Austin’s Daily Commentary – December 12, 2023

Austin: It is illegal in the state of Georgia to give public employees, government employees, gratuities. You can't just hand them cash and say, "Here's a prize. Thank you for being an employee." But what you can't do is pay them when their duties have changed or when there's extra hazardous work or when their conditions are different from under which they were hired. And folks, the way this is handled is that you articulate what you were doing and you and when you're the supervising department and you do it in a way that leaves no doubt as to exactly what you're doing and why.

The work conditions for the Richmond County Sheriff's Department for certified, badge wearing employees have changed drastically because of the shortage of personnel. People who are ordinarily traffic cops are having to work jail duty. People who work jail duty are having to work double jail duty and perhaps help out with security in other places. In other words, folks are having to step outside of their normal job duties because of the shortage of personnel. That justifies a bonus or an adjustment in their pay.

And if the sheriff's department and the people who run that department are bright enough to come up and say, "Hi, this is what we're doing and this is why we're doing it," then hip hip hooray, no problem. Their lack of candor in the way that they kind of drop this Christmas bonus bomb on everyone in the way that they even talked about it is the problem.

Yesterday, a memo was mentioned that was sent out by Judge Danny Craig, who was the senior judge, of course, for the judicial circuit in Augusta, mentioning that gratuities are not possible or legal under state law. And he's absolutely right. And so unless your department or your job title specifically has undergone drastic changes over the course of the last calendar year that reflect in the way that you're, you know, doing your job and the way that you're paid, then you don't get a gratuity. That's why non badge wearing members of the sheriff's department should have no part of this bonus.

Again, this is a clumsy mistake made by the amateurs that run the Richmond County Sheriff's Department. The sheriff and his top leadership are terrible, horrible administrators. But that's not news, is it? No. Merry Christmas. And that's the comment, I'm Austin Rhodes, AM 580/95.1 FM News Talk WGAC.