S. 1563 — Retired Law Enforcement Officers Continuing Service Act

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 entities—defined as State, local, Tribal, or territorial law enforcement agencies—for hiring retired law enforcement personnel to (1) train the entity's civilian employees on civilian law enforcement tasks and (2) perform such tasks on the entity's behalf. Civilian law enforcement tasks include assisting in homicide, carjacking, or financial crimes investigations; reviewing camera footage; crime scene analysis; forensics analysis; and providing expertise in computers, computer networks, information technology, or the internet. The section further requires (1) audits by the Department of Justice Inspector General of grant recipients beginning in the first fiscal year after enactment (with the number of audits determined annually); (2) ineligibility for grants for two fiscal years for recipients with unresolved audit findings (i.e., unauthorized expenditures unresolved within 12 months of the final audit report); (3) grant priority for entities without unresolved audit findings in the prior three fiscal years; (4) annual certifications to the Senate and House Judiciary and Appropriations Committees confirming audit reviews, mandatory exclusions, and listing excluded recipients; and (5) pre-award checks and congressional reporting to prevent duplicative grants for similar purposes.