More revenue sources needed for Cheney police to operate better

The Cheney Police Department (CPD) is a small, but professional police agency, staffed with caring and compassionate public safety professionals. For several years, the CPD has been a state-accredited police department and serves as a model to others in this area. However, behind this façade of excellence and exceptional service, the CPD suffers from a lack of funding support in several key areas.

As I near the completion of my fourth year as your chief of police, I find myself examining the state of the police department. Frankly, I am concerned about the future of public safety in our city. With a decade of state funding takeaways, and a slow-in-recovering economy, public safety that relies upon the city’s general fund has been hit particularly hard in five areas — staffing, vehicles, technology, training and facilities.

The Cheney Police Department is staffed with 14 police officers to patrol a city that has a daytime population in excess of 24,000. Cheney has the fewest police officers for a city of its size (full-time population of 11,251) in the state of Washington. We would need to add an additional four officers to move up to the next city on the bottom of this list.

This is the staffing problem as I see it — police officers should never work alone in this day and age. Our society has become far too dangerous and complex to rely upon one police officer per shift to sort through the labyrinth of issues that arise each day. We would not expect a firefighter to tackle calls for help alone or light department employees to climb utility poles without the benefit of assistance.

Why then is it acceptable to allow police officers to patrol city streets alone on some shifts without the benefit of a backup officer? Moreover, there are times when an officer has a domestic violence call, a suicidal person, traffic collision, or a theft in progress occurring at the same time. How then can an officer meet these demands when working alone? The honest answer is that they can’t.

The police department has six vehicles assigned to patrol. Three vehicles are leased and are model year 2012. They are in rather good shape, but the miles are piling up quickly. The other three patrol vehicles are model years 2008 and 2009, high-mileage cars with maintenance issues. These emergency vehicles are tired and in need of immediate replacement. The challenge for our city is that a fully outfitted police patrol vehicle costs $46,500, but the general fund is unable to meet the high cost of vehicle replacement.

In terms of computer technology, computers in police cars are essential. Police work demands the use of computers, from writing police reports, to searching for crime-related intelligence, to writing a speeding ticket. CPD computers installed in the police vehicles are over five years old and the company that built them is no longer in business. Each day these computers are routinely failing and crashing, but replacement as well as docking stations is estimated to be in the neighborhood of $90,000. Again, the general fund cannot afford to support replacement at this time or in the foreseeable future.

Each year, the state mandates 24 hours of police officer training and continuing education. The city is able to meet this basic need. The difficulty, however, is in the areas of weapons training, defensive tactics, and other specialized training that is needed, which the state does not always provide at a cost the city can afford. A professional and well-trained police department is essential to providing public safety services to our community — you deserve nothing less — but increased funding for training beyond the basics is unattainable under present economic conditions.

Finally, the police facility is a converted mortuary well over 50 years old, and while it meets the rudimentary needs of the community and officers alike it has several issues. The locker rooms lack hot water, there are electrical and HVAC issues, and the building is not technology friendly. In terms of space, the building lacks storage space for evidence and property, and the building is without meeting or training space. Frankly, the entire police facility needs work, and funding to do so is nonexistent.

By now, I suppose you’re asking yourself, “What’s the chief’s point?” Money is always a problem; we all know that. My point is simply that through no fault of our local leaders, the city’s general fund cannot support the needs of the police department. The loss of various funding streams — liquor tax and profits, motor vehicle excise tax, reduced sales tax receipts, etc.— have hurt the city’s ability to meet increasing public safety demands. Other funding options must be considered if we are to address the unfortunate facts I’ve presented here.

Cheney Police Chief John Hensley has over 30 years of law enforcement experience in Washington and California. He has served as police chief in Cypress and Costa Mesa, Calif., interim chief in Desert Hot Springs, Calif. and with the Cheney Police Department since December 2011.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of the Cheney Free Press.