Story at a glance:
- An entire Missouri police department, including the police chief and his officers, resigned.
- Kimberling City Police Chief Craig Alexander resigned on Aug. 23.
- The mass resignation reportedly caught Mayor Bob Fritz of Kimberling City off guard.
An entire Missouri police department, including the police chief and his officers, resigned leaving the city of Kimberling without immediate authority.
Citing problems like an inadequate pay rate and not having the right tools to do the job, the department has local leaders struggling to find replacements, especially when rhetoric against law enforcement is high amongst some, Fox News reported.
“It will be a struggle to fill the police department back up with qualified officers, but hopefully they can start working on that soon and get that accomplished,”Stone County Sheriff Doug Rader said of the resignations at the Kimberling City Police Department, noting that most police stations are understaffed.
What preempted the mass exodus, according to Rader, was Kimberling City Police Chief Craig Alexander’s resignation on Aug. 23. He wanted changes from the town’s mayor and he wanted to better himself, Fox News reported.
Soon after, Alexander’s resignation was joined by three officers and a sergeant, with their reasons for quitting being the absence of a police clerk to assist the department, not having qualified officers in the department, and wanting new opportunities with a better pay rate, according to NBC Springfield, Missouri.
It is being reported that some of the Kimberling City Police Officers left to join the Branson West Police Department, which caught…
Read full story [icon name=”arrow-right” prefix=”fas”] Entire police department resigns in Missouri | TheHill