Reader Responses

Recently I read in the Tyler Paper that local governments, the city of Tyler and Smith County, are struggling with budget crunches due to rising cost of fuel to operate their vehicles. Welcome to the real world.

First let's look at the county Road and Bridge. I've noticed them driving new four-door pickup trucks with only one person in the vehicle, and other new cars and trucks with V-8 engines. Can they not purchase V-6 vehicles and do they really need a $30 thousand-plus pickup?

The Sheriff's Department does have a few V-8 patrol cars. Could they not perform their duties with all V-6 cars instead of high performance police interceptors? Chevrolet has a nice V-6 Impala and Dodge has a high output V-6 Charger. Both would reduce some fuel consumption.

For the city, the police department also could purchase the above-mentioned vehicles. Since they have a "no pursuit policy" why do they need police interceptor V-8s? I dare say the Dodge V-6 high output would perform as well, if not better.

A city as large as Tyler needs to incorporate use of "Paddy Wagons." This way when arrests are made, instead of the patrol officer being taken off the streets to transport, the Paddy Wagon could transport and book prisoners into jail.

As a former reserve officer for 30 years I know, on average, during an eight-hour shift and depending on the number of arrests per shift, an officer could be off street patrol nearly two hours for booking. At times I was only on actual patrol two to three hours of an eight-hour shift due to transporting prisoners.

As for the expenses of ambulance services. Let's see, three ambulance services in Smith County; Trinity Mother Frances, East Texas Medical Center and Champion. We're surrounded! I see them cruising the streets, parked in private lots with engine running and A/C or heat running. This is a waste of fuel and wear and tear on equipment. You don't see fire trucks cruising about or parked around town waiting for a fire.

Who else has noticed that fire departments the majority of the time arrive at traffic accidents before ambulances? Why is Tyler one of the few cities where the fire department doesn't run and maintain the ambulance service? With city-owned ambulance service and an ambulance in each firehouse, I believe the city could issue better and cheaper, more efficient ambulance service.

I believe both the county and city could make big changes to cut operating cost.

As a taxpayer, why do the Tyler Independent School District, TJC and UT Tyler all need full-size campus patrol cars, fully equipped with police interceptor V-8s, high-dollar light bars and in some cases, radar? All of this just to patrol a school campus. Give me a break!

As a native and Smith County resident almost 62 years I would like some believable answers. By the way, we taxpayers are feeling the crunch, too!

Don Mullican
Tyler