Mayor Nancy Vaughan at the Tuesday, Oct. 19 meeting asked the City Council to revisit supplying Greensboro police officers with take home police cars.
Vaughan said, “I’d like council to reconsider their vote on take home cars.”
She noted that the Greensboro Police Department (GPD) recently lost two officers to High Point that does provide take home cars.
Vaughan said, “This will make us more competitive with our immediate neighbors.”
Vaughan said that it would have to phased in over time and issues like garage capacity would have to be considered.
No one objected to reconsidering the issue and Interim City Manager Chris Wilson said he would provide the City Council with updated information for its consideration at the second meeting in November.
Councilmember Sharon Hightower said she would agree to reconsider the issue but added, “You know my thoughts about that, if all those cars are going to the north side of town, I can’t support that. Where they are going, I think that is critically important.”
In June, Vaughan tried to get the money included in the 2021-2022 budget to begin phasing in take-home police cars and hit a solid roadblock.
At the June 1 City Council work session, when Vaughan asked that it be included in the budget, Councilmember Tammi Thurm said, “I’m not ready to support this yet.”
Councilmember Goldie Wells said, “It seems like the building inspectors don’t have enough cars to go around.”
Councilmember Marikay Abuzuaiter said, “This is not something that I think we should look at right now.”
Councilmember Yvonne Johnson said, “Right now, I could not support this as it is.”
Despite the raises given to police officers, according to the latest figures, the GPD has over 100 vacancies.
The fact that Greensboro does not provide officers with take-home police cars is regularly cited as one reason Greensboro has problems recruiting new officers and as Vaughan noted a reason that the GPD loses officers to other departments in the area.
Councilwomen show their true colors, again! Not supporting the police department, allowing crime along with murders to rise. Yet the ignorance the city councilwomen will not rise to the occasion to assist the police department along with the citizens of Greensboro to reduce our crime. They continue to protect the the criminal at the cost of lives of our citizens. How many more have to die at their hands?
Hightower- if no cars are going home and the “North side “ of town has less crime, how does your statement make any sense?
You racist, dumb, ignorant or all the above? The officers check- on ( report for duty) at their residence instead of wasting 30-45 minutes checking and preparing their police vehicles into service. Why is this so hard to comprehend? Oh I know the 900K you GAVE to “ Cure for Violence “ ( worthless use of city tax dollars) should have been used to purchase police vehicles and provide raises for city employees.
Good answer, this is just like the school board vote. 300k for school improvements . Then given away with 30k sign on bonus for all new teachers. They already make 40k.
if peopke dont remember the past. Let me remind you. Who is responsible for car vandalism on officers property? Who is responsible for wrecks off duty? The city insurance bill could quadruple. What about riots in ones neighborhood. Having a police car at officers house makes him a dead give away to gang members. especially with ms-13 here. Bad idea.. what about off duty mileage racking up early car retirement.. not full life.
maybe Mr.Tanger and Koury corp and private local millionaires would like to foot the bill for all new cars as a take car home project.
I’m not sure about Tanger but Mr. Koury never wanted or asked the city or anyone else to pay for anything for him. Footnote to this when he built 4 Seasons mall the state said no to the inter change at High Point Rd. so guess what happened he built it himself at no cost to anyone. Mr Koury was an honorable man
Explain why the potential issues you cite do not seem to affect High Point PD, Guilford County Sheriffs, Winston Salem ect. Council has had decades of proposals and information that prove how take home cars save money. Don’t worry, the rest of Council won’t vote for it anyway. It’s just Nancy talking to the wind.
Insurance bill? LOL. It’s illegal in NC to use an official vehicle for personal use. Also the City is self-insured so there are no premiums other than a catastrophic umbrella policy to help with big claims (like over $100k) Mileage? LOL. They rack up more miles running the same cars 20+ hours a day now than a single officer working a 10-12 hr shift. Common sense aside now isn’t the time to try and buy a car. Good luck finding one.
