City signs agreement for cross-commission of police officers with Chickasaws

The Comanche City Council reached an agreement with the Lighthorse Police Department of the Chickasaw nation for a cross-commission between the tribe and the city's police department.

Jason Williams, community partnerships director for the Chickasaw Nation and Comanche Police Chief Bill Straily spoke to the council about the proposal.

"After the McGirt and Bosse decisions, it reestablished Chickasaw Nation as a whole," Williams said. "(Chickasaw Nation) Gov. (Bill) Anoatubby has created this cross-commission agreement to be able to issue commission cards to the local police department."

The agreement will allow Comanche police officers to make arrests of Native Americans in the city. The McGirt and Bosse decisions meant if an officer tried to arrest someone with a Native American card they could not and they had to call Lighthorse to make an arrest, which could take hours for them to respond.

Williams emphasized that the cross-commission agreement did not mean that the Chickasaws would pull officers from Comanche to do duty in another part of the state.

Willilams also said 38 of the 41 cities in the Chickasaw Nation have signed on to the agreement, including Marlow and Duncan in Stephens County.

City manager Chuck Ralls had questions and concerns about liability issues, but Williams said liability would be on the Chickasaw Nation, not on the city.

He said Lighthorse has no interest or intentions of doing things like setting up speed traps in the city and the goal is simply to be a good community partner. Likewise, Comanche police officers would not have jurisdiction in other parts of Chickasaw Nation, just in Comanche.

"We don't want fines and fees," Williams said. "We didn't ask for this, we're just trying to be a good partner with our community partners."

Williams said any fines or fees that come to tribal court from Comanche will 100 percent go back to Comanche.

Ralls also questioned if Comanche police officers were required to go to Lighthorse training in Ada because of the way the agreement was worded, but Willilams said it would not be necessary.

Williams said it all comes down to protecting officers.

"It protects your officer because that's the one thing I don't want coming from law enforcement is hesitation because that's when somebody gets hurt," Williams said. "That commission card protects them as well (by allowing them to do their job)."

After more questions and discussion, the council voted to go into the agreement with the Chickasaw Nation.

In other business, the council agreed to contract with the HBC auditing firm for fiscal year audit 2021-22.

Ralls said auditors with the Angel, Johnson & Blasingame firm, which had been the city's auditor for several years were retiring. He said he had 12 rejections before receiving a couple of contract bids. Of the two, the city council decided to go with the higher bid because of a recommendation from their auditor consultant. Ralls said the $13,500 contract with HBC is still $3,000 less than what they were paying the previous auditor.

During the city manager's comment, Ralls said he had talked with Comanche school superintendent Julie Bills about a school resource officer and would have something on the agenda for the council next month to look at.

In the Public Works Authority portion of the meeting, the trustees agreed to renew the annual contract with Stephens County Rural Water District No. 3 to supply water.