A small city in southeastern Minnesota has been left without a police department after the whole force recently resigned, according to officials.
The Goodhue Police Department resigned due to issues with the city’s pay, Mayor Ellen Anderson Buck said at a city council meeting Monday.
The city council met to discuss options for police coverage following the department’s resignation. The meeting was initially called so the city could discuss salary increases for the department, but the entire team resigned before it could happen.
“Since the resignations have been handed in by our police department, it has been recommended by our city attorney that at this point we need to pursue our other options,” Anderson Buck said at the top of the meeting. “So, at this point, there’s no reason to really talk about pay increases since we no longer have a police force.”
Members of the Goodhue Police Department, including Chief Josh Smith, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Anderson Buck said she’s been in contact with the Goodhue County Sheriff’s Office, who she has a meeting with on Wednesday to discuss police coverage for the city in the interim.
The police department will be on duty until Aug. 24, according to Anderson Buck.
“I want to reiterate that we will have police coverage in the city of Goodhue, that is not an issue,” Anderson Buck said, adding she’s been assured the transition will be “very smooth.”
Anderson Buck said the entire police department resigning “is not unusual, it does happen.”
“We’re not the first, and we won’t be the last,” she said.
Following a short-term interim solution, the city will be looking to rebuild its police department, which will include discussions about raising officers’ salaries, the mayor said.
A member of city council compared salaries earned by Goodhue officers to those of welders in the city, adding, “nobody’s going to come put their life on the line for a very low rate.”
Anderson Buck said rebuilding the department will be an “uphill battle,” but it can be done.
There are currently 202 vacancies for police officers in the state of Minnesota, according to Anderson Buck.
The next city council meeting will be on Aug. 23, by which time Anderson Buck said she hopes to have a short-term solution in place.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