“Councilmember Sharon Hightower said she would agree to reconsider the issue but added, “You know my thoughts about that, if all those cars are going to the north side of town, I can’t support that. Where they are going, I think that is critically important.”
Perhaps Councilmember Hightower should hold a recruitment fair in her district.
Hightower is a blatant racist and uses any topic as a lead-in for more money for her district. I guess she never fully understood her swearing in process was for the entire city of Greensboro, not just her district. If there was ever a 100% partisan council member, it is Hightower.
I’m not sure about Tanger but Mr. Koury never wanted or asked the city or anyone else to pay for anything for him. Footnote to this when he built 4 Seasons mall the state said no to the inter change at High Point Rd. so guess what happened he built it himself at no cost to anyone. Mr Koury was an honorable man
You obviously know nothing about the development of property or how developers benefit from municipalities-water run to their properties, roads built to ease the traffic into their properties, tax breaks, low interest loans. Attend a zoning commission or council meeting. And why does Koury have anything to do with take home police cars?
What’s really needed is cars for mask inspectors, but I guess technically that is a county issue.
Why now You and the whole council were against it a few months ago. All of you are sooo Stupid
With a mileage limit, there’s nothing wrong with this. But the cars don’t need to leave the city limits.
Election time Hail Mary, Nancy? The take home car issue has been on the table for over a decade. The salary adjustment is a joke-it still does not make GPD equal or higher than the other comparable agencies in the area. GPD loses officers to High Point, Burlington, and other smaller agencies frequently. They also have officers who had many years of service completely leaving the profession. When employers make employees feel valued, they are less likely to leave. Officers know that the politicians on City Council do not care. Their actions continue to speak louder than words. Money is found for every special project but insuring the city has adequate police and public safety services.
You have two groups of people working at GPD. Those who count the days to retirement and those who have sat there for well over 30 years collecting checks. Council needs to start demanding innovative and progressive ideas from the leadership of GPD. Not the tired “ideas” from the past that do not work in the present world of policing. Good luck filling those vacancies.
The city of Hickory just increased their salary for police officers to 45,000, so if I were a candidate for a police vacancy, I’d move to Hickory which is a MUCH better city than Greensboro.
Another GPD officer bites the dust for a neighboring rural county department that pays more and has cars. Do something to stop the hemorrhaging to neighboring departments.
Expect more of feelgood Mandate Mayor as election season creeps up. Just lip service while Greensboro continues it’s decay under terrible leadership.
Phased in? They are about to dump a cool 13 million dollars into a homeless shelter and they can’t buy a few dozen police cars? Please. This all election year posturing. Even if they “approve” a phased in approach, as soon as elections are over it will get tabled and eventually disappear. Either do it outright or don’t. We are in no way deceived by this political stunt, Nancy and Company.
Over time, Greensboro will decline, rapidly perhaps.
Taxpayer should tell the so called “council “ to give back the raise they gave themselves with I might add no public input that alone would buy 2 more Police cars a year especially since a few of them make a living off of what they get from the taxpayers. A couple have never held jobs but 1 gets 900 k a year with no accountability. I should be so lucky but no I have morals. Shame on them all but KARMA is always around.
Give them time to figure out how money can be made and it’ll happen.
Among the many other questions raised by the nebulous concept of “greed” is why it is a term applied almost exclusively to those who want to earn more money or to keep what they have already earned—never to those wanting to take other people’s money in taxes or to those wishing to live on the largess dispensed from such taxation. No amount…
-Thomas Sowell
You go Hightower’ you are a good reason the men and women in your district are not qualified for these positions on the poly force.If all the Democrats that are in favor of This Woke philosophy in our schools today would spend the same amount of energy in promoting the 3R’s .You would see a better educated child in our schools.
Please see article by our Lt.Gov.in a recent article .
How can a child of any color black,brown ,or white learn when he is learning sexual positions,and is being taught to hate his fellow student. This vile mess is straight from Satan Himself.