Fresno gives police money for new handguns. Critic calls chief’s budget ‘irresponsible’
The Fresno City Council pulled funding from a couple of other projects on Thursday in an effort to help the Police Department replace some 900 service weapons, assuming the mayor’s administration can come up with the rest of the costs.
The council approved about $113,500 toward Police Chief Andy Hall’s request to swap out the department’s aging .40 caliber handguns in favor of 9 mm replacements.
The chief made the request for $273,600 in January. At Thursday’s meeting, Councilmember Mike Karbassi proposed the city cut money from an internship program and use other dollars from a fund for a monument for fallen police officers to cover costs for the new pistols.
Hall listed a number of aging assets of the department, including cruisers, carpeting, helicopters and headquarters. He said the guns are especially important because they can be an immediate safety risk.
“A gun that may fire today, may not fire tomorrow,” Hall said. “That’s the concern. It would be like driving a car that may not have brakes tomorrow.”
Hall’s request got the most public pushback from Councilmember Miguel Arias, who said the roughly $200 million police budget already gets half of the city’s general fund.
Arias said the police department should be able to find money to replace the guns in the budget it already has. He ultimately voted to support giving the department the money.
The police budget in the most recent fiscal year is about $32 million larger than the previous year. Arias said he agrees that the police department is underfunded, but so is every other department in the city.
“We’ve done more for the police department than we have for any other department in the city,” he said.
“Something as basic as service guns are not planned in your operational budget,” Arias said to Hall. “It’s irresponsible and non-negotiable for the department not to budget for something as basic (as guns). It’s like the parks department coming forward and saying, ‘We didn’t budget for the cost of water.’“
Hall said he wrote the memo in January hoping to get advice from the council, but not expecting a public debate on the matter. He said the process “wasn’t (done in) support. It wasn’t coming together and finding a solution. It was to point fingers and make allegations and insert politics into this process.”
Councilmember Garry Bredefeld said the city has not supported the department enough, saying the city did not fund more police officer jobs in the past two budgets.
The department in 2018 began refurbishing the older .40 caliber guns. Hall’s memo says the pistols are losing their “night sights,” which are lights officers use to aim in the dark.
The 9mm ammo is cheaper than the larger caliber, representing about $200,000 in savings over the life of each pistol, according to Hall’s estimate.
Officers are assessing four different pistol makers, but the department has not settled on the specific weapon of choice.
Mayor Lee Brand issued a statement on Thursday.
“Council’s vote today is a good start and the administration is already working to identify the additional funding,” he said. “We plan to ask the council at their next meeting on Feb. 27 to approve replacing 900 outdated guns, which will keep both our police officers and the people they are sworn to protect safer.”
Darling meat plant
While approving money from carryover funds for the pistols, the City Council also changed course on plans to spend $1 million that was being held for the proposed move of the Darling Ingredients meat-rendering plant in southwest Fresno.
It became public this week that the deal was on the rocks and the council looked to spend the money on other projects. Darling pulled out of its agreement with a residents group, according to several people involved in negotiations, but the talks are ongoing.
Officials with Darling have not said why they wanted to pull out of the deal, and the nonprofits involved in negotiations have said they can’t talk about what went wrong, citing legal gag orders.
After a push from southwest residents, the council decided Thursday to hold onto the $1 million until at least after the negotiations end.
This story was originally published February 13, 2020 at 2:59 PM.
