Small Towns Finding Bike Patrols Effective Surprise! Officers Like The Quiet Approach Of Their New Wheels

Police officers in Colville and other small towns in northeastern Washington say new “stealth” technology is improving their effectiveness.

Not only can they appear out of nowhere and catch bad guys in the act, they’re better able to meet the good folks who pay their salaries.

Highly regarded new police vehicles in Colville, Chewelah and Newport definitely are not Batmobiles, nor even the souped-up Mustangs favored by the Washington State Patrol.

They’re just mountain bikes, but don’t tell that to Colville patrolman Ron McKinstry.

“I think the single most-coveted possession for thieves in town is my bike, so I take it everywhere with me,” McKinstry said. “If I go inside for a pop, I take it with me.”

Thieves have reason to want to separate McKinstry and other small-town officers from their bikes.

“They’re very effective at providing security patrols and protecting property,” Colville Police Chief Damond Meshishnek said.

In fact, he said, bikes are more effective at night than patrol cars - especially for underage drinking and drug cases: “We have coasted up on people in cars parked at stoplights or in parking lots and caught them red-handed.”

Officers in all three of the Stevens and Pend Oreille county departments that have introduced bicycle patrols since spring 1994 use the same word to describe the phenomenon: “stealth.”

The high-quality mountain bikes they use are quiet, unobtrusive and can go almost anywhere.

When crooks see a patrol car go by on its rounds, they know the coast probably is clear for a while. Bicycles meandering through alleys and parking lots are less predictable and harder to spot.

“There’s nothing quite like it when you pull up on them and they haven’t even seen you,” Chewelah patrolman Mark Burrows said.

“It’s definitely a Kodak moment,” McKinstry agreed.

That may be especially true for motorists who are pulled over for traffic infractions.

Newport Police Chief Gary Markwardt said his officers have made a couple of traffic stops since getting a pair of bikes this spring.

“In one case, I know the gal was just real surprised to have a bike pull up alongside her and pull her over,” Markwardt said.

Bicycle officers in Chewelah and Colville also have made traffic stops, although generally not for speeding.

“I’ve got a whistle I carry now,” McKinstry said, “but before that I was just kind of yelling at them. Deaf people can hear me yell.”

He said a disdainful motorist once drove off before he could write a ticket. But no one on foot has tried to elude him.

“They’ve seen the way I ride, and most of them want no part of it,” said McKinstry, a trim 30-year-old ex-Marine.

Both McKinstry and Burrows, who is 31 and ex-Air Force, were avid mountain bike riders before becoming their departments’ primary cycle officers.

Although traffic stops are strictly a sideline, pistol-packing bicycle officers carry radios and respond to all kinds of calls.”It deters kids from getting out and doing crimes like malicious mischief,” he said.

Closer contact with young people is one of the main reasons for bicycle patrols in all the small towns. Burrows and McKinstry are the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) officers for their communities.

McKinstry probably issued as many coupons for free treats at the local McDonald’s as citations during the Colville Rendezvous celebration earlier this month. He cruised slowly through the crowded city park, pausing more often to chat with youths than to admonish them.

“It’s a really nice medium for police work,” Burrows said. “People can contact you and you can contact people. There’s no power windows rolled up. It’s almost a step back in time to the beat cop, but you can cover more area.”

Burrows finds it refreshing to meet law-abiding citizens, who often have little contact with police, as he rides past their houses.

Residents donated all the money for equipment and uniforms to launch bike patrols last year in Chewelah and Colville.

Newport Chief Markwardt used a grant to put his officers on bikes March 31. The City Council had passed a curfew and demanded downtown foot patrols to crack down on bands of delinquent youths, but pounding a beat on foot proved impractical.

“Just about the time you got started, you’d get a call and you’d have to get in a car and leave,” Markwardt said. “On the bicycles, they were able to respond to calls from where they were.”

In June, bicycle officers responded faster than cars to a couple of fights at the city’s rodeo carnival, the chief said. “They were able to go right into the carnival grounds on their bikes.”

Similarly, Colville’s McKinstry and another bicycle officer wrote almost twice as many tickets - mostly for alcohol-related offenses - as two to three officers in cars during their community’s rodeo.

Newport uses its bikes mainly on Friday and Saturday nights, when there are two officers on duty. Chewelah relies heavily on reserve officers to keep bikes rolling at odd hours day and night, from April until snow falls.

Bikes are also used at all hours in Colville, where four of 10 officers are outfitted for cycle duty.

Still, bikes can’t replace cars. So the small departments must juggle schedules carefully to make sure cars are always available. One strategy is to keep cars with bike racks handy.

Aside from covering ground in a hurry, cars are better at carrying bulky report forms, shotguns, fire extinguishers and other large equipment.

They’re also better at hauling prisoners, but McKinstry doesn’t worry about that.

“I like to make ‘em walk to jail,” he said. “It’s my health and fitness plan for them.”

, DataTimes