TOLEDO, OH (WTOL) - The Toledo Police Department is expecting a lot of retirements in the coming months.
The next police class to help fill those spots, doesn't start until December. A million and a quarter dollars is what it would cost to get a new police class to start about five months earlier than scheduled.
Erik Thompson has lived near the "Pour House" in West Toledo for a decade. He says in just the last year, the bar has attracted a lot of crime and he's afraid for the safety of his three young children.
"Stray bullets, they do land somewhere and we're afraid that eventually they're going to land in one of our houses and it's going to be a tragedy," said Thompson.
It's the reason while Council member Lindsay Webb says, the police class needs to get moved up to July. She's proposing an amendment to the city's budget to make it happen.
Webb says extra money from 2016 would cover the cost of more than a million dollars.
"Revenues are up. Expenditures are down. They had about $3 million they intended to transfer over, so I'm saying, instead of transferring that money over and put it into a rainy day fund, it's raining in West Toledo, put the police class on," said Webb.
Councilman Tom Waniewski agrees the police class needs to be moved up from December. He's proposing an amendment of his own, to move the class up to June.
"We get a class out on the street in May, so this would be a perfect segue to get the next police class going," said Waniewski.
Waniewski says he will work with Webb and the Council President to bring their proposals together. They could vote on the issue at the next council meeting on Tuesday.
Waniewski has a couple other amendments he's working on for the 2017 budget. One, that would provide $4 million for street paving. Another, would make $1 million available for what he's calling "District Improvement gr ants."
The gr ants would allow each of the six district representatives to apply for money to make capital improvements to their specific neighborhoods.
"Whether you're putting up new lights, led lights, which brightens up a neighborhood. Whether you're putting in curbs, whether you want to do something special with the street. That would be argued for this gr ant money," said Waniewski.
The money would come from the Capital Improvements Budget.
The 2017 budget needs to be approved by the end of the month.
