Veteran cop calls it quits
Culprit is low pay

Sgt. Richard Brown has distinguished himself with years of service with the Grants Police Department. He is quitting his job and going to work for the State of New Mexico Transportatiion Department. (Photo by Jerry Wilson/Independent)

By Jim Tiffin
Staff Writer

GRANTS — A 17-year veteran of the Grants Police Department, Sgt. Richard Brown, is leaving because of low pay. Today is his last day.

Police Chief Marty Vigil calls Brown, a senior sergeant in the department, invaluable and extremely knowledgeable about every department including patrol, detective and narcotics divisions. Brown is going to become a New Mexico Department of Motor Transportation law enforcement officer.

Brown said his beginning wages with the Motor Transportation department are 13 cents more than he is being paid now.

"The state gives raises every year and the last raise this police department received was in 1995 because we (Grants Police Department Employees Association the police union) forced them to do it ... we sued the city," he said.

He said he works with great people and loves the city and his job, but at this point in his career, with retirement facing him in a few years, he has to look out for himself and his family.

He and his wife, Marilyn, have three children, Michael, 19, a freshman at the University of New Mexico; James, 16, a sophomore at Grants High School; and Nicole, 13, a seventh-grader at Los Alamitos Middle school.

"We (the union) are trying to get a raise now, but it's too little too late," he said.

Retiring from the city would give him 62 percent of his salary. Retiring from the state gives him 80 percent of his salary and he is expecting an annual raise from the state.

"The city could give us a 10 percent raise every two years for 10 years and that would still only bring us to the level of pay we should have been getting in the 1990s," he said.

"The city has the money, they just need to adjust the budget," he said.

Vigil said Brown is one of only a couple of officers who are Voice Stress Analyzers, a test given similar to a polygraph and indicates whether the person being interviewed is telling the truth.

Filling his shoes is difficult at best.

"You hope the people in the department will motivate themselves to learn all the operations like Richard has," Vigil said.

Brown is a former U.S. Marine who served in Desert Storm.

A lot of what he did, being assigned to "special duties," is still classified, but a portion of what he did was to recover American military bodies.

"I wanted to be a policeman out of high school and interviewed to get into the State Police, but I didn't make it," he said. Brown was one of the final 60 for eight positions that were open at the time, from 800 applicants statewide.

"I knew I wanted to do something in public service," he said.

As a Motor Transportation Officer, he will be driving the silver state police vehicles and stopping and checking 18-wheel trucks on Interstate 40.

"I will be working out of the Gallup Port of Entry, but will be stationed here in Grants," he said.

Checking truckers' log books, their cabs and loads, and making sure the truck is safe to drive on the highway is what his primary responsibilities will be now, he said.

— To contact reporter Jim Tiffin call 287-2197 or e-mail: jtiffin@blackmesa-isp.net.