On hiatus while building the official site

Life happens, and freelancing is not paying the rent.

I believe there is potential in the form of journalism that I’ve started here, so while I’m looking for a regular paycheck I’m building a site to continue this experiment. It will be a labor of love in my off hours from a part-time, and probably unrelated job, but in time I hope to develop a business model that will let me focus on the reporting.

When the new site is in place I’ll post it so you can visit and participate.

-SSands

Final version of the budget cut story

I didn’t link to the final written article for this story as I said would. I ran into a dilemma I hadn’t anticipated. I don’t want to go into details but I learned a lesson and can put a safegard in place to prevent it in the future.

The article is a bit old now but still relevent. It concerns what may happen next year. So here I’m posting it as I had originally submitted it:

Law enforcement shrinks in shadow of budget deficit

Unincorporated areas expected to feel the brunt of the effects

 

“I’ve been a police officer for 28 years, Never in those 28 years have I seen an event that will so significantly change how the Sheriff’s Office responds to crime.”

-Sue Rahr

King County Sheriff

 

*By Scott Sands

 

2009 could be a good year for thieves in the unincorporated areas, like Highline, due to budget cuts that may force the Sheriff’s Department to eliminate investigations of property crimes in which less than $10,000 in goods are stolen.

 

“If you call 911, you’ll get a uniformed officer,” said Sgt. John Urquhart, spokesman for the King County Sheriff’s Office. The officer will conduct primary interviews, dust for prints, and write a report. Then, according to Urquhart, if the loss is less than $10,000 a robbery detective will file the report away and there will be no follow up.

 

If you’re not caught on the scene, or by some other means “you’re going to be home-free,” Urquhart said.

 

“The only people who would be more unhappy” with this than the Sheriff’s Department, Urquhart said, are those who will be burglarized.

 

With the cost of living outpacing revenue growth, King County has projected a $68 million deficit in the general fund making it impossible to continue to support county agencies at their current levels of service.

 

Collectively all of King County’s law enforcement agencies have been asked to make proposals for cutting $33 million from their budgets. Mandatory agencies are to make proposals for cutting 8.65 percent of their budgets, and discriminatory agencies, like Parks and Recreation, and Health and Human Services have been asked to cut one-third of their portions of the general fund.

 

Representatives of the Sheriff’s office have stated they may have to cut up to 75 positions, including staff and officers in order to reduce their budget by $10 million.

 

This would lead to the reduction in investigations of property crimes. There could also be fewer investigations of identity theft, fraud, and bad checks. There could be cuts in homicide detectives, and special case detectives to investigate child abuse and sex crimes.

 

The Sheriff has also proposed eliminating cold case investigations. These are cases that are reactivated after 10, 15, or 30 years. Urquhart explained that a case can be looked at with new eyes, new detectives, and new science. These investigations, Urquhart said, “are very effective, primarily due to the advances of science.”

 

In addition, according to Sheriff Sue Rahr, “Certain drug investigations, police storefronts, youth and crime victim outreach programs will all be in jeopardy.”

 

“When you have a limited amount of funds you have to prioritize what you do,” Urquhart said.

 

“I’ve been a police officer for 28 years,” Rahr said at a June 6 press conference. “Never in those 28 years have I seen an event that will so significantly change how the Sheriff’s Office responds to crime.”

 

While unincorporated areas are expected to feel the brunt of the effects, cities like Burien and SeaTac, which contract their police services from the county won’t be directly affected.

 

“It doesn’t have an affect on our contract,” said Burien Police Chief Scott Kimerer. “We’ve been told that there are no staffing cuts that would affect our service.”

 

It is, however, possible there will be less police back-up out of unincorporated areas, into cities. “We could see some impact in response time,” said SeaTac Police Captain Rob Mendel.

 

But, into the unincorporated areas, short of an emergency call where back-up is needed, the officers of SeaTac and Burien are dedicated to their respective cities. Mendel said, “We don’t pull resources out of the city.”