Perhaps the best way to get Eastern Washington University back to the bargaining table on a dispatch service contract with Cheney Police Department might be to equate the services the city provides the university to another business most about everybody in the world uses — and for just about everything.
“We are more than a dispatch center for them,” Cheney Police Chief John Hensley told the City Council at its July 14 meeting. “We are more like Google.”
Hensley briefed the council on the negotiations’ status, which began informally after the contract expired in 2011 but were broken off suddenly in October 2014. The city discovered in the interim that EWU has been negotiating with the Spokane County Sheriff’s Office for dispatch services, albeit at a level all parties agreed would not be comparable to what Cheney provides today.
Hensley told the council the county is capable of providing emergency services to the university, with enhanced computer aided dispatch (CAD) calls and a regional records management system going on line in 2017. The county would not provide non-emergency service calls such as responses to vehicle lockouts, building security alarms, elevator alarms and regular radio contact with officers leaving their vehicles and patrolling the campus on foot.
Hensley said these calls would need to be contracted for through another service, handled in house by the university or not handled at all.
“They know this,” Hensley said. “This is not one of those intended consequences. They know this is coming. They’re willing to live with that.”
At issue is the rise in calls for service for university officers handled by Cheney dispatch in comparison with what the university pays the city for the service. When the contract was negotiated in 2006, Eastern paid a base amount of $84,000 a year, increasing annually according to the Spokane Consumer Price Index.
Between 2007 – 2011 EWU’s CAD portion of Cheney dispatch’s workload amounted to an average of 27 percent. That increased to 40.43 percent annual average from 2012 – 2014, while Eastern’s $91,644 contribution amounted to 16.34 percent of Cheney’s overall $560,600 communications budget in 2015.
Hensley said the city sent a letter to the university informing them of Cheney’s intention to terminate the contract. But, he and others are still holding out hope the university will decide to talk to them.
“It’s important for you to know from the city’s perspective that we haven’t closed any of the doors,” Hensley said.
In other business, the council set Aug. 25 as the date for a public hearing on an application by Les Schwab for city vacation of a portion of Spokane Street. Public Works Director Todd Ableman said the tire dealer is asking the city to vacate a 60-foot section of the street allowing them to expand their business to provide a commercial unit handling larger vehicles.
Council also accepted a $5,000 grant from Empire Health Foundation that will pay for exercise equipment for the city’s Parks and Recreation Department’s senior light fitness class, and a third amendment to the city’s contract with Intrinium for information technology network management services and support. Finance Director Cindy Niemeier said Intrinium desired to amend the original agreement to reflect an increase in demands for its services at an amount that at first was larger than acceptable.
Both organizations were able to negotiate the amendment to an acceptable level, Niemeier said, with the city agreeing to a $795 a month increase and three-year contract term extension.
John McCallum can be reached at jmac@cheneyfreepress.com.
Reader Comments(0)