Will downtown Spokane police precinct reduce crime? It might be too early too tell

The hollow, ornate shell of a former bank on Riverside Avenue likely will serve as the public face of the Spokane Police Department and the cornerstone achievement of Mayor Nadine Woodward’s first year in office.

The Spokane City Council approved a 10-year lease on Monday for its deluxe new downtown police precinct at the corner of Riverside Avenue and Wall Street, but not before Councilwoman Kate Burke ratcheted up her vocal skepticism of the plan. And though she appeared to stand alone, Burke still wants her questions answered.

What evidence is there that more police officers stationed downtown will make it safer? And if so, for whom will it be safer? And how will that improvement be measured?

“I think it’s just so weird how they can just throw this out there and no one’s questioning anything,” Burke said.

The downtown precinct proposal united the City Council’s criminal justice reform-minded, left-leaning members with the city’s new right-of-center mayor. It’s an early, tangible demonstration of the two government branches’ commitment to collaboration after the council and former Mayor David Condon’s relationship devolved into sometimes bitter and routine disagreement before he left office last year.

In the months leading up to Monday’s decision, Burke asked fellow council members and the administration for a data-driven argument.

Even the plan’s backers recognize the irony of introducing a new downtown policing plan at a time when crime numbers are dropping. Reported crime downtown dropped 15% last year, though the department’s most recent report notes an uptick in the city’s core in property crimes this year compared with last. But city officials say the downtown precinct is all about improving the public’s perception of safety, which is a real and persistent concern regardless of what the statistics demonstrate.

Sgt. Terry Preuninger, a police department spokesman, said the additional officers joining the new downtown precinct will allow for different types of patrol, as well as greater coverage of an area with a concentrated population. Still, he said Burke’s questions have validity.

“None of this is set in stone either. … If we determine after a period of time it’s not effective, we step back,” Preuninger said.

The precinct plan

The new precinct replaces the one at the Intermodal Center and is expected to accommodate as many as 35 officers. Fewer than that will be stationed there when it opens this summer.

With funding from a $5.8-million-per-year levy approved by voters in 2019, the department will add five new police officers, a detective and a sergeant downtown this year. That’s on top of the existing staff of 10 officers, two sergeants, a detective, a lieutenant and a captain. The Spokane County Sheriff’s Office also plans to base two deputies at the precinct.

Coupled with the increase in staffing, city officials have pledged to dedicate additional resources to community policing, resulting in more officers on bicycle and foot patrols, interacting with the community one on one.

Five new social workers will join the two already staffing the Behavior Health Unit at the downtown precinct. The Behavioral Health Unit co-deploys law enforcement officers with mental health professionals..

The city’s law enforcement efforts downtown will continue to be supplemented by the private security force deployed by the Downtown Spokane Partnership, which represents and advocates for the interest of downtown businesses.

The data

At a committee meeting this month, Burke pleaded with fellow council members and administration officials for evidence that adding new police officers and relocating the police precinct would make Spokane safer.

Although she has been alone in voicing skepticism of the city’s plan, she’s not the first to question whether more officers make a city safer.

A 2014 analysis of community-oriented policing published in the Journal of Experimental Criminology found that studies of the practice generally showed improvements to the perception of police and public safety, but made little difference in the actual crime rate.

The Downtown Spokane Partnership has advocated for a precinct in the downtown core and points to the precipitous decline of crime in New York City in recent years as evidence of the value of increased police presence and aggressive enforcement of low-level crimes.

“Why here? This is the highest concentration of commercial office space, employment and retail in the downtown area, so that’s part of the broken windows theory. You have to invest your public resources in those areas,” said Mark Richard, the business group’s president and CEO.

Richard and the Downtown Spokane Partnership back the theories behind “broken windows” and community policing, which are different practices. Broken windows policing refers to the aggressive investigation and enforcement of low-level crimes, while community policing is a policy of proactive public interaction.

It’s the “foundation for community policing,” Richard said of broken windows, adding it’s been proved “100 times over,” where a rise in police staffing correlated with a drop in crime. But broken windows policing has been controversial and the assessments mixed where it’s been implemented. Burke called broken windows policing “classist” and said its negative impacts are disproportionately felt by minorities and the poor.

