Bikes are back: Spokane Valley Police Department reinstates two-wheeled patrollers

For 13 years, Spokane Valley’s police department has been bikeless.

This week, the bikes are back.

“It’s something we’re excited about,” Spokane Valley Police Chief Dave Ellis said. “We think the community will support it.”

Two Spokane Valley Police Department officers will now patrol Appleway Trail, Centennial Trail, Balfour Park and Sullivan Park on bicycles.

There are a few reasons to bring back bike patrols, Ellis said.

For one, there are times when small, nimble bikes can go where comparatively beefy police cruisers can’t.

Bikes are useful when officers need to navigate through and around crowds at events. Bikes also help police respond to incidents along Appleway and Centennial trail.

“It’s hard to get a patrol car back there,” Ellis said. “I think this will have a big impact on addressing some of the issues in the hard-to-patrol areas.”

More people have been camping on city trails and in city parks, Ellis said, and there has been an uptick in reports of suspicious activity and crime in those areas.

Bringing back bikes will give officers a greater ability to respond to incidents in those locations and to help people who are homeless connect to resources, Ellis said.

The two bike patrol officers will work in coordination with Arielle Anderson, who the city recently hired as its housing and homeless coordinator.

Ellis said calls related to homelessness often take more time than an average 911 call, so it will be helpful to set aside officers to specifically handle homelessness issues.

Bringing back bikes won’t mean hiring more police, Ellis said. The two who will be patrolling from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. are school resource officers and part of the police department.

School resource officers work in schools. When school lets out for the summer, they often return to traditional patrol routes. So instead of hiring two new officers for the bike routes, the police department is diverting two school resource officers who would have patrolled in cars. When kids go back to school at the end of the summer, the bike patrol officers will hang up their helmets and return to their school duties.

Ellis said there’s another benefit to putting police officers on bikes: Members of the public are more comfortable approaching an officer on a bike than one in a patrol car. That means more community interaction and engagement with police officers, which Ellis said is important.

City Council members said at their May 11 meeting they like the idea of bringing back the bike patrol.

“It’s a great program,” Spokane Valley Mayor Ben Wick said. “Trails are a big part of Spokane Valley.”