpayers until the system collapses.