Under a new policing model, Richard firmly believes people in the community will have a relationship with police and feel comfortable reaching out to them with issues, ultimately leading to a resolution of more crimes.

“If you have law enforcement that’s engaged in a neighborhood such that they have built relationships, that allows them to have a better understanding of what’s going on,” Richard said.

Burke worried about the impact more policing downtown would have on homeless people.

She described a ride-along with police in which they arrested a man who was illegally camping. He had a warrant out for his arrest for failing to appear at court for a previous charge – illegal camping.

“Downtown officers on foot are not the solution. That’s only going to create more barriers for homeless people,” Burke said.

To City Council President Breean Beggs, the benefit of the plan isn’t the addition of officers, it’s how they’re deployed. For the plan to be successful, he said more officers need to be on foot or on bicycle, interacting with people.

Beggs believes police officers would act as social workers, and “if something crazy arises, they do have guns and handcuffs.”

City Councilwoman Lori Kinnear views the model similarly and imagines police officers approaching people on the street not merely to dish out tickets or shoo them along, but to help. More officers are for the betterment of everyone, Kinnear said, particularly homeless women who are “in danger every single moment they’re on the street.”

Dainen Penta, executive director of the Center for Justice, said his organization is always watching for police harassment. It receives complaints about interactions with police, particularly with homeless people.

Penta said there are many situations in which police don’t need to cite or ticket somebody to refer them to community court, which connects people with social services providers.

The cost

The city will sign a 10-year lease on the 6,800-square-foot space. It plans to invest $295,000 on upgrades to the facility, which needs to be brought in line with the needs of a police department.

The monthly lease payment will begin at $12,979 in year one, with a 3% annual increase baked into the agreement. The city can opt to withdraw from the lease after seven years.

To Burke, that’s “a load of money we can be using elsewhere.”

“There’s so many more urgent things we could be doing right now,” she said.

Penta agrees.

“It’s funny to us that the city often will say ‘we don’t have enough money to fund things on a long range,’ but they have found money to move the downtown precinct office,” Penta said.

But Richard dismisses that argument, noting it’s one Burke makes regularly on a variety of city expenditures. Investing the money allocated for the downtown precinct into social programs isn’t going to solve homelessness or alleviate addiction in the community, he argued.

“Governing is not a two-dimensional game. It isn’t an ‘either or.’ It’s an ‘and,’ ” Richard said.

Kinnear notes it wasn’t free to maintain the old precinct space, which would have needed to be remodeled to accommodate the additional police officers joining the downtown precinct.

Gauging success

Spokane Police Chief Craig Meidl told The Spokesman-Review last month the department would look at three main measures to judge the precinct’s impact: the number of reported crimes, the number of arrests and the less-tangible perception of public safety.

The Downtown Spokane Partnership will also look for reduced crime but wants to see increased public use of the downtown, a growth in business and an increase in the number of people who live downtown.

Kinnear wants to look at crime statistics but also wants to hear from focus groups. With 50 people around a table providing an “unfiltered opinion of something, you’re going to get a pretty accurate cross section,” she said.

Beggs isn’t necessarily interested in a baseline study and wonders how one would be done. But he does want to hear feedback from the community, including the homeless, once the policing plan is active.

The politics

Beggs co-sponsored a resolution calling for a new downtown precinct last year when he was still a council member representing the South Hill district and a candidate for council president. He is trying to respect different constituencies with different experiences downtown. He has his own experiences, too, having worked as an attorney downtown since 2004.

But Burke said her requests for more information about the downtown precinct were about protecting the rights of all people in the city, including those who find themselves on the streets.

“I’m not in politics to build relationships with people, I’m in politics to make changes,” Burke said. “Once you step over the line of human rights, I won’t be quiet.

“(Beggs) understands officers are not the answer to the problems we have.”

As he ran for City Council president last year, Beggs pitched himself to voters as a diplomatic leader who could strike compromise. The precinct is one of them.

There are people who would like to implement far more aggressive, “draconian” policing to clean up downtown, Beggs said. With the new downtown precinct and increased visibility of police, “maybe these people who are calling for those types of things, which I think are super unproductive, will maybe relax a little bit,” Beggs said.

Beggs hopes the city can “find that sweet spot in the middle where everyone can feel OK downtown, including people who have a history of being traumatized by police.”