Some Pierce County residents want more sheriff’s deputies. What would that take?
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Pierce County set $406M for sheriff’s office in their 2026-2027 biennial budget.
- The council expects to make changes after the deputy guild contract is finalized.
- The sheriff’s office is responsible for allocating deputies across the county.
What would it take to have more sheriff’s deputies in Pierce County? The agency has faced staffing shortages for years, and some residents are asking.
Momentum has been growing among Key Peninsula residents, in particular, concerned about the county’s police force. Pierce County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Carly Cappetto reported Dec. 15 that the agency has 40 vacancies on the law enforcement side. The most recent county budget funded 229 deputies total, The News Tribune reported in May.
While the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office has battled deputy shortages for years, negotiations between Pierce County Executive Ryan Mello’s office and the deputies’ guild have put a spotlight on how much deputies are paid and the department’s ability to remain competitive with other agencies vying for the same pool of candidates.
Council members unanimously approved $5,000 retention bonus payments for eligible deputies at their meeting Dec. 2.
“I will tell you right now that I left the career early because of the lack of support that I saw from the state and from you guys, to be honest,” Rich Folden, a retired detective who spent 25 years with the sheriff’s office, told the county council during public comment at a meeting Nov. 25.
Pointing to the departure of deputies to join other agencies like the Tacoma Police Department, Folden accused the council of failing to act to retain experienced employees.
“We’ve paid millions of dollars to train them, and the experience that we’ve let walk out the door, it is beyond comprehension,” Folden said. “Everyone knows the money is there.”
Several others spoke at the meeting Nov. 25, expressing fear and anger and accusing the council of prioritizing other projects over public safety. Along with over 200 people who submitted comments in writing, speakers urged the council to reject the proposed biennial budget for 2026-2027 until it included more funding for the sheriff’s office.
Council members Rosie Ayala, Bryan Yambe, Jani Hitchen and Robyn Denson voted to pass the budget Nov. 25, while Council members Dave Morell, Paul Herrera and Amy Cruver voted against it.
During council discussion, several council members emphasized their commitment to public safety, while a few including Yambe, Denson and Hitchen stressed that the council needed to wait for the finalizing of the deputies’ contract before updating the budget to cover the increased costs expected from that contract.
Washington state ranks at the bottom of all 50 states and the District of Columbia for officers per capita, according to a July press release from the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs.
The WASPC annual crime report for 2024 showed that Pierce County had 0.64 commissioned officers per 1,000 residents, one of the lowest ratios for all county law enforcement agencies in Washington state. The Clark County Sheriff’s Office and the Island County Sheriff’s Office fell just below that at 0.60 and 0.62 officers per 1,000 residents, respectively.
The 2026-2027 budget for Pierce County shows that the actual ratio of officers per 1,000 residents for 2024 was 0.54.
The average in Washington state is 1.38 police officers per 1,000 residents, and the national average is 2.31 officers per 1,000 residents, the WASPC release said.
The News Tribune has reported on the long-standing staffing shortages at the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office. The shortages have drawn heightened attention in recent months while the county executive hashes out a new contract with the deputy sheriff’s guild, heading to arbitration next year.
Meanwhile, the Tacoma Police Department recently offered $50,000 signing bonuses to experienced in-state hires. The News Tribune reported that nine of 14 hires highlighted in a Tacoma Police Department Facebook post Sept. 30 came from the sheriff’s office.
What is the county council’s role?
Council member Robyn Denson, whose district includes the Key Peninsula, represents many of those who spoke at the Nov. 25 meeting.
“A lot of these folks here are from my district, so thank you for taking the time to come out,” she told them.
In a Facebook post Dec. 5, Denson addressed what she described as “recent Facebook discussions about issues that fall outside (her) authority as a Councilmember.”
She explained that the county council’s role in determining deputy pay is limited to ratifying the contract between the county executive branch and the deputy sheriff’s guild, and “adjust(ing) the budget to match the negotiated wages and benefits.” She encouraged residents to reach out to the Pierce County executive to share their views on the negotiations.
