State provides crime lab employees

Over the next three years, Missouri will provide 21 employees for the lab at a cost of about $1.75 million.

Springfield is the only metropolitan area in Missouri without a full-service crime lab. Law enforcement officers in the area currently send DNA, trace evidence, latent fingerprint and firearms analysis requests to Jefferson City, creating a backlog of cases of up to a year.

The city of Springfield still must find funding to renovate a city-owned building at 440 E. Tampa St. into the lab. U.S. Rep Roy Blunt secured $1.5 million this year for the project, but another $3 million is needed.

A Greene County sales tax initiative to generate funding failed at the polls in November, and city officials have said they are exploring other options.