Newport City Council Tales Plan To Add Members To NUB

The Newport City Council met in a special session Wednesday afternoon. After much discussion, the council decided to table a proposal that would add two new members to the Newport Utilities Board. That proposal would see the Mayor and one Alderman added to the board of Newport Utilities, raising the number of board members from 5 to 7. The board of mayor and aldermen decided after some consultation with state officials to postpone that move and revisit the issue next year.

The city council did vote to approve to eliminate two positions within both the Newport Fire Department and the Newport Police Department. The positions within the fire department include the Asst. Fire Chief position. Two patrol officer positions will be eliminated with the police department. No one is currently in those positions, as the police department is currently five officers short of full staff. The positions are budgeted for, so the money saved by eliminating those positions will be used to raise the salary of current officers and raise the beginning salary for new officers.

The fire department will use the savings from eliminating their two positions to give firefighters a raise. The $5,000 a year raises will bring salaries for the police and fire departments more inline with those of surrounding agencies. The steps being taken in order to raise those salaries will be cost neutral for taxpayers.