As Columbus police chief weighs severance, rally and council speakers prep for next steps

Tim Chitwood
·3 min read
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Another stormy Columbus Council meeting is forecast this week amid a controversial effort to remove Police Chief Freddie Blackmon.

A month after Blackmon’s supporters flooded a Feb. 28 night meeting as councilors pressured the chief to respond to a privately funded study critical of his administration, a similar showing is expected Tuesday when council convenes at 5:30 p.m. at the City Services Center off Macon road.

A rally in support of the chief is planned for 4:30 p.m., outside the building, and 10 people citing the chief or public safety as their topic have signed up to address council on its public agenda.

Muscogee County Sheriff Greg Countryman, whose staff is responsible for securing the council chamber, said his deputies are preparing for another congested meeting, but expect no additional safety concerns.

“We’re going to take precautions, because of the crowd,” he said.

The chamber holds about 220 people, and deputies do not want the audience to pack in so tightly that people are standing along the walls, he added.

Severance package

City leaders last week acknowledged Mayor Skip Henderson offered Blackmon a severance package on March 15, just a day after the chief presented a “strategic plan” to address issues raised in a police department study authored by the national consulting firm Jensen Hughes.

Here are the terms of that severance agreement, as provided to local media that filed open-records requests for the document:

  • A one-time lump sum gross payment of $250,000

  • Health insurance benefits until May 2030

  • Compensation for unused vacation time

  • Eligibility for participation in the Columbus Consolidated Government pension plan

Blackmon’s annual salary currently is $161,513, according to the city’s human resources director. A Columbus native who started at the police department in 1986, he so far has not accepted the severance offer. His office did not immediately respond to a Ledger-Enquirer inquiry Monday.

His supporters say that Blackmon, who was appointed chief with council’s approval in November 2020, is being targeted because he is Black. He succeeded a white police chief, Ricky Boren, another career officer who headed the department for 16 years.

Blackmon is not the city’s first Black police chief: that was Willie Dozier, also a career Columbus officer who rose through the ranks to lead the department from 2000 to 2004, before he retired.

Chief Freddie Blackmon is greeted by supporters after presenting his Strategic Plan to City Council.
Chief Freddie Blackmon is greeted by supporters after presenting his Strategic Plan to City Council.

Strategic plan

Councilors on Feb. 14 gave Blackmon a month to compile a strategic plan to address criticisms in the Jensen Hughes study, after representatives of the firm briefed them on the findings, citing the department’s needing a gang enforcement strategy, additional staffing overall, and more personnel in its special operations unit devoted to crime suppression.

Jensen Hughes also found the department was losing experienced officers because of low morale related to micromanagement and poor communications from its leadership. The department is budgeted for 488 officers and was down to 299 earlier this month.

The study was funded by local business leaders through the Community Foundation of the Chattahoochee Valley. Its donors remain anonymous. Responding to a Ledger-Enquirer open records request, the city attorney said no government records identify them.

Blackmon’s new strategic plan calls for boosting the number of sworn officers to 572, increasing financial benefits and restructuring the department. Police already have combined their investigative bureau’s robbery-assault and homicide units into a consolidated Violent Crimes Unit, as the study suggested. That took effect March 4.

Councilors on Tuesday are to consider one of Blackmon’s proposals: Restoring a quarterly retention bonus of $1,500 for all sworn officers and 911 dispatchers, retroactive to the start of this calendar year. Council’s also being asked to offer $3,000 to new hires moving here, to help pay relocation costs, and a $600 bonus to current employees who refer the department to a job candidate who’s hired.

The current starting pay for a rookie police officer with a high school education is $50,121 a year.

The Columbus Police Department is headquartered in the city’s Public Safety Center on 10th Street downtown.
The Columbus Police Department is headquartered in the city’s Public Safety Center on 10th Street downtown.