Close

Bureaus

Office of the Chief

Under the direction of Chief John R. Batiste, the Office of the Chief oversees the day-to-day operations of the agency. 

Budget & Fiscal Services
The Budget and Fiscal Services Division is responsible for management of all agency financial activities.

Government and Media Relations
Government and Media Relations (GMR) serves two distinctive functions for the Office of the Chief: media relations and legislative liaison relations. GMR coordinates agency legislation with committees, legislators, and other state agencies, reviews and seeks input from interested stakeholders on agency legislation, and answers policy questions for legislative constituents. The office also handles all statewide media relations for the agency and is the lead/primary point of contact for critical and major incidents. It answers media inquiries regarding agency policy and assists and trains the district public information officers.

Labor & Policy
The Labor and Policy Office represents the agency at master agreement negotiations for statewide contracts by working directly with bargaining units and union representatives.

Office of Culture & Engagement
The Office of Culture and Engagement is dedicated to cultivating a vibrant and inclusive workplace where diversity is celebrated. They provide training to foster an inclusive culture; assess our policies, practices, and procedures to make them equitable; help provide resources to our workforce that enhance their psychological safety; and build relationships of trust with the communities across the state.

Psychologist
The department clinical psychologist provides assistance to all agency employees and their families when their well-being is threatened by vocational stress.

Field Operations Bureau

The Field Operations Bureau is comprised of eight districts that are responsible for traffic law enforcement, collision investigation, and motorist assists on 17,524 miles of state and interstate highways.

District One serves Pierce and Thurston Counties.

District Two serves King County.

District Three serves Yakima, Benton, Franklin, Walla Walla, Garfield, Columbia, and Asotin Counties.

District Four serves Adams, Ferry, Lincoln, Pend Oreille, Spokane, Stevens, and Whitman Counties.

District Five serves Clark, Skamania, Klickitat, Cowlitz, and Lewis Counties.

District Six serves Chelan, Douglas, Grant, Kittitas, and Okanogan Counties as well as the southwest corner of Adams County.

District Seven serves Snohomish, Skagit, Island, San Juan, and Whatcom Counties.

District Eight serves Clallam, Grays Harbor, Jefferson, Kitsap, Mason, Pacific, and Wahkiakum Counties.

Commercial Vehicle
Enforcement Bureau

The Commercial Vehicle Enforcement Bureau is responsible for protecting state infrastructure by enforcing size, weight and load laws, ensuring compliance of commercial motor vehicle regulations.

Commercial Vehicle Division
The Commercial Vehicle Division is primarily responsible for promoting the safe travel of commercial vehicles on state highways through education and enforcement.

Motor Carrier Safety Division
The Motor Carrier Safety Division works alongside the Commercial Vehicle Division to ensure safe travel for commercial vehicles. The division conducts in-depth reviews, audits, and inspections.

Property Management Division
The Property Management Division is responsible for providing comprehensive facilities management through the capital and operating budget process.

Fire Protection

The State Fire Marshal and Fire Protection Bureau have broad responsibility to ensure fire and life safety for the people of Washington State. The Fire Protection Bureau consists of Emergency Mobilization, Fire code and Information Services, Fire Services Training, and the Regional Fire Protection Services.

Fire Training Academy
The Fire Training Academy is the premier live-fire training site in Washington State that provides critical live-fire and public safety training in a safe and controlled environment.

Fire Prevention Division
The Prevention Division is active in providing a variety of Fire Protection services including fire inspections on licensed care facilities, plan review of schools, data collection, analysis, licensing, and certification of the fire sprinkler, fireworks, and cigarette industries to both public and private sectors.

Forensic Laboratory
Services Bureau

The Forensic Laboratory Services Bureau is compromised of the Toxicology Laboratory and Crime Laboratory Divisions as well as the Impaired Driving Section.

Crime Laboratory Division
The Crime Laboratory Division provides forensic science services to local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies throughout Washington.

Toxicology Laboratory Division
The Toxicology Laboratory provides evidential toxicology services to law enforcement, medical examiners and coroners, and prosecuting attorneys about suspicious deaths, homicides and suicides, traffic fatalities, driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs, and any other forensic cases where alcohol and/or drugs may be involved.

Investigative Services Bureau

The Investigative Services Bureau provides overall administrative and support services to the traffic and investigative programs of the department, as well as to many other state agencies.

Criminal Investigations Division
Criminal Investigations provides follow-up investigative assistance on cases that go beyond the crime scene. The division is comprised of three major sections: Felony Collision and Criminal Investigation Sections, Special Investigations Section, Auto Theft Section; and is also responsible for the Vehicle Identification Number inspection program.

Criminal Records Division
The Criminal Records Division is comprised of four sections: Collision Records, ACCESS, Identification and Background Check Section, and Criminal History Records Section. It provides services for both criminal justice and non-criminal justice purposes and is also responsible for maintaining the statewide repository for fingerprint-based criminal history record information.

Firearms Background Division
The Firearms Background Division is comprised of four Sections: Firearm Transfer Support Unit, Law Enforcement Support Unit, Research and Appeals Unit, and the Quality Assurance and Training Unit. The Division is the centralized point of contact for all firearm related background checks.

Homeland Security
The Homeland Security Division focuses on Counter-Terrorism, Crime Prevention and Response, and Emergency Management. The division is responsible for security of the Washington State Ferries, the Washington State Fusion Center, Statewide Emergency Management, Multi-Agency Bomb Teams, and the largest K9 team in the State.

