NH police budget and employment data (Merrimack County) (Hooksett Police Department)

Granite State News Collaborative filed this request with the Hooksett Police Department of Hooksett, NH.
Multi Request NH police budget and employment data (Merrimack County)
Submitted June 24, 2021
Est. Completion None
Status
Fix Required

Communications

From: Granite State News Collaborative

Subject: New Hampshire Right to Know Law Request: NH police budget and employment data (Merrimack County) (Hooksett Police Department)

Mail

To Whom It May Concern:

Pursuant to the New Hampshire Right to Know Law, I respectfully request the following records related to this municipality's police department hiring, employment, and funding for the budget years 2000 through 2020:

BUDGET and FUNDING DATA - Records sufficient to show funding for municipal law enforcement offices and activities for the years 2000 through 2020.

If possible, please provide the itemized budget allocated for public safety and police department activities for each year, as well as records sufficient to show any additional funding received through other means, including but not limited to:
• funds for capital expenditures
• grants
• donations

HIRING and EMPLOYMENT DATA - Records sufficient to show the following data regarding police department employment for the years 2000 through 2020.
• The number of employed law enforcement officers (as defined by RSA 105-D:1). Please provide the date on which the provided numbers were accurate.
• Annual demographic information (age, race, gender) of law enforcement officers employed by this municipality
• Annual demographic information (age, race, gender) of any individual employed in a position of leadership within this municipality’s public safety or law enforcement department

If any of the requested information is available in aggregate form, provision of this aggregate information by year would likely satisfy this request. If there are any known caveats involved with the data and information your office is able to provide, I would really appreciate it if you could share them with me.

*Please note* that if any of the requested information is held by another office or agency, direction to the appropriate office would be greatly appreciated.

This request is being made on behalf of the Concord Monitor through the statewide nonprofit Granite State News Collaborative. This request is not being made for commercial purposes. It is being made as part of a journalistic data collection effort to benefit news organizations and the public good throughout the State of New Hampshire.

If your office anticipates that fees associated with the processing of this request, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request be filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Please call 603-224-5301 with any questions about this request. If your call is not answered, please leave a message and your call will be returned as soon as possible.

I look forward to receiving your response to this request within five business days, as required by law.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I really appreciate your time and help.

Sincerely,

Cassidy Jensen, The Concord Monitor

From: Hooksett Police Department

Subject: Town of Hooksett - Police Department Demographics Right-to-know Request

Email

Hello,

Our Police Department notified me that they received an identical right-to-know request to one they received earlier from "requests@muckrock.com<mailto:requests@muckrock.com>". I am duplicating our most recent response below that we sent the Friday before last. Please respond with specificity and we'll work to get the relevant requested material the town has according to the options / methods below.

Thank you.

Nick Germain, MPA
Project Coordinator

From: Nicholas Germain
Sent: Friday, July 30, 2021 11:29 AM
To: requests@muckrock.com
Subject: Town of Hooksett - Tentatively Ready to Provide Access Pending Wishes - Awaiting Follow-up

Good morning,

The Town of Hooksett has completed its internal assessment for all the records related to this request. Please see below for a review by component. The town will need payment and/or clarification on method of disclosure requested before staff or other personnel can fully provide access.
BUDGET and FUNDING DATA - Records sufficient to show funding for municipal law enforcement offices and activities for the years 2000 through 2020.
-Published Town Reports should contain all the detail information related to Police Department Budgets for the Town of Hooksett. Town reports are available digitally back to 2008 on https://www.hooksett.org/administrator/pages/town-reports and for that period and beyond via https://scholars.unh.edu/hooksett_nh_reports/. Budget information can be found under terms like "Police Department" or "Police Commission" depending on the year. We can also probably provide original run physical booklets of many of the reports for inspection or even free pickup, but please be advised that the town is probably running out of some of the older reports and they're de facto turning into artifacts that can't be parted with. I can probably figure out a way to get you the digital files of all the reports if that's specifically needed versus just the links, but I expect it might take some time to schedule.
* funds for capital expenditures
-See above section on town reports.

* grants
As previously stated, out Finance Department has a collection of grants received for or by the Hooksett Police Department for the applicable period. Cover sheets themselves should amount to a few dozen pages, while the full documentation of all the grants could be more than hundreds of pages. We can either make copies of all the documents rapidly or digitize the cover sheets that detail the main points of each grant. Digital records in question would be free as no physical copies would be required as would be physical inspection on site. Physical copies would be the production cost of $.50 per page of whatever's ultimately desired.

* donations
Town doesn't have records that specifically summarize donations as those details go undifferentiated in municipal financial records and documents, but this information can be found trailed through minutes. During the period in question, donations were either accepted by Town Council (2013-present) or by the Hooksett Police Commission (2000-2013). The Town Clerk's office has records for all Town Council and Police Commission minutes physically available for inspection and copying (.50 per page). The Town website -does- have a digital archive of minutes accessible by any user at any time, but there are some caveats:
-"recent" town council minutes from 2016 to the present are available here: https://www.hooksett.org/node/39/minutes
-Older Town Council Minutes back to 2001 are archived here: https://cmsarchive.civicplus.com/Hooksett%20NH/default.htm
-Police Commission Minutes 2008-2013 are archived here: https://cmsarchive.civicplus.com/Hooksett%20NH/default.htm - These are the only digitized police commission minutes available online, actual physical minutes with the town clerk go back to 1978.
HIRING and EMPLOYMENT DATA - Records sufficient to show the following data regarding police department employment for the years 2000 through 2020.
The records for the period Spring 2013 to December 2020 appear to be what the town has related to this portion of the request. As a refresher, it its around 196 pages of documents. These can be: 1.) inspected on site ; 2). Dispersed via mail 3); Dispersed digitally. Cost for taking possession of copies would be the production cost of $98.00 previously quoted - as a reminder, we must still charge the production cost for digital access or physical copies in this case due to the fact physical copies had to be made for redaction.
________________________________
When ready, please reach out - I'll try to be prompt.
With respect,
Nicholas P. Germain, MPA
Project Coordinator
Town of Hooksett
Administration Department
Office: 603-485-8472x1
Fax: 603-485-2439
ngermain@hooksett.org<mailto:ngermain@hooksett.org>

Files

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