Lewis County revives Law and Justice Council to consider public safety tax
Lewis County will reconvene a long abandoned Law and Justice Council that will include more than 20 members, including the Washington state Department of Corrections Secretary Tim Lang.
The Lewis County Board of Commissioners approved the appointment of all 24 members to the county's new Law and Justice Council on Tuesday morning during its weekly business meeting. The resolution passed to appoint the members commissioned the council to consider the needs of the local justice system and more specifically consider the "pros and cons" of enacting a public safety tax.
The council will include familiar faces. Former Grays Harbor County Commissioner Vickie Raines will have a seat on the council as part of her new gig with regional behavioral health agency Community Integrated Health Services.
Raines recently resigned from her seat on the Grays Harbor County Board of Commissioners and stepped down from positions on flood and fish committees with the Chehalis Basin Board and the Chehalis Basin Flood Authority.
The council will include multiple members of the Lewis County government and the Lewis County Sheriff's Office, including both Commissioner Lindsey Pollock and Sheriff Rob Snaza.
Centralia and Chehalis Police Chiefs Andy Caldwell and Randy Kaut will serve on the commission. Chehalis will benefit from a bit of extra representation with Chehalis City Council member and Mayor Pro Tem Kate McDougall also serving.
Napavine appears to be the only small city government with a representative on the council, with Duane Crouse receiving an appointment. It's not for lack of trying, as commission members solicited appointments from city mayors earlier in the month at a recent Lewis County mayors meeting.
The resolution appointed the new members for four-year terms.
According to the resolution passed by the commissioners, it is the first time new members have been appointed to the Lewis County Law and Justice Council since 2010. Before passage, Clerk of the Board Rieva Lester stated that the council was originally established "quite some time ago."
"(It) had been dormant for a long time," Lester said. "This would revive that council and fill those 24 positions."
Lester added that the members would set the council's meeting schedule and calendar at a later date.
County code requires a law and justice council to include at minimum two police chiefs from cities within Lewis County with at least one coming from either the Centralia or Chehalis police departments. The county requires two members of the county bar association to sit on the council. Both are expected to be public defense attorneys, including one contracted by Lewis County and another contracted by another local government.
Finally, the county requires representation from some of the county's cities, including at least one prosecuting attorney, one representative of a municipal court in the county and two members of a city council within the county with at least one representing either the Centralia or Chehalis city councils.
The state of Washington permits counties and cities to pass local sales tax levies to fund public safety. County governments can levy a 0.3% tax on eligible sales in their jurisdiction. City governments can do the same but are capped at a 0.1% tax on eligible local sales.
Similar taxes have received support recently in neighboring areas. Thurston County notably passed a public safety tax back in 2023 to levy a 0.2% sales tax on eligible sales in the area.
The topic of a Lewis County public safety tax came up earlier this year as the county seeks to deliver new revenue sources. The county is also considering allowing the sale of cannabis in unincorporated areas of the county.
The public safety tax has been a long discussed option in Lewis County as a way to provide steady funding for law enforcement and the local justice system.
It's also seen as a way to reduce the reliance of public safety on funding from the county's roads fund. This year, the county will send just under $1.5 million from its roads fund to public safety accounts through a reimbursement process to pay for traffic policing. This as the county struggles to keep up with maintenance on its roads, not to mention its many aging bridges.
Nineteen counties in Washington have some form of the tax.
To impose a public safety sales tax, Lewis County would have to put the issue on the ballot to be approved by voters in the area on either a primary or general election ballot.
A county budget official said earlier this year that if the county passed a public safety tax with the maximum rate, it could generate as much as $6.9 million, with 60% going to the county and 40% going to cities, per Washington state law.
For previous reporting by the Chronicle on a possible public safety tax in Lewis County, visit https://tinyurl.com/yb9wnjc8.
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