Vancouver City Council increased funding for the police department Monday night, a move that will add 61 positions to the department by 2020.
The boost in funding will allow the police department to fill gaps that were made during the Great Recession when cuts were made.
“We will focus these new resources on programs that Vancouver citizens have indicated were important to them, such as our Traffic Unit, Property Crimes Unit and community outreach programs. We will also add more patrol officers, intelligence officers and drug and gang task force officers, in addition to civilian technicians and other support staff,” said Vancouver Police Chief James McElvain.
A Community Resource Team was convened in spring of 2016 and made up with community members, business organizations and neighborhood organizations. Their suggestions were approved by the council and will tap both new and existing fund sources to generate $5.1 million in 2017 and increase to $12.5 million by 2020, according to information from the council.
The funding package includes money from a variety of sources, including; marijuana sales tax revenue, the COPS grant funding, proposed Van Mall North annexation tax revenues, business license surcharge, an increase in utility tax rate on city-owned utilities, an annual surcharge on multi-family units and an annual square-foot surcharge on retail, commercial and industrial space.
The multi-family per unit fee won’t include housing for low-income tenant nor affect senior citizens of the disabled. The retail, commercial and industrial and multi-family per unit fees won’t increase until 2019. If an alternative funding source is identified before, the council would repeal the multi-family per unit fees.
The police department currently has 198 sworn officers and 47.5 civilian positions. By 2021, that will increase to 232 sworn officers and 62.5 civilian.
The community group also suggested the city approve a public outreach process to establish long-range service needs for city services. The council will kick of this process at the beginning of this year.