A member of the search committee for Pine Bluff's next police chief confirmed Wednesday that Mayor Shirley Washington offered the position to Kingsland, Ga., Chief Robert Jones.
Jones visited Pine Bluff from June 13-15 and fielded questions in a public forum on the second day of that visit. He was selected as the lone finalist out of more than 30 who applied for the position. The search committee of seven, each representing a sector of the community, then selected nine out of that group to interview via Zoom in May before inviting Jones to visit Pine Bluff.
Kymara Seals, the community activism representative of the committee, said she talked with Washington after hearing the mayor talk about the offer to a local radio station. Seals said she called Washington and aired a concern to her about the minimum salary the mayor stated that Jones asked for, which was $115,000.
That is higher than the budgeted pay of $90,152 for outgoing Chief Kelvin Sergeant, who will retire July 1 after 26 years in the department.
"The outgoing chief did not make that much, and that's not within the range that we could pay," Seals said. "Now, of course, it has to be approved by the city council. I have gotten call after call after call about it. I heard [Washington] talk on the radio about it. I gave her a call and shared with her my concern. I'm fearful that if she offers him $115,000, you've got other police officers – command staff, lieutenant, captains – who haven't gotten a raise."
According to a September 2020 article in The Commercial, the Pine Bluff City Council used the approximate $300,000 freed up from 10 job cuts within the department to fund raises for 118 uniformed officers at the time. The department now employs 102 officers.
Officers were not given a raise from fiscal year 2020, according to Pine Bluff's fiscal year 2021 budget.
"I'm concerned about the morale of the department if she offers him $115,000," Seals said. "I have expressed that to her. The morale is challenging as it is. You have people in the police department who have more years of experience, but I do understand they didn't apply for the job. At the same time, I think he needs to be within the salary range."
Attempts to reach Washington and Jones for this article were unsuccessful.
Washington told the radio station that, when asking Jones about a starting salary, he responded "like $105,000" but realized he couldn't teach any college courses outside of Georgia to supplement his salary. A check of Kingsland's budget for fiscal year 2021 did not reveal an individual salary for Jones.
The final decision whether to offer the position rests with Washington, who said she would meet with search committee members following Jones' visit before making an offer. Seals said the committee has not met in unison since Jones' visit.
Washington told the radio station she thought Jones' request "was problematic" because she was unsure how the city council would feel about offering that amount, given Jones would make more than her if he were to accept the position. Washington's salary is budgeted at $87,382.
Seals says she is concerned about Jones' salary request.
"He knows he's the lone candidate," she said. "So, I think that is playing in the factor that he's asking for more money. The reason I'm so passionate about it, I asked at least two different times about the salary range. There are people who applied who made more where they were than [if they were] coming to Pine Bluff.
"Did every applicant know that the salary was negotiable? He's too far in to not have asked. He's been to Pine Bluff for three days to visit. I have a hard time believing that Chief Robert Jones didn't know the salary. I do not believe in my heart that man didn't know what the salary range was. That's not normal to go through all this process and you don't know what the salary range was."
Asked why he would want the position in Pine Bluff during the public forum, Jones said: "I look at what I do as a calling. For me to be here, I'll tell you, it's not a big bump in pay. It's not that I'm wanting to save the world. It's just that I feel a duty and have been pointed this direction."
Seals said she believes every law enforcement officer deserves a pay raise, but adds Pine Bluff needs a plan to offer raises to everyone in the police department.
"The mayor did say to me they are trying to look at the '22 budget for all city employees, but that doesn't address right now," Seals said. "The line of work they do, it's hazardous."
The search committee identified Jones as the top candidate through a rubric, or a scoring system, used with each of the nine interviewees during the May interview, Seals said.
"I gave him very high rankings," Seals said. "He was sharp on paper, sharp in person. It was [Washington's] decision to bring on one candidate instead of three."
It was discovered that Jones had also applied for the chief position in the Austin, Texas, police department, but he said when he was in Pine Bluff that if he was offered the Austin job, he would come to Pine Bluff.
Washington has said should Jones turn down the position if offered, a new round of applications and interviews would begin.