The Riley County Law Board will hold a special meeting Thursday afternoon where it will consider publication of the Riley County Police Department’s 2022 budget.
RCPD staff have drafted four potential options, ranging from approximately $22.6 million to just under $23 million.
Options one and three include a 1 percent cost of living adjustment, a converted payroll technician, a court security screener and a cook for the jail. Option one would grow the RCPD budget by 2.1 percent. Option two also adds a 2 percent pay adjustment for RCPD employees and would grow the budget 3.5 percent.
Options two and four are similar to the other proposals, with the primary difference being a stand-alone payroll technician versus a converted position. Like the other budget proposals, it includes the extra personnel positions with option four also including the 2 percent pay increase and option two leaving it out. Option two grow the budget 2.17 percent while option four would grow the budget 3.57 percent.
All four proposals include non-personnel funds of $18,000 for training and $53,000 for insurance.
Last year’s budget was held flat due to the pandemic and omitted COLAs for all employees.
The Law Board had planned on meeting before the end of May to set the budget for publication. However, according to RCPD Director Dennis Butler, the process got held up due to some budgetary curve balls, including the Kansas Legislature’s new rules concerning revenue neutral tax rates. Riley County took action earlier this spring to award COLAs to county employees.
The Law Board meets at 3:15 p.m. The meeting can be streamed on the RCPD Facebook page.
A link to the Law Board’s agenda packet can be found here.
