St. Louis County police officers are getting a 30 percent pay raise. On Tuesday, the St. Louis County Council unanimously approved the bill to give county officers a boost in pay.
The money comes from the voter-approved Proposition P tax increase, but it was a long road as leaders fought over the health and stability of pensions as a result of the pay increase.
Those discussions, that got heated at times, were largely held by County Council Chairman Sam Page and County Executive Steve Stenger.
Both Stenger and Page said they are ready to put that behind them.
"I think we should move on from the politics of this," said Page.
"There really shouldn't have been a disagreement or anyone trying to obstruct this to begin with because this was promised by Proposition P and this was what the will of the people had in mind when they passed Proposition P," said County Executive Steve Stenger.
The bill passed allocates about $19 million of the $46 million that will go to the county police department to increase officer's salaries. The bill also set aside $7 million for the pension system.
St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar said he's happy the county council passed the bill because he believed his officer's deserved to be paid more. He also said he is glad the politics on the issue are now over.
"I think we really turned a page here," said St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar. "I think it's a positive page and if you paid attention which you all did, that was a unanimous vote tonight so I really appreciate the county council coming together and I really appreciate at the same time the county executives leadership on this because without that it is a really difficult road to go down."
The base salary for a county officer will increase from $48,000 to $52,000, said Chief Belmar.
The budget for the allocation of Prop P is expected to be presented Wednesday. There will likely be much discussion about that and on how to allocate the money to other municipalities.
Page said the budget won't be finalized until the middle of December.
