City Council Meeting Date: June 18, 2024
To: Mayor and City Council
City Administrator
From: Mark Elliott, Chief of Police
Title
Authorizing execution of the 2025 Rice County Toward Zero Deaths Enforcement Grant
Body
Action Requested:
The Northfield City Council is asked to approve the attached resolution - Authorizing the Northfield Police Department as fiscal agent of the 2025 Rice County Toward Zero Deaths Enforcement Grant.
Summary Report:
For over a decade, the Northfield Police Department has partnered with other Rice County Law Enforcement agencies to provide increased traffic enforcement opportunities funded by Office of Traffic Safety grants. The member agencies have taken turns as the fiscal agent and administrator of the annual grant. The NPD has applied for the 2025 grant on behalf of partner agencies and seeks Council approval to be the fiscal agent and authorized agent of the grant.
The Office of Traffic Safety (OTS) provides annual grant funding to states for increased traffic enforcement and education. The Minnesota Department of Public Safety (DPS) administers these funds to local agencies for area-based traffic safety education and enforcement in the form of Toward Zero Deaths (TZD) Enforcement grants. The Rice County Safe Roads Coalition along with local law enforcement agencies and other community groups has worked to decrease the number of fatalities and injuries on local roads via increased education and enforcement. The grant partners believe part of the decrease of these types of crashes in Rice County is at least partially due to the grant-funded efforts.
The NPD was asked to be fiscal agent for the upcoming 2025 TZD Grant period, October 1, 2024 - September 30, 2025. Sgt. Kevin Tussing applied for the grant on behalf of the Northfield, Faribault, and Dundas Police Departments, the Rice County Sheriff's Office, and the Rice-Steele Consolidated Dispatch Center. The application sought a total of $89,352 in grant funding...
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