Public Safety & Community Health Committee
Afraid of the park
The Spokane Police Department is asking the City Council to change city law to make being in a city park after hours a misdemeanor rather than a civil infraction. The change would mean police could arrest or detain people for staying in parks after dark — not just write them a ticket.
All city parks close at 10 p.m., with the exception of Riverfront, which closes at midnight. In a letter to the council and its equity subcommittee, Captain Thomas Hendren said that a civil infraction isn’t enough to prevent groups of people from gathering at parks after closing hours. Arresting people for trespassing in parks after hours isn’t currently allowed at the state or city level. State law allows an officer to detain a person who won’t identify themselves, but only as long as is necessary to figure out who they are and issue the citation. Existing laws don’t give police the authority to make people leave, so police are asking for a new law that would make trespassing a criminal infraction, paving the way for arrests.
The ordinance to change the law to a misdemeanor is sponsored by council members Karen Stratton, Jonathan Bingle and Michael Cathcart. Council President Breean Beggs is proposing an alternative ordinance that would only make it a misdemeanor if someone refuses city employees' order to leave a park after hours.
In his letter, Hendren cites “unprecedented violence” in the parks for the last year as the reason why the ordinance needs to change. He specifically points to three after-hours park shootings in the summer of 2022 that left nine people injured and one person dead. The first shooting on June 29, 2022 at Dwight Merkel left a 16-year-old boy wounded, the second at Dutch Jake Park on August 25, 2022 injured the same 16-year-old boy and three women. The third shooting on August 27, 2022 left a 22-year-old man dead and three men wounded.
He stated that between January 1, 2021 and March 31, 2023, 79 violent crime incidents have been reported at parks after hours, though he notes that the data may not be accurate because of the way people report locations. RANGE has not been able to independently verify this figure, but it’s worth noting that emergency calls don’t always mean a crime happened or someone was hurt. For example, someone could call 9-1-1 for shots fired at a park, police could get there and find no one at the park, or it could’ve just been fireworks or a car backfiring. It’s unclear if police included these calls in their number.
Hendren said that the department will try to limit arrests and use of force with this ordinance by educating violators on the change in law and getting them to leave without actual enforcement. Then for those who refuse to comply, they would issue criminal citations, and then for those who still stay in the park, they would arrest them.
He said the alternative ordinance that Beggs is proposing wouldn’t work because the offenders would just keep gathering and only leave once police tell them to. This, he said, would require constant patrol for problem locations and more officers at those locations and they don’t have enough staffing for that. It’s unclear how that is different from how he said they plan to approach the issue to avoid many arrests and uses of force.
Another drug ordinance
The public safety committee will also be discussing another new ordinance aimed at illegal drug use after the state legislature did not pass a response to the WA Supreme Court’s Blake decision, which struck down Washington’s felony drug possession law in 2021.
A temporary law passed after that decision made police officers present treatment options to people caught with unlawful possession of a drug and then made it a misdemeanor crime on the third violation. That law sunsets June 30, 2023 and state lawmakers weren’t able to pass something new in this session. Now cities, including Spokane, are planning to pass their own laws to maintain the misdemeanor penalties.
The ordinance creates a new section in the city laws that makes unlawful possession of controlled drugs (except cannabis) a gross misdemeanor. The penalties laid out in the law state that violators will be cited and released instead of booked into jail and that their drugs and related paraphernalia will be seized. It also gives police an alternative to arrest and citation: they can offer a referral to assessment, treatment and other community resources. The law also states that the prosecutors in these cases are encouraged to use diversion programs to resolve cases.
This new ordinance is separate from the public drug use ordinance, but uses some of the same language in its preamble. (We are once again asking public officials to stop repeating this piece of misinformation: that “contact with trace amounts of the drug can be deadly for anyone, especially kids.” Fentanyl cannot be absorbed through the skin with casual exposure and you can’t overdose by touching something the drug has been on. Here’s a helpful article from a toxicology expert at UC Davis.) It’s unclear if this new ordinance would preempt the public drug use ordinance altogether, as it also includes a section about public drug use.
Trent shelter needs more money
The CHHS department is requesting an additional $3.9 million for the Trent Resource and Assistance Center (TRAC) because its operating costs have already exceeded the amount that city council approved for it in the 2023 budget. The agenda packet cites an increased number of shelter residents taken in from Camp Hope and necessary service changes as the reason for the increased cost. According to the Inlander, TRAC’s operating costs are more than $13 million per year.
The funding will come from the Real Estate Excise Tax Fund, which has about $4.2 million in its balance. Under city code, that fund is supposed to pay for “capital facilities” — a fancy term for infrastructure (Latah corridor, cough, cough) — it’s unclear how paying a service provider from this fund is an allowable use of these funds, but this isn’t the first time the city has gone scrounging through other funds to pay Salvation Army. The city has also been dipping into the criminal justice fund to pay indirect costs to Salvation Army that Commerce won’t pay for… expect more on that from RANGE in the coming days.
