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Steven Seagal Joins MPD ... Sort Of
APRIL 1, 2008 - 10:36 AM
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Steven Seagal, MPD
Professional tough guy Steven Seagal has played police officers in Hollywood films, but his next role with law enforcement might not make it into Variety.
In a meeting of the City Council's public safety committee, police director Larry Godwin said he has met twice with Seagal about doing advertising for the department. "He's committed to doing our commercials," Godwin said. "He gets a million dollars a commercial, but he's agreed to do it free of charge to not only promote the Memphis police department, but Memphis, Tennessee."
Enlisting Hollywood help is only one of the strategies the police department is utilizing to recruit new officers.
Last year, the department struck down its college requirement, which mandated that new recruits have at least some college or military experience to join the department. Since then, Godwin said, about 1,000 people have applied; roughly a fourth of those applicants do not have any college.
The city is also looking at relaxing residency requirements for police officers, offering signing bonuses, and sweetening pension plans.
--Mary Cashiola
-- Mary Cashiola is an associate editor of The Memphis Flyer. She edits “The Fly-By” news section of the paper and writes the weekly column, In the Bluff. She was born on a cold and bitter night in 1978. Since then, she has managed to develop a serious Diet Coke addiction, graduate from Northwestern University, sit through hours upon hours of City Council and Memphis City Board of Education meetings, spend 50 percent of her gross income on clothing, scale a rock climbing wall in under 60 seconds, watch every episode of Buffy, Angel, Sex and the City, Alias, and The Sopranos (produced so far) on DVD, and dye her hair an unfortunate shade of blond.
http://www.memphisflyer.com/memphis/Content?oid=oid:41299
APRIL 1, 2008 - 10:36 AM
Mail Article Print Article
Share this page:
?
(enlarge)
Steven Seagal, MPD
Professional tough guy Steven Seagal has played police officers in Hollywood films, but his next role with law enforcement might not make it into Variety.
In a meeting of the City Council's public safety committee, police director Larry Godwin said he has met twice with Seagal about doing advertising for the department. "He's committed to doing our commercials," Godwin said. "He gets a million dollars a commercial, but he's agreed to do it free of charge to not only promote the Memphis police department, but Memphis, Tennessee."
Enlisting Hollywood help is only one of the strategies the police department is utilizing to recruit new officers.
Last year, the department struck down its college requirement, which mandated that new recruits have at least some college or military experience to join the department. Since then, Godwin said, about 1,000 people have applied; roughly a fourth of those applicants do not have any college.
The city is also looking at relaxing residency requirements for police officers, offering signing bonuses, and sweetening pension plans.
--Mary Cashiola
-- Mary Cashiola is an associate editor of The Memphis Flyer. She edits “The Fly-By” news section of the paper and writes the weekly column, In the Bluff. She was born on a cold and bitter night in 1978. Since then, she has managed to develop a serious Diet Coke addiction, graduate from Northwestern University, sit through hours upon hours of City Council and Memphis City Board of Education meetings, spend 50 percent of her gross income on clothing, scale a rock climbing wall in under 60 seconds, watch every episode of Buffy, Angel, Sex and the City, Alias, and The Sopranos (produced so far) on DVD, and dye her hair an unfortunate shade of blond.
http://www.memphisflyer.com/memphis/Content?oid=oid:41299
