The Pierce County Council targeted burglary, stolen cars, identity theft and other crimes Tuesday by passing a 2012 budget with more positions for the Sheriff’s Department.
The council paid for two detectives to combat burglaries and car thefts and added two deputies to the gang unit.
It also funded two half-time positions to verify that sex offenders are registered and to combat fraud and identity theft.
While the council added five full-time equivalent sheriff’s department jobs, it took away two others – an unfilled detective slot and a community service officer. The department has around 260 deputies and detectives.
The seven-member council unanimously approved a total budget of $801.5 million for next year, including about $273.6 million for core government services.
All told, the 2012 budget will add some jobs and cut others for a reduction of 23 positions in the general fund.
The budget has no cost-of-living raises. Thirteen of the county’s 20 bargaining units have agreed to go without them next year. Negotiations are continuing with the other units.
The spending plan includes several fee hikes, such as sewer rates for single-family residences that will go up 10.6 percent.
The added sheriff’s positions boosted that department by $615,000. The council also shuffled $60,000 in County Executive Pat McCarthy’s budget for services to reduce crimes against children and youth.
County Council Chairman Roger Bush said public safety comes first.
“We are actually beefing up our criminal justice system in Pierce County,” Bush said. “We are putting troops on the ground.”
Even so, the council reduced Pierce County Juvenile Court’s budget of $19.8 million by $500,000. The council cut seven detention officers at court-supervised Remann Hall.
A recent audit revealed the annual cost of housing a youth at the county’s juvenile detention facility has skyrocketed by more than a factor of four over the past 11 years. The council directed the court to carry out the recommendations of the audit, including contracting out food service and consolidating cell units.
The council made several changes to McCarthy’s proposed budget. She projected cutting 46 full-time equivalent positions next year. The council ended up cutting half that number from the general fund.
The cuts pale in comparison to three years ago, when the county cut 97 positions as the recession started eroding tax revenues.
The council’s overall budget for 2012 includes more money for road projects, jail debt service and pass-through money from the United States Golf Association for changes to Chambers Bay Golf Course to prepare for the 2015 U.S. Open.
The total 2012 budget is nearly the same as this year’s budget of $802 million. The general fund goes up from $271.4 million to $273.6 million, an increase of less than 1 percent.
The general fund gets the most attention because it pays for services that are discretionary but also highly visible, such as sheriff’s deputies.
The council approved a variety of fee increases as proposed by McCarthy.
Sewer rates for an estimated 252,000 people in unincorporated Pierce County and cities served by the county will go up by $3.64 a month, to $37.83 in 2012. The rates will increase again to $41.86 in 2013. Rates for multifamily units and businesses also will rise.
The increases are the last of four years of planned rate hikes to pay for expansion of the Chambers Creek Regional Wastewater Treatment Plant.
Council members Tim Farrell and Stan Flemming proposed spreading them over the next four years to lessen the impact on residents hurting from the economy. But doing that would have resulted in sewer rates by 2015 that would have been nearly $1 more than under McCarthy’s proposal.
The council approved increasing the annual stormwater management fee for single-family residences from $103.17 to $108.39. It also increased a variety of Planning and Land Services fees, including a 4 percent hike in building permit fees.
Other increases include higher green fees for Lake Spanaway and Fort Steilacoom golf courses and hikes in fares for ferry service between Steilacoom, Anderson Island and Ketron Island.
Steve Maynard: 253-597-8647 stevemaynard@ thenewstribune.com blog.thenewstribune. com/polibuzz
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