Ridgefield staff outline HB 2015 grant, 0.1% councilmanic public-safety sales tax; ordinance headed to council

Ridgefield city staff on Monday outlined how House Bill 2015 would let the city seek state grant funding for new officers and co‑responders and separately adopt a 0.1% councilmanic public‑safety sales tax to support local criminal‑justice needs.

Mr. Johnson, a city staff presenter, said the bill creates a three‑year grant program administered by the Criminal Justice Training Commission (CJTC) and the option for cities to adopt a 0.1% local public‑safety sales tax. "For every $100 in sales, the city would receive 10 cents back," he said, noting that the tax is permanent once enacted and that applications for the state grant are expected to open by the end of the year.

The grant, Mr. Johnson said, is expected to be a statewide pool of roughly $100 million, will cover up to 75% of salary and benefits for eligible new positions and caps assistance at $125,000 per position over the grant period. He emphasized that, under the state program as explained to staff, grantees must either already receive a public‑safety sales tax or adopt one to qualify; Ridgefield currently receives a portion of Clark County’s public‑safety tax and therefore meets that condition.

Chief (the police chief) walked council through the program’s certification requirements, saying Ridgefield is largely compliant or near compliance on most items and will submit policies and data to CJTC for certification. She described planned policy work with Lexipol (city policy vendor), crisis‑intervention training already completed by several officers, and scheduling for required gender‑based‑violence training for the department’s detective and lieutenant. The chief also explained new use‑of‑force reporting obligations to the state WADEPs system, and said Ridgefield must submit required use‑of‑force data in the program’s first reporting window (staff indicated an October 1–6 submission window).

Councilors asked about limits and tradeoffs. Staff said the state grant cannot be used to pay for lateral hires (it must fund new positions), while some federal programs such as the COPS grant can be used for laterals but impose other constraints; the city is seeking clarification on how federal and state grants can be stacked. City staff estimated an initial first‑year revenue yield for a 0.1% local tax in the low hundreds of thousands (initial internal estimate cited about $442,000) and noted a typical two‑month collection lag from point of sale to city receipt.

On performance metrics staff offered numbers the city will use for certification: a 12‑month average response time for priority one–three calls of 7 minutes, 17 seconds, and a case‑closure rate reported at roughly 46.15% (described as among the county’s highest). Staff also outlined budget impacts, saying public‑safety costs rose roughly 20% over two years (about $811,000) and judicial expenses rose 23% (about $47,500), and argued the sales tax can spread costs across visitors and shoppers and reduce pressure on property tax revenues.

Council did not adopt the tax at the session. Instead, after discussion the mayor and councilors signaled support to put an ordinance on next week’s agenda for first reading so the public process can begin; staff said the ordinance has been noticed and prepared. Staff also said they will return to council to request formal authorization to submit grant applications when the CJTC application opens and to present budget options that would tie any new officer FTEs to identified funding sources.

The next steps are procedural: staff will file the ordinance for first reading at the next council meeting as noticed, submit materials to CJTC for pre‑certification, and return to council with a funding and hiring table showing stacked grant/tax scenarios and budget implications. The council did not take a recorded formal vote on adoption during the study session.