This week, over the objections of myself, Midvale Mayor Marcus Stevensen, and many others, a legislative committee advanced a bill that would repeal the statutory authorization under which Salt Lake County and other municipalities and townships created and continue to maintain the Unified Police Department (UPD).
House Bill 374, sponsored by Rep. J. Teuscher from South/West Jordan, was principally motivated to remove the Salt Lake County Sheriff as the CEO of UPD. But Rep. Teuscher believed the approach to accomplishing that was to repeal the language that enabled the UPD to be organized in the first place.
As members of the UPD, we have been closely following Rep. Teuscher’s efforts, but did not see this version of the bill until the day before the committee hearing. Without our input, Salt Lake County Sheriff Rosie Rivera has announced her support of the bill, though reluctantly. She concluded the result was either inevitable or that the issue would continue to resurface, causing low officer morale and the prospect of defections from UPD ranks due to continued uncertainty. The bill in its current form is likely to pass.
The legislation would give us until July 1, 2025 to plan and decide what to do. It will not prevent the re-formation by interlocal agreement of UPD (UPD 2.0) on a multi-municipal model so long as the County Sheriff is not a party to it. It is also possible that the sheriff and county council could contract with UPD 2.0 to perform certain functions to blunt the impact of the county leaving the UPD.
While nothing has been determined, I continue to favor having a regional police force where Millcreek would partner with other municipalities and townships to achieve economies of scale and to be able to marshal greater resources than what Millcreek might be able to afford were we to form our own police department. The city council agrees. Further, I have confirmed with Mayor Rob Dahle of Holladay and Mayor Stevensen of Midvale that they also would want to participate in a “new” UPD to share economies and resources. The metro townships and the town of Brighton may also wish to participate, as well as other communities that could envison the benefits of shared resources.
Millcreek has options and this situation will take some time to sort out before we commit to a specific resolution. We will explore multiple alternatives, I am sure. Of a couple things you can be certain. Millcreek residents will always and continuously have quality police services and we will always look out for the best interests of our UPD officers, whom we value to the utmost.
There will be opportunities for you to be heard before we make any decision about the future of policing in Millcreek (and other cities in Salt Lake County who don’t have a dedicated police department like South Jordan).
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