KING COUNTY, Wash. — Budget cuts are forcing the King County Sheriff’s Office to reduce staffing at some precincts. The department says deputies will not provide regular coverage to some unincorporated areas of the county.
This includes the affected communities of Redmond Ridge, Fairwood, Fall City, and other areas.
Undersheriff Jesse Anderson told KIRO 7 that the department is forecasted to be over budget so they are taking steps now to move some of the resources to help cut back.
“We want to be there,” Anderson told KIRO 7. “This hurts us to say, ‘Sorry we can’t respond.’ But we’re there for you. If you need a police officer because of the situation you’re in whether it’s a domestic violence incident or somebody’s breaking into your home, we will be there.”
Anderson told KIRO 7 that there are currently six deputies deployed per shift for the northeast precinct. The cuts mean there will be one less deputy at any given time. The southeast portion of the county typically has eight deputies on shift at any given time. That number will be reduced to seven.
KIRO 7 spoke to residents in Fall City, who expressed some concern about how these cuts could impact response times.
“We need protection,” said Carol Gunderson.“It’s terrifying. I mean, we’ve had a couple of incidents and it just seemed like it took forever.”
Anderson told KIRO 7 that scaling back to accommodate the budget is tricky because three-quarters of the department’s budget is made up of salaries.
“It’s not like you can save on buying cheaper pens or paper or something like that. These are real people out there and we have to make tough decisions to preserve that budget,” he told KIRO 7.
He said this initial move is an overtime savings and that this is the first phase of potential cuts.
“My hope is that we don’t have to continue down the road of additional changes but that is going to be dependent on our budget situation,” Anderson said.
Anderson told KIRO 7 that the department plans to practice alternative call handling, which means low-level crimes like larceny, mail thefts, minor disturbances, and drug complaints will be diverted to online reporting. You can report those incidents here.
King County Sheriff’s Office will also stop responding to non-injury, non-blocking crashes. Instead, drivers will need to exchange insurance and contact information and report the crash online to the Washington State Patrol.
Anderson said the department will still be responding to calls where someone’s life or safety is in jeopardy.
“Those are priorities. We need to be there, the public expects us to be there,” Anderson told KIRO 7. “We like to be at every call and this is really tough for us because we like to have that community member contact, not reporting through an online system. We like to be there in person to investigate the scene, hear them out, offer sympathy for what they’ve been through.”
The move won’t impact the department’s contracts. Anderson told KIRO 7 that 55 percent of what they do is contract work with cities, transit, tribal, airports, and more.
At a recent King County council meeting the King County Sheriff warned something like this would happen if county officials could not fill the budget gap.
During that meeting, some King County officials hoped an increased sales tax passed at the state level could do that, but there are no guarantees.
Carol Gunderson is certain she and her neighbors will miss the presence of deputies.
“What are we going to do? We need them,” She told KIRO 7. “We get some cuckoos around here and we need protection.”
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