Thursday, Dec. 21, 2006 | The study on San Diego city police underfunding is absolutely correct. Our police are poorly paid compared with other local jurisdictions’ police departments. This must be rectified.
But the police and their union are partially at fault for this disparity. Like the good union lackeys that they are, the police strongly supported the overpayment of the other 9,000+ city employees, plus 120+ percent pensions for these lucky souls.
Furthermore, the police union dutifully opposes competitive bidding of city services, even though the police cannot be replaced by a private contractor. Without competitive bidding, the city’s spiraling labor costs cannot be reined in.
So, bottom line, the police union supported the overspending on the rest of the city employees, leaving the city budget drained when it came time to improve police compensation.
Clearly, our police must be better compensated, but somehow I can’t feel too sorry for them since they helped dig themselves into their hole.