Ward V’s Bob Langstaff seeking four more years, with focus on police, job creation, finances

Editor’s Note: Eighth in a series about the candidates seeking the Ward II, Ward III and Ward V seats on the Albany City Commission in the Nov. 2 municipal election.

ALBANY — Heading toward the end of his 20th year on the Albany City Commission, Bob Langstaff’s tenure places him as the second-longest member currently serving.

Langstaff, who represents Ward V, is seeking re-election in the Nov. 2 municipal election to a sixth term in a three-way race with challengers RyShari Burley and Colette Jenkins.

Several issues are motivating the incumbent, most notably public safety, economic development and ensuring the city remains on a strong financial footing.

“I think the main thing is, the most important thing to me and I think it’s the most important thing in Ward V, is being safe, public safety,” he said. “Everybody is concerned about crime, and crime is up around the country.”

Like other law enforcement agencies, the Albany Police Department has a severe shortage of officers to patrol the streets. A consultant hired by the city estimated APD is about 70 percent short of the number of officers needed, and the issue also affects the city’s finances. The same study showed that over five years, the losses incurred by training officers who left after a short stint cost the city $5 million.

“That’s tax dollars,” he said. “Retention is not just how many officers (are) on the street, it’s also a financial problem.”

One potential solution Langstaff said he sees is freezing the city’s pension plan to new hires. While current employees would remain in the plan and accrue benefits for retirement, it would allow new employees to receive bigger paychecks.

Currently public safety officers have 7% deducted from their checks and other employees 4%.

While a pension plan was a valuable inducement in the past, younger people these days do not anticipate remaining in a job for 30 years, the commissioner said. Allowing them to see a better paycheck immediately would help recruit new officers.

“That’s money we could be using to increase salaries,” Langstaff said. “Seven percent is significant. The Generation Z’s don’t look at jobs the same way as our generation did. The younger generations are more mobile. The majority of new hires don’t think they’ll be around long enough” to collect a pension.

There are several options that could be examined, Langstaff said, such as making the freeze applicable to only new officers rather than all departments and an opt-out option where they could decide whether or not to participate.

The city, Dougherty County and Albany Area Chamber of Commerce jointly fund the Albany-Dougherty Economic Development Commission, a relationship that has served well in attracting companies. Langstaff said.

An additional tool was added with a $22 million infusion of cash into a job investment fund through reimbursement from the Municipal Electric Authority of Georgia. Already, $1.8 million invested through that fund has paid off, including helping attract Webstaurant to Albany, Langstaff said.

“The thing that’s so great about it is that $1.8 million investment has resulted in a private investment of about $60 million,” he said. “We’ve also got close to 500 jobs that may not have been here but for the 1.8 million we gave to those companies.”

Several downtown businesses, including The Flint restaurant and Pretoria Fields Collective brewery also were helped with loans, Langstaff said.

So far the funds have been used to help provide a final nudge to companies when Albany is in competition with other cities. Langstaff said he would favor opening it up as an inducement earlier in the process. Another idea is to adjust the number of jobs and investment required on the part of investors for receiving grants or loans.

“It’s just a different way to market it,” Langstaff said. “It’s just we might be a little more flexible.”