Tumwater committee considers renewal of school resource officer program 

The Tumwater Public Health and Safety Committee is considering renewing a contract between the city and Tumwater School District for a school resource officer (SRO) program. 

Under the program, two Tumwater Police Department officers are assigned to 10 elementary, middle, and high schools for the purpose of providing uniformed presence and building positive relations with students and staff. 

The contract expires at the end of the year, so the city is now working to renew the agreement. The committee reviewed a new contract prepared by staff at a meeting on Tuesday, July 8.

Police Chief Jay Mason said the program has existed for 15 years. It was expanded in 2016 under the request of the school district to add a second SRO, whose salary and benefits were paid by the district. Before that point, the city entirely funded the program by paying the first SRO and the other associated costs. 

The city-funded SRO primarily serves Tumwater High School and Bush Middle School, while the district-funded SRO is mainly present at Black Hills High School and Tumwater Middle School. 

Both SROs also show up when needed at Black Lake Elementary, Tumwater Hill Elementary, Michael T. Simmons Elementary, Peter G. Schmidt Elementary, East Olympia Elementary and Littlerock Elementary. 

Mason said the new contract is the same as the one renewed contract three years ago, with a change to include updated wages and benefits. 

Under the new contract, the school district would pay a total of $610,430 from 2026-28. 

Members signaled they would endorse the new contract to the city council if additional reporting requirements were included. 

City council and committee member Leatta Dahlhoff requested Mason modify the tasks and responsibilities of SROs to include data tracking. Dahlhoff said she wants to see data of incidents involving youth violence, weapons, harassment, gang involvement, drugs and other related activities. 

Mason said the school district is already required by the Revised Code of Washington to compile specific data sets.  

Dahlhoff said she would email Mason and the city attorney to get that specific provision so they could appropriately refer to it under the contract. The council member also wants the police department to periodically present the data to the city council. 

“I still haven't seen data, and I've been talking about this for seven years,” Dahlhoff said. 

“There is an option to expand the SRO program, right? So for council to be the ambassadors to the community of the benefit that school resource officers are offering, I need to show like what they're doing.” 

City council and committee member Kelly Von Holtz said she wants to see evidence of the program's impact on students, such as through improved attendance, reduction in referrals and lower suspension rates. 

Mason said those findings could be presented, but admitted not knowing how it would fit into the contract. 

At the end of the discussion, the committee members said that once the contract is returned to them, they would like to forward it to the full city council for consideration instead of placing it on the consent agenda as staff originally planned. Doing so would allow other council members to discuss the program as well.