CSUPD to lose 5 cars following budget cuts

The CSU Police Department plans to scrap five police cars and cut the hours of its administrative assistant in an attempt to preserve officer salaries and technology in the face of looming budget cuts for fiscal year 2011 totaling $152,000.

Despite the cuts, police work will continue as usual, leaders said.

“The university will not see a notable change in how the CSU Police Department provides services to the community,” said CSUPD Chief of Police Wendy Rich-Goldschmidt, whose vehicle is among those to be cut.

After a recent evaluation of the university’s budget, the department was instructed to cut $152,000 from its budget by for FY11, which starts in July. The cuts reduce CSUPD’s budget 6.3 percent from this year’s $2.4 million total budget, said CSUPD budget administrator Christie Hanawalt.

Decommissioning the five vehicles will save the department about $37,000. CSUPD will keep its 19 other vehicles but will no longer allow officers to take the vehicles home to reduce fuel costs.

And the department will not cut any personnel but reduced a full-time administrative assistant position to a three-fourths time position. Much like the university, state support to the department has dwindled in the last several years, Rich-Goldschmidt said.

“We’re looking at ways we can rely less heavily on state funds to help offset salaries and air cards, which allow for Web access in the cars.”
The Information is used to look up crime information. Air cards will not be cut.

Officer Ashleigh Rose anticipates this change will make more officers double up inside patrol cars, something the department already encourages.
Though it was considered as an area for cuts, the department chose to leave it’s Community Service Office, or CSO, program unscathed. The 17-year-old program provides students interested in criminal justice an opportunity to serve their community as safety officers and will continue for the foreseeable future, Rich-Goldschmidt said.

“I think (CSOs) are a great asset to CSU and to (CSUPD) as well,” Rich-Goldschmidt said. “They are an extra set of eyes and ears and report important things to us.”

The chief maintains that the department will not lose people because of the cuts but knows that things could have been worse depending on the severity of cuts.

“If we had to cut double, things might have been different,” Rich-Goldschmidt said.

Staff writer Joe E. Goings can be reached at news@collegian.com.