Bluffdale debates police contract

BLUFFDALE — Ditch the Salt Lake County sheriff and let a Utah County city handle a police force, or stay with the sheriff and risk crushing the city budget?

It's a tough choice the Bluffdale City Council has to make soon, as the city has already missed the preliminary deadline (July 1) to decide whether to join Salt Lake County's Unified Police Department.

Sign with UPD under the current contract, though, and Bluffdale may be forced to hire almost four more officers for their city (one per 1,000 residents) — a jump that would crush the current budget.

"To go from 4.5 officers to eight, what do I cut or what do I tax?" said Bluffdale Councilman Bill Maxwell. "My concern is having this board telling Bluffdale what they should have. I think Bluffdale should decide that."

An alternate option is to contract for police services with Saratoga Springs, a Utah County city roughly 10 miles away from Bluffdale. Saratoga Springs Police Chief Gary Hicken presented a proposal at Tuesday's Bluffdale City Council meeting.

Contracting with Saratoga Springs would cost Bluffdale $687,583 in the first year of service but would go down to $643,983 in the second year. Both estimates are still less than Bluffdale's current contract with the Salt Lake County Sheriff's Office, Maxwell said.

For that price, Bluffdale would receive five officers based in its city, including one around-the-clock patrol officer.

Bluffdale, however, would not own any of the police equipment. And the only access point from the two cities outside of I-15 is on Redwood Road.

In case of an emergency on Redwood, Hicken said he is not concerned about it and notes the thoroughfare is expanding to four lanes. Police response time, he said, would be five to seven minutes.

But Riverton Mayor Bill Applegarth encouraged Bluffdale to join the UPD. Riverton, Herriman and the unincorporated parts of Salt Lake County are all slated to sign on with UPD.

"This isn't a stop gap for us to be with the sheriff's department. This is where we see our destiny because of the level of service we can get," said Applegarth, noting the amount of pooled services Riverton receives through the county.

Maintaining an interlocal agreement that currently allows Riverton and Bluffdale to share officers in an emergency would be an issue under the Saratoga Springs contract, Applegarth said.

Three Salt Lake County cities — Cottonwood Heights, Draper and Taylorsville — have abandoned the county sheriff's service for their own, city-based police force in recent years.

e-mail: amelia.elaine@gmail.com