So why can't the elected city council of a city elect to buy a helicopter?
Besides the only police helicopters in this state are owned by counties anyway
King County has 3 helicopters(one is on fulltime patrol), Pierce has two fixed wing aircraft and a helicopter (they only fly upon callout though) Snohomish County has a chopper (never used) Chelan Sheriff has a helo for search and rescue, never read about it being used in an LE role. and Spokane County has one Helo that I know of that's always on call, but only flies when requested. So already no cities have their own helos. I should say the state patrol owns 5 cessnas....
What exactly do SWAT teams use that's not legal for joe schmoe with a clean background to buy? Ok, some SWAT teams in some juristictions may operate full auto or burst fire weapons, but most SWAT teams use Semi-Auto only variants of those weapons. A sheriff's deputy told me awhile back that Kitsap County SWAT relies entirely upon Semi-Auto AR-15 variants and a couple of bolt action .308 rifles for sharpshooting (his claim being his department holds deputies accountable for every bullet fired, so spraying a full magazine of ammo at someone and all those rounds missing would cause him some grief with supervisors). unlikely many cities use machine guns... what's wrong with an armored vehicle? how do you define "armored vehicles" a utility truck with a lowered snow-plow will shrug off small arms fire to the front, is that an "armored vehicle"
I see nothing wrong with a city employing their own SWAT team, nearly all their gear is stuff that the average citizen could buy if they could clear the check. The problem is, the County is not obligated to provide LE service to an incorporated city unless contracted, so if the County's team is busy or if the sheriff decided a shootout is not his problem or the sheriff's team is kept long out of town, what's the city supposed to do? your proposal is absurd on another level, you're saying that the Columbia County Sheriff's office, a department of 8 officers with a population of 4000 people should get to raise a SWAT team, and Seattle Police, a 1600 officer agency serving a town with a permanent population of 650,000 people which is a main hub in the state with a developed port, high rise buildings, important federal and state agencies, and probably has over a million and a half people during the day time.... can't have a SWAT team on callout?