Somerton lifts freeze on two police positions
SOMERTON — The Somerton Police Department has gotten approval to fill two positions that have been frozen since 2008, one for a patrol officer and the other for a dispatcher.
At a recent meeting, the city council approved filling the vacant slots. But council members stressed that while they were lifting a freeze on some hiring, they weren't authorizing the creation of new positions at City Hall.
“We were starting to see in the police department that it was urgent to hire again,” Mayor Martin Porchas said. “Unfortunately in the last year, under different circumstances, we lost three officers, and what happened was that everyone (in the department) went on patrol, regardless of their rank.”
City Administrator Bill Lee said filling the previously frozen positions will cost the city $70,000 in salaries and benefits.
City Hall imposed the hiring freeze in 2008 as one in a series of belt-tightening measures amid a recession that brought construction to halt in Somerton and caused the city's portion of state revenue to fall off.
Since then, a near-doubling in the city's population, as reflected in the 2010 census, has caused its state-shared revenues to increase by a projected $750,000 this fiscal year, city officials said.
The extra revenue already has enabled to the city to end its furlough program, in which each municipal employee was required to take one day off without pay each month. And Somerton officials say the two police positions are the first of what could be six in city government to be unfrozen in the months ahead.
“What we have to assure the community is that this won't be like creating new jobs in the city,” Councilman Jose Yepez said. “There will be no extra costs beyond those that are in the budget, and we will see to it that these are positions that are really needed.”
What other positions can or should be unfrozen will be the subject of discussion in an upcoming retreat that will be attended by council members, city department heads and other city officials, Yepez added.
