News

County presents police budget

By Scott Wagar

11/29/2011

With the city and county’s police committee members at a stalemate with their joint police contract, and four members of the city’s leadership writing a letter to the editor on Nov. 22 stating the city of Bottineau finances 62 percent of the police contract, the Bottineau County Commissioners have come forward with their budget figures to show just how much each entity is financing in the contract for policing.

Over the past couple of months, the city’s police committee (made up of Chairman Troy Marsden, Brad Gangl and Jeff Hall) has been claiming the city is funding 62 percent of the budget. However, the county disagrees with the city’s statement.   

“They do not pay 62 percent of the budget. When we did our budget this year it came out at 236,000 for the city’s part of the police contract, which is 33 percent of the total budget,” stated Commissioner Jeff Beyer, one of the representatives of Bottineau County’s police committee. “Bottineau’s population is a third of the county, or 33 percent. From our stand point, they have one-third of the population and are paying one-third of the bill. That’s as fair as we can make it when it comes to being fair.”

Beyer also added that when the county commissioners saw the financial figures from the city’s police committee, they had no clear way of understanding how the city came up with their finance numbers.

“The county has no way to argue the city’s numbers because we seriously do not know how they came up with those numbers,” Beyer said. “So, the county feels we have to deal with the facts, which is 33 percent.”

Lisa Herbel, the auditor of Bottineau County, presented the Bottineau Courant with the figures the county has for the joint police contract, which show that the city does pay one-third of the police contract, not 60 percent.

“The entire sheriff’s budget for this next year is $792,858. The city’s part has been figured out at $236,000 for 2012,” Herbel said. “If you take the city’s valuation of $4,149,501 and multiple it by $236,122 and divide it by the county’s valuation of 38,711,623 the city’s county tax portion comes to $25,309.

“If you take the $236,122 that’s coming from the city’s levy, than add the $25,309 from what the city’s levy in county taxes that equals 261,432, which is 33 percent of the entire police budget,” Herbel continued to state. “Bottineau’s population is right around 34 percent of the entire county population. So, according to county’s calculation they are not paying 60 percent of the contract, but only one-third of the contract.

Fines

The city’s police committee has also stated that revenue earned by criminal and traffic fines are presently down by 62 percent from last year’s total revenue. The city feels that the crime rate hasn’t declined from last year, but has stated in so many words that the local deputies are not doing their job properly in handing out traffic tickets.

Steve Watson, sheriff of Bottineau County, handed over public documentation on revenue made by criminal and traffic fees for the past three years to the Courant, which shows that $11,000 was received in fines two years ago, $9,000 was raised in 2010 and so far in 2011 around $4,800 has been collected in criminal and traffic fines. However, Watson stated that the $4,800 doesn’t show the true number of crimes and traffic fines handed out.

“At the present moment, we are waiting on Rick Hummel to complete the revenue numbers from municipal fines, which has not been placed into the total amount of fines for this year yet,” Watson said. “Besides that, traffic tickets only bring in $10 to $20 each time, which brings in very little revenue. What generates revenue are criminal fines which can bring in thousands of dollars.”

Watson added that traffic tickets at the present moment appear to be on track from any other year. He also stated that the majority of all major crimes have either been solved or are close to being completed, which should increase the revenue for court fines.

County Commissioner, Verdean Kveum, stated that when it comes to the city-county police budget, he and the other commissioners want to see the impasse break, so the city and county can bring the best police protection to all the residents of the county at the fairest price.

“I really want the contract to work between the city and county. The county has been quiet over this issue so far because we don’t want to antagonize the city’s leadership. However, we can’t sit back and let them stomp on us either,” Kveum said. “But, our numbers prove the city only pays a third of the budget.”