In brief: Resolution on police gets council assent
The Spokane City Council on Monday unanimously approved a resolution calling for a series of measures that it said would improve accountability of the police department.
At the heart of the resolution is a provision to amend an ordinance governing the Office of Police Ombudsman to restore independent investigative authority to the ombudsman and remove a prescreening requirement provided to the Police Guild, which represents rank-and-file officers.
The resolution calls for publishing internal affairs reports from 2009 through 2011 on the website of the Office of Police Ombudsman by March 1.
The council also is calling for a program to purchase and equip officers with body cameras.
The Police Guild said Monday that it agrees with the issue of reform, but that changes would have to be negotiated under the Guild’s labor contract with the city because the changes could affect working conditions.
City leaders reject firefighter labor contract
A tentative labor contract with Spokane firefighters was narrowly rejected Monday night by Spokane City Council members.
The 4-3 decision hinged on Councilman Steve Salvatori, who said he opposed the lack of transparency in how the tentative agreement was struck. Joining him in opposing the deal were council members Nancy McLaughlin, Mike Allen and Mike Fagan.
The three-year contract was negotiated in December by former Mayor Mary Verner in her final days in office.
Under the rejected deal, firefighters would not get cost-of-living raises this year or next. In 2014, they would have received a 1.9 percent raise. In exchange, firefighters would have received more money in their paychecks by paying none of the cost of their health insurance premiums in 2013 and any portion of health coverage increases beyond 4 percent after that.
Officials said the deal would have increased city spending on Fire Department payroll and benefits by more than $1 million per year.
Lawmaker wants EPA out of Silver Valley
BOISE – An Idaho lawmaker says the Silver Valley is clean enough, and she wants federal regulators to end their Coeur d’Alene Basin cleanup, rescind the valley’s Superfund designation and get out within five years.
Freshman state Rep. Shannon McMillan, R-Silverton, told the House Environment Committee on Monday that by the Environmental Protection Agency’s own admission, “blood-lead testing of local residents have proven that the hazard is gone if it even existed. Also with the way technology is growing by leaps and bounds, we feel that the cleanup should be wrapped up.”
McMillan’s nonbinding resolution would tell Congress that Idaho wants the EPA out because any further cleanup in the basin “would have a devastating effect upon our mining industry.”
Suspected voyeur arrested in Cheney
A man with unzipped pants was arrested on suspicion of voyeurism following reports that he was spying on young women in Cheney late Friday.
Police responded about 10:45 p.m. Friday to the 500 block of Clay Street, where an Eastern Washington University student said she arrived home to find a man looking into her apartment window. She said she’d seen the same man looking into her neighbor’s window last week. Police didn’t find anyone, but they were called back to the apartment about 11:30 p.m. on reports the man had returned.
Police didn’t locate anyone, but officers responded to the apartments again about 12:52 a.m. after hearing reports the man’s vehicle was seen driving by. They stopped the dark Hyundai SUV and identified the driver as Richard M. Wallingford, 37, who matched the description of the alleged voyeur.
Wallingford’s pants were unzipped when he exited the SUV, police said.
Wallingford left jail on $7,500 bond over the weekend. Arraignment on three counts of voyeurism is scheduled for Feb. 22.