Police chief briefs committee on staffing pressures; committee approves fee increase and orders review
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Summary
Keizer’s police chief described staffing shortages and growing operating costs; the committee approved a 10% police service fee increase and asked staff to form a task force to study fee equity.
Chief Copeland told the Budget Committee that Keizer is grappling with staff recruitment and retention, noting multiple officers have left for higher pay elsewhere and that detectives carry caseloads of 12–20 active investigations. He outlined spending pressure areas for the department: personnel costs, dispatch (WVCC) contract increases, equipment (license-plate readers, drones, tasers with cloud subscriptions), vehicle rotation and uniform/duty gear.
Chief’s examples and staffing context: - Patrol officers reported they were behind on reports due to call volume; a patrol officer described being "down 15 reports" and then called back out to the field. - Several personnel positions remain vacant; the department has hired some new officers but has struggled to sustain full staffing. - The department highlighted discretionary programs under consideration (community education campaigns tied to opioid-settlement funds, BLAST Camp youth outreach) that depend on having discretionary personnel time.
Committee action on fees and funding: - The committee approved a 10% increase to the police service fee; the committee also directed staff to form a task force to study whether the fee distribution should be more closely tied to account type (impervious-area or otherwise) so that large commercial accounts pay proportionally more. Because the committee approved the FY2025–26 budget before the fee would take effect (Jan. 1, 2026), they authorized using contingency funds to hold the police department whole for FY2025–26 and asked that the task force report back with recommendations and an implementation timeline.
Quotes: - Chief Copeland: “We have 5 general detectives and each one of those detectives is carrying somewhere between 12 and 20 cases at any time.” - Chief Copeland: “We’re trying to be smarter with what we do… drones have been kind of a game changer.”
Next steps: creation of the police-fee task force (staff to propose membership and schedule) and staff to return with options for fee allocation by account type and revenue modeling to show the trade-offs between household impacts and commercial contributions.
