Auburn to hire five more police officers

Published 2:47 pm Wednesday, August 7, 2013

The City of Auburn will soon augment its police force with five new full-time officers, bringing the number from 100 to 105.

Monday’s Auburn City Council decision was the product of lengthy negotiations between City officials and union representatives of the collective bargaining units representing the police.

A sticking point of the negotiations had been staff overtime and work levels. In the end, both sides agreed that increasing the number of officers would improve the situation.

“This is … the first time we’ve had a significant increase in our police force since 2008, and it’s because of the work of a good number of people in the City that we are able to increase that number,” said Deputy Mayor Nancy Backus.

Backus and fellow councilmembers Rich Wagner and Bill Peloza worked closely with staff of Auburn Police Chief Bob Lee, Finance Director Shelley Coleman, and Human Resources Director Brenda Heineman for almost a year to bring the City to Monday’s budget amendment.

The City found the $258,430 it will need for those hires by amending its 2013-2014 biennial budget ordinance.

Mayor Pete Lewis said Auburn had also been set by the end of 2013 to lose five grant-funded police officers, but thanks to a recently-awarded grant, it gets to keep them.

“We were worried about going from 100 officers to 95, but we got in on the grant so that we could ask for these five grant-funded officers to be retained,” Lewis said. “In addition, this gives us an authorization for an additional five officers we can look for right now. And we can look for laterals to bring ourselves up.

“Our officers worked so hard, this is everything,” Lewis added. “Not only are the citizens going to see a result, but our officers are going to see the increased support by their City, City Council and citizens.”