And, read more about the city’s homelessness system budget woes from the Inlander here.
Agenda here
Monday, May 1 at 1:15 p.m.
Council Chambers in the Lower Level of City Hall.
808 W Spokane Falls BlvdThe meeting is also livestreamed here.
Spokane City Council
Public drug use ordinance coming up for a first reading
The “Safe Open Spaces Act” was first brought up a few weeks ago in the Finance and Administration Committee and now it’s coming in front of the Spokane City Council for its first reading. This ordinance would make it easier for police to arrest people using unprescribed controlled substances in a public place.
The ordinance changes the current section of local criminal code that addresses loitering for the purposes of drug-related activity (like if someone is buying, selling or doing drugs in a public park) to make a violation of that section a gross misdemeanor, which is punishable by up to a year in jail, a $5,000 fine, or both.
As we mentioned above, this ordinance may end up being moot if the Blake legislation response ordinance is passed.
Read our full breakdown here.
More money for emergency rental assistance
Spokane is getting another chunk of money to help with emergency rental assistance and to prevent evictions. The federal government is providing $335,295 for the Emergency Rental Assistance 2.0 (ERA2) program and the city plans to have it all spent by June 2023.
The city is also getting another $2 million for Eviction Rent Assistance Program (ERAP) 2.0 funding, which will be distributed to the city’s rental assistance provider partners: the Carl Maxey Center, Family Promise of Spokane and FORWARD (formerly known as LiveStories).
Mayoral veto of more budget oversight ordinance
The city council will consider a mayoral veto on an ordinance that put more stringent monitoring rules on the city’s budget. In a letter to city council, Mayor Nadine Woodward said that while she supports most of the ordinance, parts of it are hard for the finance department to comply with because the department is understaffed.
She first asks that one of the deadlines for a report to council be moved back by one month. Secondly, she asks that a section of the ordinance be eliminated. This section mandates a mid-year review of the budget and then a one-time supplemental budget ordinance rather than a bunch of smaller budget changes throughout the year.
Read more about the ordinance here.
Agenda here
Monday, May 1 at 6 p.m.
Council Chambers in the Lower Level of City Hall.
808 W Spokane Falls Blvd, Spokane, WA 99201
The meeting is also live streamed here.
Spokane County Board of County Commissioners
Surveillance software
The county commissioners are voting on a nearly $150,000 contract for surveillance software. The company, BriefCam, advertises facial recognition and other technologies that “accelerate investigations” on its website. This technology can also apparently track people in crowds and has raised concerns about biases embedded in the platform and in the way it’s deployed.
This effort is part of the “Real Time Crime Center” initiative covered by Colin Tiernan in The Spokesman Review here.
Pistol sights
Another county commissioner meeting, another gun purchase. This time the Sheriff’s Department is requesting $103,000 for pistol sights and mounting plates. The winning bidder is a company out of Athens, Georgia, so they won’t be shopping local this time around.
Dock project at Liberty Lake
The county commissioners will be voting to approve a $377,110 project to renovate the docks at Liberty Lake Regional Park.
Agenda here
Tuesday, April 11 at 2 p.m.
Public Works Building
1116 W Broadway, Spokane, WA
Commissioner’s Conference Room, First Floor
Community, Housing, and Human Services (CHHS) Board
Last chance to comment on how Spokane should spend federal HUD funds
The CHHS board will be closing the annual action plan comment period at its monthly meeting. The Annual Action Plan is the overview of how the city will spend its annual allocation of U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) funding in the 2023 fiscal year — which is several million dollars. The Consolidated Plan is the five-year planning document required by HUD where the city lays out their priorities and goals for using the Community Development Block Grant Program, HOME Investment Partnerships Program and Emergency Solutions Grant Program. Read more about it here.
The agenda doesn’t have much information on the rest of the items, but the board will also get an update on the Regional Homeless Continuum of Care workgroup and an update on the city’s annual Point-In-Time data.
Agenda here
Wednesday, May 3 at 4 p.m.
Council Briefing Center in the Lower Level of City Hall.
808 W Spokane Falls Blvd, Spokane, WA 99201
Liberty Lake City Council
Agenda here
Tuesday, May 2 at 7 p.m.
In person at Liberty Lake City Hall or Zoom link here.
22710 E Country Vista Dr, Liberty Lake, WA
Citizen's Transportation Advisory Board
Agenda here
Wednesday, May 3 at 5:30 p.m.
In person at Streets Department Conference Room or Zoom link here.
901 N Nelson Street, Spokane, WA
Spokane Human Rights Commission
Agenda here eventually
Thursday, May 4 at 5:30 p.m.
Council Briefing Center in the Lower Level of City Hall.
808 W Spokane Falls Blvd, Spokane, WA 99201
