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<br /> <br />City of Elk River <br />REQUEST FOR COUNCIL ACTION <br />Agenda Section Meeting Date <br />Consent A ril2, 2007 <br />Item Description <br />Re uest to s end forfeiture funds-new bad es. <br /> <br /> <br />Introduction <br />The police department has issued the same style badge for almost twenty-two years. Staff has become <br />concerned in recent months that with retirements and new assignments, there are badges that have been <br />lost, retired, stolen or are unaccounted for over that quarter of a century. In addition, we have used a <br />variety of companies over the years, so although the badges are similar in shape, they are often different <br />in size, ftnish and materials. <br /> <br />New Homeland Security regulations require that departments issue a "unique badge or symbol of offtce" <br />to uniformed personnel. Our current badge is a generic stock template that can be ordered from any law <br />enforcement supply house. Staff recommends a badge that contains speciftc detail or characters that are <br />unique to our City or department, and ones that can only be ordered through an approved, single source <br />vendor to avoid replication or counterfeiting. <br /> <br />Discussion <br />Badges are the major identifying feature utilized by our offtcers. Their badge and badge number are their <br />identity, and the manner in which they identify themselves to the public. Obviously ordering new badges <br />is not a guarantee that someone could not impersonate an offtcer. It does however provide us with a <br />more secure system of identiftcation that would prevent any citizen from ordering a badge as they <br />currendy could. Using a secure vendor, with limited ordering rights in place, assures us that from here on, <br />only authorized users will be issued our police badge, and only upon the offtcial approval of the <br />department. <br /> <br />Will the public know upon seeing the new badge that it is the "offtcial badge?" I would speculate that <br />most will not. However, the new badge will contain a speciftc embossed feature, the front of our police <br />facility, which will provide us with a one of a kind identifying trademark, that will insure us that the badge <br />the public saw was indeed an authorized one. <br /> <br />Financial Impact <br />Although this could have been a budget request for this year or next, I would prefer to utilize drug and <br />DWI forfeiture funds to pay for this expenditure. These funds by statute can be used for this expense, <br />and it makes sense to utilize these funds when they are available rather than impact the yearly budget or <br />other funds when city budgets are stretched so thin. <br /> <br />Our current vendor, V & V Badge in California and Streicher's Policy Supply in MN, quoted us a cost of <br />$120 for the new style badge. Symbol Arts in Utah had the lowest pricing at $64.38 per badge. We are <br /> <br />s: \ Council \Police \2007\Badges.doc <br />