Ballot Measure Aims to Increase Public Safety

Hemet’s Measure E is a proposed one percent sales tax that would pay for more police, firefighters and paramedics. Proponents say the extra manpower is needed because the city’s crime rate is going up, but critics say the tax could hurt the city’s economy.

Hemet voters will decide tomorrow whether they want to beef up their city’s police and fire departments during the next decade.

Voters will say yes or no to Measure E, a one-percent sales tax that would pay for more police and fire personnel. If approved, Measure E would raise about $10 million a year for 10 years, the length of time of the tax would be in place.

In February, the city council voted 4-1 to place the proposal on the ballot.

The Hemet Police Department would add nearly 40 sworn officers during that time, while the fire department would hire about 16 new workers, most of which would be firefighters and supervisors, according to the initiative.

Because it would raise taxes for a specific purpose, the Hemet Police and Fire Community Safety Measure must receive two-thirds of the vote, a so-called super majority, to become law.

Measure E would increase neighborhood patrols, bring back anti-gang and anti-drug units and allow for faster emergency responses by both departments, among other improvements, said Dave Brown, Hemet’s chief of police.

It would also ensure that paramedics are on duty at every fire station, and it would bring back a fire station on the city’s east side.

When asked why Measure E  is needed now, Brown cited a recent survey found that crime in Hemet is up 21 percent since 2010, with violent crime up 50 percent during that time.

The survey also noted that Hemet has 25 percent fewer officers patrolling the street than it did 10 years ago, and that Riverside County released about 10,000 prisoners last year before they had finished their sentences because it did not have enough space to accommodate them.

“They have to end up somewhere,” Brown said of the former county inmates. “I think a lot of them ended up in Hemet. We have a lot of affordable housing.”

Maybe worst of all, 75 percent of the Hemet residents surveyed said they fear being the victim of a violent or otherwise serious crime.

Faced with those numbers, the city has no choice but to increase the size of its police department, Brown said.

“Measure E is a reaction by the community to the rise in crime that we’re experiencing,” Brown said. “Some people are calling it a crime wave, and they’re afraid to go out of their houses. If you’re a police chief it’s devastating to hear those numbers.”

Critics of Measure E dispute the crime wave allegations and say Hemet, with a population of 83,800, should do what most other cities in Riverside County its size do for police and fire protection: contract with Riverside County.

But there are several reasons why that approach probably wouldn’t work.

The Hemet Police Department was founded in 1959, 49 years after the city incorporated. Hemet residents take pride in having their own police department, and any attempt to do away with it would likely meet the same resistance the proposed removal of the Hemet Fire Department met with several years ago.

In what was billed as a way to save money, Hemet officials proposed shutting down the fire department, which was founded in 1908, six years before the city incorporated.

The council’s first plan was to contract with Cal Fire, a state agency that provides emergency services in 36 counties. It also considered contracting with Riverside County or a combination of the county and Cal Fire, but none of those things happened.

The proposal met with resistance from fire department members and city residents who did not want to see the department eliminated. In December 2014, the city council voted to keep the department in place, after an outside consultant’s report found that employing its own firefighters and paramedics saved the city money.

Also, a contract with the sheriff’s department would be too expensive. A Riverside County Sheriff’s deputy is paid about 25 percent more than a Hemet Police officer, so the cost of contracting with the county would start high and go up from there, Brown said.

“It would end up costing the city twice as much as it’s spending now,” said Brown, who also questioned whether the sheriff department’s method of policing – which he called “totally different” from Hemet’s – would work in the city.

But one opponent of Measure E says Hemet’s rise in crime is being exaggerated by the measure’s supporters.

“Any increase in crime that happened was because the population grew, which is true anywhere,” said Robert Righetti, a member of the Hemet Taxpayers Association, which is opposed to Measure E. “Anytime population goes up crime goes up. Hemet’s population has gone up about 30 percent since the mid-1980s.”

Economically, Measure E is not well-timed, Righetti said.

“In general, I don’t think any retail-based tax is a good idea, especially when the economy is still in a slump,” said Righetti, who said he doesn’t live in Hemet but said he has worked there for 44 years as an engineer. “It’s going to hurt people, and it’s going to affect big purchases. You will see automobile sales in the city slow down if this passes.”

Like its police department, Hemet’s fire department is also overworked and badly in need of more personnel, Fire Department Chief Scott Brown said.

Last year, Hemet firefighters and paramedics answered more than 16,000 calls for service,  while nearby Murrieta, which has about 24,000 more people than Hemet, responded to approximately 8,000 calls, Scott Brown said.

“We have a good fire department but we’re understaffed,” Scott Brown said. “We can’t sustain our current level of service unless we get some help. I fee like I’m holding up a chicken bone, only there’s no meat on the bone.”

Like the police department, outsourcing the Hemet Fire Department is not an option.

“They’ve already suggested that,” Scott Brown said. “The community didn’t want it.”