FY 2009 Justice Assistance Grant Program

This grant program is authorized by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5) (the 'Recovery Act') and by 42 U.S.C. 3751(a). The stated purposes of the Recovery Act are: to preserve and create jobs and promote economic recovery; to assist those most impacted by the recession; to provide investments needed to increase economic efficiency by spurring technological advances in science and health; to invest in transportation, environmental protection, and other infrastructure that will provide long-term economic benefits; and to stabilize state and local government budgets, in order to minimize and avoid reductions in essential services and counterproductive state and local tax increases. The Recovery Act places great emphasis on accountability and transparency in the use of taxpayer dollars.

Among other things, it creates a new Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board and a new website ' Recovery.gov ' to provide information to the public, including access to detailed information on grants and contracts made with Recovery Act funds.

The Justice Assistance Grant (JAG) Program funded under the Recovery Act is the primary provider of federal criminal justice funding to state and local jurisdictions. Recovery JAG funds support all components of the criminal justice system, from multi-jurisdictional drug and gang task forces to crime prevention and domestic violence programs, courts, corrections, treatment, and justice information sharing initiatives. Recovery JAG funded projects may address crime through the provision of services directly to individuals and/or communities and by improving the effectiveness and efficiency of criminal justice systems, processes, and procedures.

The disparate jurisdiction consisting of Bonneville County and the city of Idaho Falls will share their Fiscal Year 2009 Recovery Act JAG award in the amount of $336,074. Bonneville County, acting as the fiscal agent, will utilize their award allocation to complete implementation of a mobile data project and purchase hand-held P25 Digital 700 MHz radios. The city of Idaho Falls will their portion of grant funds to replace and upgrade equipment. To further enhance the patrol division, nine in-car systems and 50 Colt AR-15 semi-automatic patrol rifles with accessories will be purchased. Funds will also be used towards the development of an online citizen police reporting tool to eliminate the cost of having officers take no-suspect reports while still documenting the incident and collecting the reportable data for statistical analysis and state reporting requirements. Coplogic will allow citizens the convenience to go online and report non-emergency and not in progress type crimes at their leisure from home or the office. Investigative tools such as LiveScan computer fingerprinting equipment, a Forensic Recovery of Evidence Device (FRED) computer forensics program, and a cell phone forensics program called Cellebrite will help investigators solve and clear more cases in a more timely fashion. Remaining funds will be used to purchase hardware that will enable patrol officers to complete accident or crime reports in the field as well as issue citations electronically. This will save time and put more officers on the street and in the neighborhoods.

NCA/NCF