The city manager of Lakewood has found a way to fully staff the city’s popular neighborhood policing program, including in Lake City and Tillicum-Woodbrook by the middle of next year. But it’s ultimately up to a divided City Council.

City Manager Andrew Neiditz at first proposed scaling back the program because of organizational and cost problems. But he’s taken a second look after hearing negative reactions from some council members, neighborhood groups and others.

One city councilman, Walter Neary, likened the cutback to throwing two neighborhoods “under the bus.”

Neiditz now proposes to pay for neighborhood policing teams for all six of Lakewood’s neighborhood districts by reducing some employee pay increases and police overtime, among other things.

But the new proposal has raised concerns among people who watch the police closely.

Alan Hart, chairman of the citizen public safety advisory committee, said a majority of his group wants a fully staffed and sustainable program.

“It’s crucial to make our community livable,” he said.

He said the crime addressed by the neighborhood policing program – including property crime, noise, uncontrolled animals and excessive fireworks – must be handled, as well as major crime.

He said he wasn’t sure Neiditz’s new proposal would maintain the program year after year.

“Is this a short-term fix or for the long term,” Hart said. “What will we do next year?”

He said a majority of his committee favors increasing taxes – if the council approves – to fully staff the neighborhood policing program and add two patrol officers to bolster the Police Department’s day shift.

The police goal of a fully staffed neighborhood team in each of six districts hasn’t been achieved in the 11 years Lakewood has been a city, officials said.

“There needs to be a neighborhood police officer for each district,” Neiditz said. “This would be a move forward.”

Neiditz originally proposed eliminating neighborhood policing efforts in two districts: Lake City and Tillicum-Woodbrook. He proposed consolidating to better serve the four other districts – Northeast, Lakeview, Ponders-Springbrook and Oakbrook, which is in north Lakewood.

The program allows police officers to focus exclusively on neighborhood crime in one district. An officer partners with an unarmed community services officer who helps identify crime problems and mobilizes resident support for crime prevention.

City officials and neighborhood leaders credit the program with cleaning up the once-crime-ridden districts of Tillicum-Woodbrook and Ponders-Springbook over the past five years.

Police Chief Larry Saunders said the program now has four community service officers and three neighborhood police officers, each covering two districts – a staffing level that isn’t working well. One officer has transferred out of the program because of burnout, he said.

Neiditz said a fifth policing team could be added by the middle of next year by reducing the police overtime budget and by saving money through a change in how city prisoners are arraigned. They would be taken to Lakewood court instead of to the Pierce County jail in Tacoma.

A sixth team could be funded by mid-2008 by reducing 20 senior managers’ cost-of-living raises and scaling back their merit pay increases. Neiditz also proposed reducing merit pay hikes for about 155 nonunion staff members to help fund the teams.

The moves would generate more than $250,000 to fund the two new teams, according to city records.

While there’s support for neighborhood policing on the City Council, members appear split on Neiditz’s overall 2008 budget proposal.

Some are concerned about the rising cost of employee salaries and benefits. The city’s medical costs for 250 staff members are going up about 10 percent next year and salaries by 5.66 percent.

Councilman John Arbeeny said he wants to see what a 3 percent across-the-board cut in general operating funds would look like to help him determine if there are opportunities for cuts and cost shifts or to identify additional needs.

Neiditz said a 3 percent cut would reduce the $38 million general operating budget by $1.1 million and could result in service cuts that would anger the public.

That budget supports most Lakewood operations, including police, city manager and council, community development and parks.

A cut to the budget could also affect neighborhood policing.

Councilman Doug Richardson said there’s no groundswell on the council for across-the-board cuts. He said only three of seven council members want them – Arbeeny, Pad Finnigan and Ron Cronk.

David Anderson, president of the Tillicum-Woodbrook Neighborhood Association, said the new neighborhood police proposal is promising, but he and other residents still plan to attend a Monday budget hearing to tell the council to keep their neighborhood team.

Larry Woods, president of the Lake City Neighborhood Association, said he would be there, too, urging the council to fund all six teams.

“I glad they came up with a possible solution,” he said.

Rob Tucker: 253-597-8374

rob.tucker@thenewstribune.com

What: Lakewood City Council hearing on 2008 budget proposal

When: 7 p.m. Monday

Where: City Hall, 6000 Main St. S.W.