EDMONDS—The Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office is meeting with city of Edmonds officials on Friday, December 13, to discuss the option of contracting out law enforcement services to the city if a dissolution of the Edmonds Police Department were to occur. The Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office currently has 29 open deputy sheriff positions.
“They are working on a few options to address budget gaps, and one of those options includes talking with us about a possible contract for police services…We will, of course, be considering impacts to our agency during those conversations,” said Snohomish County Sheriff Susanna Johnson. “These are not easy situations for a city to be involved in, so please be compassionate to our brothers and sisters in blue in Edmonds.”
The City of Edmonds is considering dissolving its Police Department to cut costs in the wake of a $13 million budget deficit. City officials are also in conversations with the King County Sheriff’s Office with a similar deal.
The multi-million dollar deficit stemmed from the city overestimating revenues by $200,000, King 5 first reported back in October, and made worse by overestimating the beginning budget balance by $550,000, and paying more than $250,000 in un-budgeted funds to laid off employees.
To deal with this nearly $1 million mistake, Edmonds Mayor Mike Rosen is proposing 12-day furloughs for non-union employees, cutting human resource staffing, eliminating a probation officer, selling city vehicles, cutting the beach rangers program, annexing its fire department into South County Fire, laying off 46 city employees, taking out a $7.5 million loan and asking voters for a potential levy lift, all in addition to dissolving its police department.
Rosen told Reporters back in October that he inherited the city’s budget problems when he walked into office back in January but takes full responsibility for cleaning up the mess.
Edmonds Police Officers Association, the union that represents the Edmonds PD, President Officer Will Morris told reporter Jason Rantz, who broke the story Monday, in an interview this week that a large part of the city’s budget problems are also the result of investing in expensive equipment that’s hardly used—such as drones, dive equipment, and bicycles.
Morris continued that there was virtually no communication between the city and the union on this potential option. The plan has also not been brought up to the Edmonds City Council.
Edmonds residents voiced their concerns over potentially annexing its fire services to South County Fire during a City Council meeting last week but its plan to dissolve its police department, up until now, has been mostly kept under wraps.
To ensure the city does not make the same budgetary mistakes in the future, officials say they will be implementing more checks and balances, changing purchasing policies, and being more frugal in income projections. The city also plans to move to a biannual budgeting process instead of an annual.
Author: Kienan Briscoe
