24/7 Patrol is a high priority, survey says

In total, the county received 585 completed responses to the Hood River County Public Safety Services Survey — approximately 2.3 percent of the total county population (25,310, according to county records). Of those 585, 326 stated that they lived in the City of Hood River, 36 in Cascade Locks, and 223 in the unincorporated county. Despite the survey being translated and advertised in Spanish, the county only received two Spanish submissions.

These results are “anecdotal,” said Paige Rouse of Pageworks Design, a local communications firm contracted to conduct the survey, because the survey was not conducted scientifically and most of the responses were voluntary, “but that’s pretty common these days,” she said.

Participants were asked to rate the importance of 12 Hood River County public safety services on a scale from one to seven, with one being least important and seven being most important (descriptions of each service were provided — and are printed in the sidebar).

Patrol and Domestic Violence Investigation and were, on average, the two highest-rating services, with 74 percent and 76 percent, respectively, of survey respondents giving those services a 6 or 7 ranking. Child Abuse Investigations came in third, followed by Prosecution and Emergency Management.

“It’s fairly unsurprising for me,” said Rouse of the results. The results are not currently available online, but county intends to have them put up online soon.

Participants were also given a blank box with a 400-word limit and a prompt: “In your own words, please take a moment to offer your opinions about Hood River County’s public safety services or other services. What is or is not important to you?”

The county received 139 answers to this prompt. Most stated that all of the public safety services provided by the Sheriff’s Office were important to the community and that they had difficulty trying to prioritize them, and many stated that they felt bringing back 24-hour patrol coverage should be the top priority. The Sheriff’s Office decreased patrol to 20-hours per day in July and dropped down to 12-hours per day in October. 

Even if a levy is passed, Sheriff Matt English said rebuilding the sheriff’s office will be a considerable task and it will take a long time to see visible results of the funding, given the number of vacancies the office has and the time and effort it takes to recruit and train new officers. “We’re talking about a multi-year process,” English said.

Commissioner Karen Joplin suggested presenting the levy as a five-year package plan, with measurable goals year-to-year in order to ensure accountability while the office works to rebuild.

The county commission is currently deliberating a levy rate to ask for on a 2020 ballot. So far, they have agreed to set the rate somewhere between 67 cents per $1,000 assessed value — the minimum needed to fill the deficit — and the 89 cents per $1,000 assessed value that they asked for in May.

The commissioners are waiting for English, County Administrator Jeff Hecksel and County Finance Director Tina Ruffin to finalize some numbers related to sheriff’s office funding before they officially decide a rate sometime in January.

A work session on the topic is scheduled for Monday, Dec. 30, from 1-3 p.m.

The county’s timeline is set up so that the new levy proposal will hopefully be ready for the May 2020 ballot, but they have the option to wait for November 2020.