Wash. Bill Would Create $100M Grant for State Law Enforcement Hiring

OLYMPIA, WA — As the City of Spokane Valley struggles to adequately staff its police force for a rising population, Councilman Rod Higgins told members of the Senate Law and Justice committee that a proposed $100 million grant program to hire law enforcement personnel would be a "great start."

"However, we ask the Legislature to also please consider ways to help cities sustain reliable law enforcement funding, so we're not faced with service cuts or layoffs over the long term," Higgins said during testimony in Olympia Tuesday morning to support the proposal.

The Spokane Valley councilman was before the committee to testify in support of legislation to establish a state grant program to hire additional law enforcement, a proposal that has bipartisan support in the Legislature.

While months away from the end of session, legislation to support cities like Spokane Valley in hiring additional law enforcement has seen strong support in the early days of the legislative session. The bipartisan bill is sponsored by the chair and ranking members of the committee — Sens. Manka Dhingra, D- Redmond, and Jeff Holy, R- Cheney — and Gov. Bob Ferguson indicated in his inaugural address that the Legislature's final budget must include the proposal.

For Spokane Valley, the proposal could help ease the city's finances as it looks to boost its police department to match its rising population.

The city, Higgins said, has grown from around 85,000 in 2003 to 110,000 in 2025, with a study released last year indicating it would need 25 additional dedicated law enforcement officers, three shared law enforcement officers and two civilian positions.

Through federal funding, the city is currently hiring 10 additional officers, though Higgins said it remains "acutely understaffed for our growing community."

Nathan Olson, Ferguson's public safety policy adviser, testified in support of the legislation Tuesday and urged that the bill pass out of committee.

A former detective in the Spokane Police Department, Holy told the committee Tuesday that the grant would be "one step, one aspect of an integrated solution that we need to address here to re-establish interest, motivation for people to want to be law enforcement officers."

"I think this is a timely bill here, and I'm happy to present it," Holy said.

Speaking on behalf of the labor organization, the Washington Council of Police and Sheriffs, Jeff DeVere said funding more officers would boost response times for residents in need while easing officers' workload and stresses.

"We are also glad to hear the conversation that this is not viewed as just a one-time effort," DeVere said. "We are thousands of officers down. This is not going to be taken care of in a biennium."

James McMahan, policy director for the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, noted in testimony before the committee that Washington continues to rank last among every state in the country — and Washington, D.C. — in officers per capita, and has held the rank for 14 years.

"We're falling further and further behind," McMahan said. "We've never had a lower officers' per capita than we've had in our most recent year. We are continually going down."

According to McMahan, Washington would need to hire 1,370 additional law enforcement officers, more than double the size of the state's largest police force, to tie for 50th place.

"We are that far behind," McMahan said.

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