S-R reports new police guild contract won’t include investigatory powers for Ombudsman.
In its Sunday edition, the Spokesman-Review is reporting what, for the past ten days, has been the most conspicuously withheld detail of the tentative deal reached between the Mayor’s office and the Spokane Police Guild. Did the city secure independent investigative authority for its police ombudsman, or not?
The answer, according to the newspaper, is no.
The S-R is reporting that City Adminstrator Ted Danek said the ombudsman’s role “was 
discussed” in the recently concluded negotiations but resulted in no changes to the previous contract on the ombudsman’s powers. The article doesn’t disclose whether Danek or Mayor Mary Verner were disappointed that the guild didn’t agree to the change. The mayor had previously made clear that she doesn’t believe the ombudmsan’s office needs independent investigative authority, in part because the new ombudsman, Tim Burns, has yet to tell her he needs it.
The issue is clearly a political hot potato. Public demands for an ombudsman who can conduct independent investigations are driven by recent high profile cases of alleged police misconduct. Moreover, city officials had clearly encouraged citizen activists to patiently accept an initial, watered-down ombudsman ordinance last year arguing that the time to seek independent investigative authority was when the city opened new negotiations with the police guild this year.
Last month, a unanimous council responded to the appeals of citizen organizations, including the Center for Justice, and adopted a resolution calling on the mayor to seek independent investigative powers for the ombudsman in the new contract with the guild. The resolution passed even as the longest serving member of the current council, Al French, warned proponents that it would accomplish nothing.
“My fear for this resolution is that it’s going to create a false sense of hope for people,” French said. “You’re going to think that the minute we pass this, something miraculous is going to change. Nothing is going to change. I would bet that there’s not a council member on this council that hasn’t shared with the mayor what their individual desires are with regard to independence for the ombudsman. So, the mayor is not going to hear anything after we take this vote that she hasn’t already heard. Our city charter clearly places the responsibility for union negotiation solely in the hands of the Mayor, period. We can sit up here and pass resolutions until we get tired of pushing the button, and it doesn’t change the mayor’s authority to do what she decides she wants to do.”Any hope that French was wrong were dimmed on November 11th. That was the day the Mayor announced the city had reached an agreement with the guild that included wage concessions that would save 12 police department positions next year but at the same time, according to the S-R, she “declined” to comment on whether the agreement included new powers for the ombudsman.
–CFJ
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