DeKAY: Take-home city owned cars, benefit or liability?

By PEGGY DeKAY
Local Columnist

August 27, 2008 07:12 pm

— “A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.”
— George Bernard Shaw
•••
Take-home cars are like take-home pizza. It seems like a good idea at the time, but after a while, it gets expensive, you feel bloated, and it gives you a headache. The Evening News has run several articles in August discussing the viability of city-owned take-home cars for employees, i.e.; police officers and 'department heads'. Let's talk about the officers first, and save the best for last.
Council President Ed Zastawny wants to restrict the use of city owned cars. His plan is to restrict local police officers from driving their police cars home unless they live within the city limits. This type of policy has been in place in Jefferson County in Louisville for some time. In Jefferson County, officers drive their police cars to the county line, where they park their police car, and switch to their personal car for the remainder of the trip home. The next morning they reverse the procedure.
It works in Jefferson County, partly because the county is huge compared to the size of Jeffersonville. Since New Albany, Clarksville, Jeffersonville and Charlestown are within a few miles of one another, it seems arbitrary to me to restrict them by city limits. How about a Quad-city agreement or a 25 mile radius limitation from the officer's police station? Charlestown, Clarksville, New Albany and Jeffersonville, could agree to allow any officer living in one of these quad-cities to drive their police cars home when off duty. If the officer lives outside the quad-city area, he or she would be required to park the police car and drive their personal cars home.
Zastawny says the ordinance could save 78,000 miles annually, yielding a fuel savings of $31,000.00. In a year of continuing budget shortfalls, this is a noble effort at saving money. I agree with Councilman Nathan Samuel, however, when he points out that 'it helps increase the sense of security in local neighborhoods.” Two police officers live in my neighborhood. They both have garages, but park their police cars in their driveways at night. I do feel that it gives the neighborhood added security by a heightened police presence. I believe it also gives the officer the ability to respond more efficiently in a civil emergency. We live in a time when a national, state or local emergency involving many people is certainly possible, if not probable.
Bottom line, I think a law enforcement officer should have access to his/her car. An officer's car is his mobile office, and we all know, you need to have access to your office to do your job done effectively. Our officers are the 'thin blue line'. That thin blue line keeps the creep's away from all of us. If we can help them hold the line ... let's do it!
Now, for the much more questionable expense; department heads driving cars paid for by the taxpayers. I feel a little nauseous ... don't you? Councilwoman Connie Sellers said, according to an Evening News article (Mann, August 5, 2008) that 'department heads were expected to come in at all hours in the case of an emergency. They should be supplied with a vehicle in order to do that.” Ms. Sellers doesn't say which city government department heads are given a city owned car to drive. I am having a hard time believing that city department heads are 'driving in at all hours of the night', and therefore should be allocated a car, in addition to their salary. For you department heads out there diligently working in the private sector, driving your own car, buying your own gas, and putting charges on your own credit card ... don't you wish your boss would see it the way Ms. Sellers does?
Officers put their lives on the line every day. I dare say many would risk their lives for you or me, even if we live outside the city limits. I would like to see two things happen ... first, the Council publish a list of the city departments whose department heads have been allocated a city-owned car to drive to work at our expense, and two; I would like to see those cars taken back by the city, sold, and the proceeds used to pay for the gas in the officers cars.
For you city government department heads out there, it's not your fault that your bosses don't know how not to spend the taxpayers money. If they gave me a credit card, free gas and a free car to show up for work, I'd take it too!
“The government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.”
— Ronald Reagan

“Thoughts from the Hungry Side of Daybreak” are written by Peggy DeKay, a Clark County business and freelance writer. She can be reached at pldekay@insightbb.com.

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