By Harry Gatjens
After a long discussion Tuesday evening, the Edmonds City Council approved a new police services contract with the City of Woodway. The contract nearly triples the price Woodway pays, to a minimum of $36,000 each year. The contract changes billing from a “per call” basis to a new monthly base, with incremental charges for more than 10 calls in any single month.
Council President Strom Peterson negotiated the contract with Woodway officials for the past several months. Peterson was joined in voting yes by Councilmembers Diane Buckshnis, Kristiana Johnson and Frank Yamamoto, who is recovering from heart surgery and called in on speakerphone to cast the deciding vote.
Councilmembers Lora Petso, Adrienne Fraley-Monillas and Joan Bloom voted against the contract. Concern was expressed that Edmonds taxpayers were subsidizing Woodway residents.
Farmer’s Market on Wednesday evenings approved
The Council voted to approve an ordinance allowing for a “produce only” Farmer’s Market on Wednesday evenings for the next several months, and instructed city staff to work on a more complete ordinance and code for long-term, year-round markets. The motion carried unanimously.
Regional Fire Authority study passes
Also passing unanimously was a motion to sign an interlocal agreement to continue exploration of a Regional Fire Authority (RFA). This did not commit the city to a long-term decision on the RFA, but did authorize the city to participate in the hiring of an independent consultant to verify the work of the group studying the idea. The City’s financial commitment is limited to $2,750 for the study.
Updates given on budget schedule, Hearing Examiner caseload, and pavement “Chip Seal”
The council was updated on the upcoming budget schedule, a report from the Hearing Examiner on the cases he has overseen this past year, and a presentation on using “chip seal” technology for pavement repair.
Note-taking pulled from agenda
A discussion on taking notes during executive session was pulled from the agenda for more clarification at a later meeting. In the past, the issue has generated robust discussion.
Compensation for non-represented employees tabled
A discussion on compensation for non-represented employees was tabled as the meeting approached 11 p.m.
Its great that we have 4 senseless council members! They just allowed Woodway to have police services from Edmond’s 16 hours a day, everyday for $36,000. To me that seems like highway robbery! That cant even cover the cost of one police officer! When our city is facing a massive deficit for 2013, this doesn’t seem right.
I have studied the proposed agreement for providing police services to Woodway, the Edmonds Police 2011 Annual Report, as well as Chief Compaan’s 2012 budget, and have learned the following:
1) The police responded to 30,413 incidents in 2011.
2) Police responded to 22,018 incidents with traffic stops removed. Calls to Woodway are included in the 22,018.
3) The Police budget for 2012 is $9.5 million.
4) Assume the number of non-traffic incidents in 2012 to be the same as in 2011.
5) Apply 100% of the department’s expenses to the 22,018 incidents; $9,500,000/22,018 equals $431 per incident.
6) The proposed charge to Woodway is $3,000 per month for a maximum of 10 calls per month; historically there have been 7 or 8 calls per month. There will be an extra charge for calls in excess of 10.
7) $431 x 10 calls/month to Woodway equals $4,310/month. It seems like the proposed charge of $3,000/month is appropriate, since Edmonds Police are not patrolling Woodway to do crime prevention, or doing any parking enforcement, etc.
8) The Woodway calls represent only 15% of one police officer’s time.
Chief Compaan has said that his department’s expenses will not be diminished if there’s no contract with Woodway. However, with no contract the city would lose $36,000 in revenue.
Council President Peterson and Councilmembers Buckshnis, Johnson and Yamamoto, in voting for the Woodway contract, clearly made a prudent business decision that benefits Edmonds taxpayers.
Thanks Ron for all the good information. Your discussion is basically a fully allocated cost model that accounts for all costs allocated on a per call basis. Another way to look at this deal is on a marginal cost model. If Woodway uses 15% of an officer and if an officer is $100k then the cost would be $15k (100x.15%) So $36k as a base price more than covers our marginal cost. This is a big improvement from what we were charging in the past.
Woodway has an interesting model for a town. They subcontract many services, they use the business districts of the neighbor cities and as a result they keep the cost of government low.
Not sure of the following but I think they do not pay a tax to support SnoIsle Library but they can use several of the library services without cost. So if the council members who are concerned about Edmonds subsidizing Woodway they could look at the financial issues of how we pay for library services. Likely they would find that the Edmonds taxpayers are not only subsidizing Woodway but we are also subsidizing other communities as well.
Darrol is correct that Edmonds subsidizes some of the cities in the Sno-Isle library district. We pay taxes per thousabd dollars of house value. People with more expensive homes pay more than those in less expensive homes. the small city of Woodway has turned down being part of Sno-Isle. The voters apparently decided they could buy a lot of books for the cost. Anyone including Woodway residents may use the library, but they cannot check out books.
SnoIsle has not
I’ll continue my Sno-Isle Library comment. My computer would not let me finish and correct my typos. Sno-Isle Library District has not made a policy for Woodway residents (and others?) to pay for a library card. If they did, it would probably be quite expensive.
Barbara, It is not you computer that does spell check and other functions. When you are on this site it looks like the controls at the site are in control of some functions. If you want to be sure about spelling and other fuctions a way to do that is create you comments off line in WORD or some other application and then cut and past it to the site.
When we paid for the library out of the General Fund the cost was about $1m. When we converted to paying for the library with a special tax. We left the $1m in the GF and the tax we now pay is $3m. As property values grow the $3m will grow proportionally.
With 40,000 people in Edmonds we each are paying an average of $75 a year for the liabrary. So if we were to charge Woodway or anyone else to uses the liabrary their fair share it would be around $75 per year. For that they would get free computers, books, newspapers, a climate controlled room and a place to sit, and a restroom. Some of these services compete with the private sector and while that may be good they compete. This discussion is about Woodway and police services and subsidies. The whole discussion about what is subsidized and not is important as we look to the future but I will stop with that discussion just to keep this a bit more on track. Bottom line is Woodway has a different model for its citizens than Edmonds. Their cost are likely lower as a result.