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Olympia Public Safety Committee weighs which programs should be funded in 2022 budget

Olympian - 9/14/2021

Sep. 14—The city of Olympia is considering nearly $5.5 million worth of new investments in public safety in their 2022 operating budget.

The city of Olympia's Ad Hoc Public Safety committee — comprised of city council members Lisa Parshley, Clark Gilman and Mayor Cheryl Selby, along with several city officials — heard city departments make their case for multi-million-dollar investments in programs they hope will advance public health and safety.

"How we provide public health and safety services is evolving and changing," Assistant City Manager Debbie Sullivan said at the Thursday night meeting. "Having predictable and permanent funding for programs that result in outcomes that are successful — it's important to memorialize their value."

Homeless services

Cary Retlin, the city's Home Fund manager, presented new investment options for the city's homeless services programs. The new investments, he said, were derived from a survey the city commissioned that showed 87% of Olympia residents are dissatisfied with the city's response to the homelessness crisis.

Many citizens want more visible outcomes and solutions to homelessness in Olympia, Retlin told the committee. The survey showed residents want more reliable services for the city's homeless residents, such as mental health centers, and for the city to do a better job managing camp sites.

"Unsanctioned camping continues to create a really high level of demand for resources," Retlin said.

In previous years, homeless services used loans to prop up services. Retlin hopes the city will supply $650,000 to maintain current homeless services and mitigation operations, which moves homeless residents away from unsanctioned camp sites and into the city's new mitigation sites, some of which have tiny homes.

Retlin asked for $220,000 to allocate to Rosie's Place youth shelter, run by Community Youth Services, to keep the shelter open 24 hours a day and to hire a homeless response coordinator and an aide for them.

In total, Retlin requested an additional on-going investment of $1.06 million from the city. He also asked that the city consider providing a one-time payment of $500,000 to move the city's current mitigation site from downtown to a property on Quince Street near Interstate 5 the city bought that used to be a Quality Inn.

City Manager Jay Burney said most of the new investments are in programs and positions the city already has using cobbled- together funds, "but it's time to solidify that position within our organization."

Fire services

Olympia's fire department asked for funding to acquire more basic life support (BLS) vehicles and launch a new program to treat people where they are rather than taking them to a hospital.

Kevin Bossard, Olympia Fire Department Assistant Chief of Operations, asked for $3 million to buy new BLS vehicles. Bossard said the unavailability of private ambulances "is creating a significant problem for us."

The last time the city's fire department acquired new BLS vehicles such as ambulances was in the 1990s. The decreased availability of BLS vehicles, both private and city owned, has increased how long a caller has to wait for an ambulance and how much time the EMTs spend at the scene.

Bossard said that call volumes have gone up 114% since the last time the city bought new BLS units.

Olympia fire also is seeking $265,000 for a pilot program that would treat people with BLS injuries at the scene of the injury. This would allow the department to keep people out of the county's crowded hospitals.

Council member Clark Gilman supports the program, called "FD Cares," saying it will both help people and save the city money. "It makes sense to treat people we can on site, refer them to alternative services, and divert them from the hospital."

Police services

Olympia interim Police Chief Aaron Jelcick, who announced last week that he will retire by the end of the month, requested additional funding for programs to mitigate interactions with police and to provide people in crisis services police officers cannot provide.

Jelcick asked the committee to consider a nearly $800,000 investment to hire more people to work in the Crisis Response Units (CRU) and expand their services to all day every day.

"This is a citywide program, not just a downtown program, that focuses on harm reduction," Jelcick told the committee. He said Providence hospitals will provide a registered nurse who will help administer emergency medical care when needed and keep people out of the emergency room.

Jelcick shared data that showed CRU teams respond to mental and behavioral health calls, which he said police should not respond to so the department can comply with police reform legislation the state legislature passed in 2021.

Jelcick said he wants to have the recruiting process start immediately so the department can hire qualified applicants for multiple positions by the end of the year. In total, he's looking to fill six positions: four CRU team members, a CRU Lead and a program assistant. Jelcick said he's already heard from an experienced nurse who was interested in filling a position on the team.

City Council member Lisa Parshley signaled support for the expansion of CRU teams to 24/7 services, but wanted to make sure the jobs provided workers a living wage. "I'm assuming the phenomenal candidates wouldn't be here if we weren't offering enough to make it something they'd be interested in."

To further comply with the 2021 police reform legislation, the department requested nearly $1 million to lease body cameras and create new positions to review police behavior.

"We need, in our line of work, increased transparency and a level of accountability, particularly when it comes to police use of force," Jelcick said.

The department would need $160,000 to lease body cameras, rather than purchase them outright. Jelcick said many of his officers are eager to get body cameras.

Most of the money from the request would fund five new positions to review body camera footage. The department would create a Professional Standards Lieutenant and hire assistants and a program specialist to implement and manage body camera training and use, if given the full amount of $965,000.

However, Burney said the city is still working on coming up with rules and regulations for when body cameras have to be turned on and when officers get to turn them off. "There's a lot of pieces to this ... a lot of the policy development — that's what's going to take time."

Jelcick hopes to have the program implemented by July 2022, which Selby said was a quick turnaround for a government organization.

While body cameras can be used to provide accountability, it will be up to OPD to review footage and investigate incidents.

However, the Assistant City Manager Sullivan requested $100,000 be allocated to the law firm that serves as Olympia's independent police auditor to increase public trust and confidence.

In 2020, Olympia contracted the law offices of Ogden Murphy Wallace to serve as police auditor and perform independent reviews of OPD internal investigations and complaints against OPD submitted by citizens. The law firm is currently paid $30,000 a year for its services, a number that quickly proved to be insufficient, Sullivan said.

The additional funds will allow the firm to increase the scope of what they review and would increase the reporting frequency, Sullivan told the committee.

Many of the numbers shared at the committee meeting were preliminary, Burney said, and could change as more research is done. "We still have a lot of work to do ... so tonight was just a bit of an overview to show you what we're considering and all the things that are being proposed."

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