Pullman seeks funds to hire new police officer

The Pullman City Council authorized Pullman Chief of Police Gary Jenkins to submit an application for the COPS Hiring Program during its regular meeting Tuesday, giving the Pullman Police Department an opportunity to potentially hire a new police officer – likely a student resource officer.

“We feel that the workload at the schools justifies an additional school resource officer,” Jenkins told the council.

Jenkins said he and City Supervisor Adam Lincoln met with Pullman School District Superintendent Bob Maxwell to discuss the possibility of having the school district fund the additional position, though Jenkins said the district could deny that proposal.

The program, headed by the U.S. Department of Justice, offers a three-year term grant that covers up to 75 percent of the hired officer’s salary, with a maximum federal share of $125,000 per position.

Positions funded by the grant must be maintained for at least one year beyond the three-year grant period. Additional years beyond the three-year period would be funded by the city, Jenkins said.

Grant applications are due July 10.

The council also approved – via head-nods, as the proposal was not listed as an action item – the Pullman Arts Commission to move forward with fundraising for a new bus stop to be built in front of Safeway, designed by WSU Collaborative, a team of Washington State University art, architecture, design and engineering students and WSU professor Ayad Rahmani.

In April, the commission chose the “Magnificent M” as its favorite design out of four presented by WSU Collaborative.

Now called Rolling Hills, the modified design shows previously sharp points of the “M” have been softened to mimic the hilly Palouse landscape. The design has also been modified to incorporate bike parking and add an anti-graffiti clear coat for wood and metal parts of the structure.

The project was originally estimated to cost $2,500. With the modifications, that estimation jumped to $5,000.

WSU is donating its time and manufacturing resources, the commission’s interim chair, Joanna Bailey, told the council. Crowd-sourced fundraising may also be utilized.

The council also approved proposed separate six-year capital and transportation improvement programs for years 2018 to 2023 in a public hearing that received no public feedback.

The proposed amount for the 2018 CIP totals $735,857. Six-year funds are scheduled to go to everything from bullet-proof vests and helmets for the Pullman Fire Department ($30,000) to an Aquatic Center vehicle ($16,500) to sewage treatment projects ($5.38 million) to City Council Chamber technology replacement ($132,000).

The TIP allocates $218,000 to transit fund projects and $1.19 million to arterial street funds for 2018. Specific projects include new bus shelters, solar lights at bus stops, city-wide traffic signal improvements and arterial streets resurfacing, among other projects.

Full outlines of the CIP and TIP can be found on the city’s website.