Editorial: Police chief, ombudsman search deserves due diligence

The Spokane Police Department needs a new chief and new ombudsman, and city officials should be more earnest about filling in the blanks.

Chief Frank Straub was forced out in part because the department’s lieutenants and captains didn’t like his abrasive and, some say, abusive style. His interim replacement is Assistant Chief Rick Dobrow, who is apparently well-regarded by those who have worked with him but an unknown to most Spokane citizens.

Their trust in the department and its officers has increased substantially in recent years, for good reason, but they still want an independent ombudsman to affirm that confidence when a complaint occurs.

Citizens should be assured, too, that the city will get the best man or woman to permanently replace Straub. That means a national search. If Dobrow withstands comparison with outsiders, so be it. A serious search should give him time enough to convince us he’s our man.

More details of Straub’s tenure may emerge, but it’s clear Mayor David Condon took the internal complaints seriously. It was Condon who found Straub, and he would not let him go over frivolities. It’s telling that every member of Straub’s initial management team had asked to be reassigned, including public information officer Monique Cotton. She was moved to the Parks Department after the Fire Department said “No thanks.” She remained on the Police Department’s payroll.

(As a side note, the city must stop the practice of creating new positions while maintaining salaries. Straub will draw his chief’s salary while working his final months with the city attorney’s office. Cotton got a $9,000 raise for moving to a smaller department that already had an information specialist.)

In announcing Straub’s departure, Condon, with City Council President Ben Stuckart at his side, told the community that new initiatives and reforms will survive this bombshell. The city has little choice because it remains under the scrutiny of the U.S. Justice Department, which gave the city 18 months to comply with recommendations laid out in a review produced in December. The federal review showed that the community’s distrust in the police department was justified. Straub and Condon concurred.

It was encouraging to see city leadership embrace that criticism. The in-custody death of Otto Zehm in 2006 had set reforms into motion, and the Zehm family took the city’s vow to change as an assurance that something positive would come from tragedy. In February, the momentum continued when the city’s Use of Force Commission praised the Police Department for the changes made in the previous two years.

But the momentum stalled when the city put off replacing Ombudsman Tim Burns, who announced his departure in January. Then, the Rachel Dolezal scandal flared, and the citizens Ombudsman Commission imploded, losing three of its five members.

Good chiefs and good ombudsmen are hard to find. It would be simple to hand the chief’s job to Dobrow – especially in the middle of an election – but not right.

A search should not wait until Nov. 4. And the hunt for an ombudsman deserves the same urgency.