The Police Department is the City's Biggest Budget Item: What Are They Using the Money For?

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Photo from the Port Townsend Police Department Strategic Plan  [/caption]

News by Scott France

Port Townsend's high level of community engagement and civic discourse seems to give disproportionately little attention to the department that garners more funding than any other City department: its police.

“It is very typical for the police department to be the largest part of a city’s general fund budget,” said Jodi Adams, Finance Director for Port Townsend.

So what are Port Townsend citizens getting for the money? The Beacon looked into that question: the Port Townsend Police Department’s (PTPD) mission, operations, challenges, aspirations, and place in the community as envisioned by its chief, Thomas Olson.

PTPD officers respond to a wide range of incident types, according to Olson, “ranging from  giving somebody directions to get someplace, to being the first on scene to a medical aid call, giving CPR to save a life.”

Navigating Mental Health Service Calls

A theme of department service calls that has been increasing in the last few years, according to Olson, is a mental health element.  “We have a lot of mental health-related calls,” Olson said.

To assist officers with such calls, the PTPD has on staff a master-level-qualified mental health therapist, a Navigator, who is available if officers deem it necessary.

Olson said that the Navigator saves responding officers a lot of time. “For example, say someone is screaming in the park, we go there, de-escalate and there’s no crime, but clearly this person needs services. Normally, officers would need to wait there until someone arrives. Now, we can bring in [a Navigator], and he can determine where they need to go based on what he diagnoses in the field, whether it’s mental health, whether it’s substance use. He’ll make those phone calls, and either take them there or wait for the service provider to arrive.”

“That position is really important to us,” Olson said.

In 2024, the department received 8,921 calls for service, of which 134 fell into a group of serious offenses, including aggravated assault, burglary, robbery and sexual assaults. A second, less serious group of offenses, including disorderly conduct, liquor law violations such as DUIs, and some traffic offenses, comprised just 44 of the calls for service. Officers have made a total of 1,259 traffic stops during the year.

Need a Job?

Olson said his biggest challenge in the job since joining as chief in 2021 has been recruiting and retaining staff.

“People aren’t coming to Port Townsend to look for a police job,” he said, “We have to go out and find them and recruit people who want to be here. We’re battling every other police and sheriff's department here on the peninsula for staffing.”

The department currently has 17 staff, and Olson believes that a staff of 20 will meet the needs that he has outlined in the department's strategic plan. A key specific area that lacks sufficient resources is related to proactive policing, which Olson believes will reduce crime.

Community Connection Lays a Path for Reducing Crime

Property crimes and domestic violence are the most frequent felony crimes that the department encounters, Olson said.

“If we’re responding to calls, we are not being proactive, " Olson said, “The only way we will reduce crime is to proactively police. We do that by looking at data about where and when crime occurs, and proactively address it. That’s the only way to reduce crime. If we don’t have enough officers to be proactive, and only respond to calls, we’re never going to get there.”

Olson said the department plans to assign officers to specific city sectors or neighborhoods to encourage community policing with residents and businesses. This will enable them to learn more about the neighborhood, especially as it relates to criminal activity. Olsen says that the approach should deter crime in the long run.

“Because it is a project that will take a fair amount of time and effort, I want to make sure we have key personnel in place and no other major projects in the works,” Olson said, “I would like to start this project by mid-2026, right after we are awarded our accreditation.”

Another initiative that Olsen says leads to better outcomes for offenders is participation in the Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) program, managed by a Port Townsend organization called Believe in Recovery.

Offenders of minor crimes with a substance use component can qualify for the program if they are willing to get services and counseling. With a sign-off from the County prosecutor's office, the offender has the opportunity to avoid criminal charges as long as they stay in the program.

“It is often those challenges that are causing them to commit these minor and low-level crimes,” Olson said, “So if we can get them in a program to stop that, it benefits the community, to us and our time, and certainly to them.”

Olson said that 71 people have been admitted into the LEAD program in the year or so since the PTPD has participated in the LEAD program through referrals by PTPD.

ICE: to Collaborate or Not?

Olson would not give specifics on how his department would respond to possible requests by the federal Immigration, Customs and Enforcement (ICE) department that is currently using highly aggressive and often illegal methods to enforce immigration laws, “because every situation will be different and require a situational response.”

Olson’s PTPD Strategic Plan, however, lists a number of restrictions on what it will do on behalf of ICE, including that it will not:

• Inquire into or collect information about an individual's immigration or citizenship status, or place of birth, unless under criminal investigation.
• Provide information to federal immigration authorities for a non–criminal matter, except as required by law.
• It will not detain individuals solely for the purpose of determining their immigration status.

This language could be significant for individuals, especially as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) ramps up efforts to use funding from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, passed earlier this year, to reimburse local law enforcement agencies that partner with ICE when the department’s officer staffing is insufficient. It is particularly targeting rural Police Departments that are understaffed, a profile resembling that of PTPD.

Olson said that he would like funding to provide training in the area of tactical response, for example, in potential suicide or hostage situations, or when a suspect is barricaded, and for task force operations, which tend to be the realm of major drug investigations. Such incidents are rare for the PTPD, and some assistance is often available from other law-enforcement agencies, but Olson said it’s good to have the departmental capacity when the need arises.