The Clallam County Commissioners approved a contract with Norpoint Protective Services of Port Angeles to provide courthouse security through the remainder of the year.
Sheriff Bill Benedict said the $46,200 would come from unspent deputy salaries.
“At the end of the year, we’ll take another look at it, whether to continue with the contract, have deputies do it or turn it over to the Port Angeles Police Department,” Benedict said following the Monday meeting.
“This situation will not self-correct for several months; the entire profession has been challenged with a small applicant pool, and once hired, the additional delays in providing required training,” Benedict wrote in a memo to the county commissioners.
According to Jefferson County Administrator Mark McCauley, Jefferson County hired a private security firm in 2017 to provide courthouse security.
“We went the private security route because it was a more cost-effective solution than adding staff in the Sheriff’s Office. The firm we hired in 2017 is still with us,” he wrote in an email.
Jefferson County Commissioner Kate Dean wrote in an email that the commissioners are considering bringing courthouse security back in-house to the sheriff’s department.
“County staff is assessing the efficacy of the current security set-up and the sheriff is assessing their capacity to provide this service,” she wrote.
Benedict told the three commissioners that the Port Angeles Police Department used to provide courthouse security.
It was turned over to Clallam County Sheriff’s deputies after the Police Department’s investigation of former Treasurer’s Office clerk Katherine Betts in 2009 was judged unsatisfactory by the commissioners.
In July 2011, Betts was convicted of first-degree theft, money laundering and 19 counts of filing false or fraudulent tax returns in the theft of between $617,467 and $793,595 in public money — from the Treasurer’s Office cash drawer — between 2003 and 2009.
The contract will pay the person $55 per hour, which Benedict said was “in line” with what a sheriff’s deputy would cost the county. He asked for the contract because of overtime costs that were “killing him,” Benedict told the commissioners.
The earliest a sheriff’s deputy position could be filled is late October or early November because of the need for a background check and training at the police academy in Burien, he said.
Benedict’s memo noted that staff from other assignments, such as inmate transport as well as courthouse security, have been reassigned to meet jail staffing requirements.
Twice recently courtroom staff had requested a deputy’s response and one was not available, according to the memo. The Elections Department will also need additional security with the upcoming mid-term elections.
Benedict said the staffing situation at other county sheriff’s offices runs the gamut, but Clallam’s situation is similar to a lot of other counties. The sheriff’s office currently has 8.5 vacancies out of 27.5 corrections deputy positions, and the operations division has a similar staffing shortage.
Police staffing levels in Washington have reached a crisis point, according to Steven D. Strachan, executive director of the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs.
Policing agencies across Washington state saw a 4.4 percent reduction in the number of sworn officers in 2021. Combined with the drop in 2020, Washington now has 667 fewer deputies and police officers than in 2019, Strachan said.
With 1.38 officers per 1,000 people, the lowest ratio since statistics were first tracked in 1980, Washington is the least policed state in the country. The national average per capita rate is 2.33, according to FBI statistics.
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Reporter Brian Gawley can be reached by email at brian.gawley@peninsuladailynews.com.
