§2. Grant program
This section establishes a new grant program under Title I of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 authorizing the Attorney General to award grants to eligible state, local, Tribal, and territorial law enforcement agencies for hiring retired law enforcement personnel. Grants may be used to (1) train the agencies' civilian employees on specified civilian law enforcement tasks (i.e., assisting in homicide, carjacking, or financial crimes investigations; compliance reporting; reviewing camera footage; crime scene or forensics analysis; or providing IT expertise, but excluding arrests or use of force); or (2) have the retirees perform such tasks. Prior to hiring, grantees must conduct a good faith review of the retiree's disciplinary and internal investigation records via the National Decertification Index or prior employers' personnel files, with misconduct findings reviewed by the agency's highest-ranking law enforcement officer or designee.
This section further imposes accountability measures on the program, including (1) annual audits by the Department of Justice Inspector General beginning in the first fiscal year after enactment, with recipients having unresolved audit findings (i.e., unauthorized expenditures unresolved within 12 months) ineligible for grants for the next two fiscal years; (2) grant priority for entities without unresolved findings in the prior three fiscal years; (3) annual certifications to the Senate and House Judiciary and Appropriations Committees confirming audit completion, exclusions, and listing excluded recipients; and (4) pre-award checks to prevent duplicative funding, with reports to the Judiciary Committees if similar grants are awarded to the same applicant.