The King County Council has agreed to Sheriff Urquhart’s training plan for 2017. The training will include implicit bias and de-escalation training. Previously, the Council cut the funding for the specific training by 50% during the budget process in 2016.
“I’m glad the Council saw the wisdom of a well-trained police force, especially given our task of dealing with so many in mental or behavioral crisis,” said Sheriff Urquhart after yesterday’s vote.
In 2016, Sheriff Urquhart went to Executive Dow Constantine after a social media post by the Executive decrying the lack of training offered to police officers, and especially implicit bias training. Urquhart asked for $800,000 for training to be added to the Sheriff’s Office budget for 2017-2018. Executive Constantine agreed, and that budget request was sent to the King County Council.
However when the budget was passed by the Council in November 2016, the amount was cut by half to just $400,000, with a proviso added that the Council must approve of the training to be provided.
The Sheriff’s Office plowed added with planning for the training during the first half of 2017, and sent the plan to the Council for approval in July and requesting the additional monies be restored. The training plan was approved yesterday.
In addition, Sheriff Urquhart is now lobbying for additional budget authority to train all patrol deputies and sergeants to the 40-hour standard for crisis intervention, or how to better deal with those in mental crisis. Currently around 499 are trained to the 8-hour standard, and just over 300 to the 40 hour standard. Under Urquhart’s plan, all would have the 40-hour training. This would be the first time any major police agency in Washington would have all their patrol police officers trained to that standard. The Sheriff’s Office has 725 commissioned police officers.
As a result of these efforts, Executive Constantine has proposed to Council a supplemental budget request for $400,000 for de-escalation and implicit bias training, and $361,000 to fund the additional Crisis Intervention Training.
“I thank Executive Constantine and the King County Council for their foresight and leadership to make sure deputies have the best and most advanced training available,” said Sheriff Urquhart.
