Porterville committee approves quarterly reports and forwards proposed Measure H, I budgets to council

The Porterville Measure H/I Oversight Committee on an unspecified date reviewed fourth-quarter spending and the proposed budgets for the 2025–26 fiscal year for Measure H and Measure I, heard department updates on police equipment purchases, fire training and station projects, and approved the committee reports to forward to city council.

Committee members and staff said the police department incurred several one-time and recurring costs during the fourth quarter, including a portion of a Lumen Flex payment and a scheduled Axon equipment payment for body cameras, in-car systems, drones and cloud storage. Police staff said the Axon payment recorded in the quarter was about $272,000, of which roughly $40,000 was charged to Measure H and about $231,000 to Measure I. The department also reported expanding its SWAT unit to 20 personnel from 12 and adding covert equipment with a small fourth-quarter charge described as “about $8–9.”

“Axon covers our body cameras, the software, the drones, our fleet and car camera system, taser equipment, and our cloud-based storage,” Police Captain Josh Menas said while describing the line items. Menas also said the department had begun upgrades to the…