Investigative Assistance Division
The Investigative Assistance Division provides investigative services, technical support, and training to the Washington State Patrol, law enforcement agencies, other agencies, and community groups. This division is comprised of three sections: Narcotics, Special Investigations, and the Special Weapons and Tactics Team.

Office of Professional Standards
The Office of Professional Standards provides oversight responsibility for the agency’s complaint and disciplinary procedures.

Special Operations Division
The Special Operations Division is comprised of the Aviation Section and the Executive Services Section. The Division also oversees the Awards Committee.

Technical Services Bureau

The Technical Services Bureau provides many diverse support services to the entire department, as well as many other law enforcement and government agencies throughout the state, and members of the general public.

Communications Division
The Communications Division provides around-the-clock professional emergency support to WSP, federal, state, local, and tribal agencies. Their main responsibilities are to answer 911 calls and initiate emergency services to meet the needs of the public and officers in the field.

Electronic Services
The Electronic Services Division provides statewide public safety telecommunications, land mobile radio, microwave, and engineering services to the WSP, its partner agencies, and customers.

Human Resources Division
The Human Resource Division provides HR-related support to the entire agency through consulting, researching, and interpreting civil service rules, collective bargaining agreements, and agency policies and procedures. As well as processing and maintaining employee health and safety, recruiting, testing, hiring, transfers, and promotional actions for all civil service and commissioned personnel.

Information Technology Division
The Information Technology Division supports all information technology needs of the Washington State Patrol.

Risk Management Division
The Risk Management Division develops strategies and provides analysis and direction to the agency on all risk management issues. It is comprised of the Audit, Public Disclosure, Strategic Planning and Accountability, and Tort sections.

Training Division
The primary function of the Washington State Patrol Training Division is to provide world class training to trooper cadets, who ultimately become fully commissioned troopers serving the citizens of Washington State. The division also provides various annual training to fully commissioned officers.

Specialty Teams

Aggressive Driving Apprehension Team
The Aggressive Driving Apprehension Team program is a proactive effort to locate and arrest those drivers who drive aggressively.

Bomb Squad
The WSP Interagency bomb squad operates under the Washington State Patrol Homeland Security Division and is nationally accredited through the Federal Bureau of Investigation and National Bomb Squad Commanders Advisory Board.  It is the largest public safety bomb squad in the state with primary responsibilities to investigate, render safe, and/or dispose of suspected hazardous device(s) improvised explosive devices (IEDs), incendiary devices, explosives, pyrotechnics, flares, ammunition, explosive chemicals and other hazardous situations.

Chaplaincy Program
Washington State Patrol Chaplains provide comfort, care, and counseling to employees and their families. 

High Tech Crime Unit
The High Tech Crime Unit provides technical investigative support both within the State Patrol and to outside agencies. One of the fastest growing areas is computer seizure and forensic processing. Specific cases have related to homicide, child pornography, embezzlement, telephone and credit card fraud, narcotics, and internal affairs investigations.

Honor Guard
The Honor Guard performs ceremonial duties at special events and department functions at the direction of the Chief.

Impaired Driving Section
The Impaired Driving Section includes the Breath Test, Drug Evaluation and Classification, Standardized Field Sobriety Testing, Ignition Interlock and Traffic Safety Resource Prosecutor Programs of the Washington State Patrol. The Impaired Driving Section also manages the Mobile Impaired Driving Unit.

Major Accident Investigation Team
The Washington State Patrol’s Major Accident Investigation Team is charged with investigating catastrophic collisions occurring within the jurisdiction of the Washington State Patrol.

Missing and Exploited Children Task Force
The Missing and Exploited Children Task Force assists law enforcement and other agencies with missing, abducted, and exploited children cases through investigations, case referrals, case management, and training.

Missing Persons Unit
The Missing & Unidentified Persons Unit assists law enforcement agencies and parents in locating a missing person.

Motors
The Washington State Patrol has 42 motorcycle troopers assigned primarily to the urban I-5 corridor. Motorcycles are highly effective in apprehending speeders and other aggressive drivers, particularly in heavy traffic. Motorcycles are often the only emergency vehicle able to reach collision scenes and other incidents on crowded freeways with narrow shoulders.

Rapid Deployment Force Team
The WSP Rapid Deployment Force Team is comprised of five regional teams located in Tacoma, Bellevue, Spokane, Marysville, and Bremerton. The team provides all hazards response capability for civil disturbances, demonstrations, crowd control, critical infrastructure protection, and other situations to restore law and order as well as to protect life and property.

Serious Highway Crime Apprehension Team
Serious Highway Crime Apprehension Teams combine canine troopers and line troopers in tandem to focus on serious highway crimes. These teams are highly successful in apprehending DUI’s and aggressive drivers and in detecting non-driving crimes, such as narcotics trafficking and possession, weapons violations, ID theft, and much more. The teams also help gather and forward valuable street-crime-related intelligence to task forces and other investigators.

SWAT
The SWAT Team provides tactical response for the Washington State Patrol and other law enforcement agencies upon request. Team members are trained to respond and manage barricaded persons, sniper incidents, hostage situations, terrorist confrontations, and other high-risk arrest situations.

Traffic Incident Management Program
The Washington Traffic Incident Management Coalition is based on a partnership involving the Washington Sta​te Patrol, the Washington State Department of Transportation and the local fire departments throughout the state aimed at reducing freeway congestion.