OSP correction

Reporter Elizabeth Suh just wrote to say that Kulongoski had asked for $17.6 million for 139 new patrol officers over the next two years. That means our thumbnail estimate of about $24 million for 120 troopers was off by quite a bit. Well, we said it was rough.

Either the new officers are paid considerably less (with a strong union, if there were reductions in force, the most senior hold their jobs), or the overhead represents a much larger portion than the 15% we used (new troopers do not mean more command staff if the agency was "top heavy").

It may also be that when resisting budget cuts in the past, OSP decided to take the most visible off the streets, a little game of legislative extortion, and left their infrastructure intact. Agencies and unions want the cuts we impose upon them to hurt us.

Thank you, Elizabeth. I wish that info had been in the original story. How about a follow up talking about how that $17.6 million will actually be distributed, why there is a difference in per officer cost, etc. Yeah, I am a numbers guy, but we are talking about numbers, here.

And so now we have a request for an additional $17.6 million for two years, at least $87 million over the next decade. Still a lot of money (it's just the additional!) for Oregonians to get more speeding tickets, and the occasional meth bust. We would use the funds elsewhere.