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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Police Pay Questions Unresolved Cda City Council Decides Not To Act On Raise, Benefits

Police pay and benefits remain unresolved after the City Council decided not to act on the dispute during the public portion of its meeting Tuesday.

The council made no move on a recommendation that it provide a 2.5 percent pay increase, better disability benefits and a two-year contract for city police officers after a 30-minute executive session Tuesday evening. Earlier in the week, city officials said they expected the council to accept at least part of the fact-finding report.

The council settled with the employee groups representing firefighters and all other city employees in September. Those groups received the same 2.5 percent pay increase.

For the third time since 1990, however, the Coeur d’Alene Police Officers Association and city negotiators reached an impasse and a fact-finding commission was called in to hear the issue. The police department asked for a 6 percent wage increase, two-year contract and disability insurance that matches other city workers.

The association also is asking the city to come up with a less hostile means of settling contract disputes.

The fact-finding group ruled there were serious flaws in the comparison data the Police Officers Association presented in arguing for a wage increase, instead settling on 2.5 percent. It did side with the group on increasing the disability insurance to cover 75 percent of lost wages and on a two-year contract.

The commission’s members were elementary school principal John House, former State Sen. Mary Lou Reed, and Gonzaga University professor Lynn Daggett.

In other business, the City Council voted unanimously to move its Dec. 16 meeting to the Lake City High School auditorium. Councilman Ron Edinger recommended the move to accommodate the anticipated crowd at the council’s public hearing on a urban renewal plan for downtown, midtown and the Northwest Boule vard area.

The proposal is causing widespread dissension in some quarters because of fears that the urban renewal project will mean the end of the Third Street boat launch and McEuen Field.

Earlier in the meeting, City Finance Director John Austin told the council that a consultant’s report recommends a master plan be developed for the entire area south of Front Street from the city parking lot to Tubbs Hill. That doesn’t mean the end of McEuen Field, he said.

Austin quoted consultant Doyle Hyett as saying McEuen “should always be protected and maintained for public use as a park.” And any master plan should include ample public input, Austin said.

That didn’t dissuade citizen Carol Stacey, who told the council that including McEuen Field in the downtown redevelopment plan “has caused enormous resentment” and unfair condemnation of the downtown merchants.

Virtually all of Hyett’s proposals for the field, including a performing arts center are “silly,” Stacey said. She also worries that the urban renewal plan calls for borrowing $8 million against anticipated revenue from business and residents who supposedly will move to Coeur d’Alene.

, DataTimes