SPOKANE, Wash. — Spokane City Council voted 4-2 in favor of a resolution specifying a community engagement process and timeline for leasing the former East Central Library building.
City council also voted 4-2 on another resolution calling for a police precinct in the East Central neighborhood along the the East Sprague corridor. According to the City of Spokane, this part of the neighborhood is where crime is reported at the highest rate.
“Under these proposals, the East Central Neighborhood can get a medical or mental health clinic on the community center campus and a new police precinct in the part of the neighborhood where most of the crime occurs and is needed,” Council President Breean Beggs said.
This June, Mayor Nadine Woodward announced the former East Central Library would be home to a new police precinct.
The idea gained support from businesses, neighborhood councils, the MLK Center and hundreds of residents that took part in a thought exchange, according to the mayor's office.
"Overwhelmingly, 600 people responded to that thought exchange," Mayor Woodward said. "Overwhelmingly, they wanted police presence, a police precinct in that location."
Council woman Betsy Wilkerson was so upset with the announcement that she organized a protest. She claims the mayor promised council members they would have a say in the location.
"We were asking for a seat at the table to be part of rebuilding East Central," Wilkerson said. "So, this is going to be a precinct. A precinct is not open to the community. It is a locked building."
Wilkerson also challenged the results of the thought exchange that the council itself put on seven months earlier, saying that anyone from any neighborhood could participate.
"We don't know if those are truly the voices of East Central or not," Wilkerson said.
"This has been a polarized issue so it would not surprise me that there was an organized campaign on either side of things at all," Council President Breean Beggs said.
Councilman Jonathan Bingle took issue with claims the results weren't accurate.
"We like the public model when it agrees with what we want and then when it doesn't, we say 'Oh, you know actually we've got to do it again. We didn't have a good enough public process,'" Bingle said.
Wilkerson wants the precinct on East Sprague and says data from Spokane police shows there's more issues with crime in that area. She also believes a healthcare clinic would make better use of the former library.
Councilman Michael Cathcart argues that East Central needs a new precinct now and shopping for a building on East Sprague would take too much time and cost too much money.
"Money does not grow on trees and we don't have any money," Cathcart said. "So, I don't know how were going to buy a building on East Sprague to put a police precinct."
The resolutions council members passed Monday are non-binding. The mayor won't be forced to reconsider a location unless council passes an emergency ordinance next week. That would require five votes, meaning council members Bingle and Cathcart, who voted against tonight's ordinances, would need to be persuaded.
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