In a phone call with The News Tribune, Denson said she’s advocated for more deputies to serve her district in the past but was told no.
“ ... the answer was, all of the districts want that, and the sheriff really needs the ability to move people where he feels they are most needed,” she said to The News Tribune. “But every time that our sheriff’s office comes to talk, I talk about the geographic challenges of my district, the waterways, you can’t get from A to B in a straight line ... . So I have always said that we need more deputies.
“And of course, we all want deputies to be competitively paid and we need to be competitive with other competing jurisdictions. We certainly want the best deputies here in Pierce County, and we want them to be able to live in Pierce County and raise their families here and be involved in the community and all of that.”
She continued on to say that the council will look at the budget again after county and deputy sheriff’s guild finalize their contract. She expects the county will receive a “big bill” to pay for the wages, benefits and “anything else that they bargain,” and back pay for the time since January they’ve been working without an active contract, she told The News Tribune.
Mello was scheduled to sign the biennial budget on Dec. 16. A press conference was canceled due to ongoing severe weather. Making changes to the adopted budget requires a supplemental budget, Denson explained. She said she anticipates the county executive to propose a supplemental budget after the contract is finalized, taking “the first stab” at how to shift funding around in the budget and cover the increased costs in the contract.
Pierce County is working to avoid a future budget deficit as costs outpace revenue growth, The News Tribune reported in November. The funds for the $5,000 retention bonuses that the council approved to allocate for deputies — a total of $1.5 million — came out of the county’s fund balance, which is their rainy day fund.
Denson said the county dipped into their fund balance during the last biennial budget as well. The county needs to save as much as possible so that they’re prepared to make the adjustments required by the new contract, she said.
Besides the fund balance, the county could also look at using money from “vacancy savings,” which are savings that accumulate from positions that are funded in the budget but currently unfilled, said Denson. Denson told The News Tribune the agency has about 44 vacancies
“And then we’re going to have to potentially look at the entire county budget beyond the sheriff’s office, and figure out ... what do we need to cut to be able to pay our officers?” Denson said.
While it’s up to the council to ratify the contract and make adjustments to the budget, the sheriff’s office decides where to station deputies throughout the county. The News Tribune has reported that the county’s urban areas, covered by the Central Patrol division, tend to have more deputies on duty than in the rural areas to match the higher calls for service.
How much does the current budget invest in the sheriff’s office?
Denson said that the 2026-2027 biennial budget includes over $406 million for the sheriff’s office.
The total 2026-2027 budget is $3.5 billion, according to the county website. A news release said that the budget includes a “$26 million increase for the Sheriff’s Office to strengthen staffing, training, wellness, and incentive programs designed to recruit, retain, and support deputies.”
The sheriff’s office requested funding for a variety of needs such as replacing expired bulletproof helmets, raising pay for their SWAT Special Team and increasing overtime for several emphasis patrols, according to a presentation to the county council Oct. 8 by Pierce County Undersheriff Cyndie Fajardo.
The department also requested $190,000 for “law enforcement obligated hiring incentives” and $37,500 for “marketing and recruiting services to fill vacant positions.”
County council members requested the county executive’s office explore a public safety sales tax that could be authorized under House Bill 2015. The undersheriff was at the council’s Public Safety Committee meeting Dec. 8 to answer questions about how the tax program could apply to the sheriff’s office, including for hiring incentives and covering new hires’ moving expenses.
Even with more funding, it’s not clear when or how that could translate into more positions for the sheriff’s office.
“What we need to do is increase staffing countywide, and ... that does not necessarily mean increasing the numbers of positions funded,” Denson said. “We can have that discussion at some point. We need to fill the positions we have now, because we have so many vacant, and if we even get close to filling those positions, then we can talk about, OK, can we afford to add more, which would be great. But we’re a ways away from that happening.”
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include the date of a meeting where the county council learned more about a potential public safety sales tax that could be authorized under House Bill 2015.
This story was originally published December 16, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
