Feds reject COPS request

Spokane County won’t be among law enforcement agencies in Washington sharing more than $18.5 million in federal grants to hire new police officers.

Coeur d’Alene will get enough money to hire three officers; Post Falls was also left out.

Nationwide, the Justice Department announced $1 billion in grants Tuesday for cities, counties and tribes to hire new officers under its Community Oriented Policing Services program. More than 7,200 agencies applied, but just 1,000 were approved.

Seattle was left out, as were New York, Houston and Pittsburgh. The city of Spokane didn’t apply for the grants, spokeswoman Officer Jennifer DeRuwe said.

Coeur d’Alene police Chief Wayne Longo was pleased. “I’m pretty excited to get three out of the four we asked for,” he said. The money comes with a catch:

The agency must pick up the salary of any new officer hired under the COPS program after three years.

“We all hope the economy in three years will be better than what it is today,” Longo said. Also, “just through attrition based on the number of officers we have at retirement age, I feel very comfortable that we will be able to keep these officers even if the economy doesn’t improve.”

In Washington, grants range from nearly $2.6 million for Vancouver to $145,249 for the Colville Tribal Police Services.

Agencies that applied but did not receive grants were in Stevens County, Kettle Falls, Airway Heights, Colville, Cheney, Grant County, Clarkston, Benton County, Lincoln County and Okanogan County and at Eastern Washington and Washington State universities. The Spokane Tribe of Indians’ police agency was also rejected.

In Idaho, Spirit Lake was approved for one officer, Boise got eight and tiny Kamiah, in Lewis County, got one officer.

Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich said he requested funding for 22 deputies to replace the four let go earlier this year for budget reasons and 18 expected to be let go under the 2010 budget. “I’m extremely disappointed,” Knezovich said. “There will be cuts in services.”

All sheriff’s offices in Washington were turned down. “It seemed to be heavily weighted toward police departments,” Knezovich said. “Quite frankly, sheriff’s offices tend to lack manpower more severely than police departments.”

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said the new officers “will go to where they are needed most.” He said decisions about grants were “based on crime rates, financial need and community policing activities.”