S-4267.1
SUBSTITUTE SENATE BILL 5974
State of Washington
69th Legislature
2026 Regular Session
By Senate Law & Justice (originally sponsored by Senators Lovick, Dhingra, Chapman, Frame, Nobles, Pedersen, Salomon, Stanford, Trudeau, Valdez, and Wellman)
READ FIRST TIME 01/23/26.
AN ACT Relating to modernizing and strengthening laws concerning sheriffs, police chiefs, town marshals, law enforcement agency volunteers, youth cadets, specially commissioned officers, and police matrons; amending RCW 35.21.333 , 35.21.334 , 35.23.161 , 35.27.240 , 36.28.010 , 36.28.025 , 42.12.010 , 43.101.095 , 43.101.115 , 10.93.170 , 36.28.020 , and 43.101.400 ; adding a new section to chapter 35.21 RCW; adding a new section to chapter 35A.21 RCW; adding a new section to chapter 36.01 RCW; adding a new section to chapter 36.28 RCW; creating a new section; repealing RCW 35.66.010 , 35.66.020 , 35.66.030 , 35.66.040 , 35.66.050 , and 36.28.011 ; providing effective dates; and declaring an emergency.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:
NEW SECTION. Sec. 1. The legislature finds that certain laws governing the eligibility requirements, duties, and responsibilities of sheriffs, police chiefs, and town marshals should be updated and revised to reflect best practices, and to ensure that local law enforcement leaders, whether sheriffs, police chiefs, or town marshals, whether appointed or elected, and whether partisan or nonpartisan, are subject to the same eligibility requirements and standards. For sheriffs, the legislature is authorized to prescribe eligibility requirements. However, other than the eligibility requirements for any elected official, the only requirement for sheriffs in existing law is completion of academy training within 12 months of being elected, and this requirement applies only to persons who have been elected to the office, and not to appointed sheriffs. The legislature may also prescribe eligibility requirements for police chiefs and town marshals, but those requirements have not been updated since 1987. The existing requirements do not include elements such as a minimum age requirement or a prohibition on misconduct that would require denial or revocation of certification. The background check requirement for appointment as a police chief or town marshal has also not been updated in many years, and there is no required background check before appointment or election as a sheriff. The legislature finds that the state Constitution requires it to provide for the duties of elected officials, including sheriffs, for whom duties were first prescribed by the legislature in 1854, but existing law is in part outdated and inconsistent with current values and practices.
For example, there is a need to clarify and reinforce state law that a primary duty of sheriffs, in addition to upholding the United States Constitution, is to uphold and enforce the Washington state Constitution and laws, as enacted by the legislature and interpreted by the Washington supreme court, so as to align state law with the Washington supreme court's ruling in In re Recall of Fortney , 196 Wn.2d 766 (2021).