Medical Lake renews court agreement with Cheney

Medical Lake will continue to hold its court in the city of Cheney.

At its Dec. 20 meeting, the City Council renewed the city’s interlocal agreement with Cheney for municipal court services and facilities.

City Administrator Doug Ross said the agreement is for five years and will cost the city $59,000 annually with inflators included. Inflators are adjustments to cost of service if case filings increase or decrease by more than 20 percent from 2016. Terri Cooper, Cheney Municipal Court’s administrator/commissioner who oversees Medical Lake court services, said there were 280 case filings for Medical Lake this year. This was an increase from 156 in 2015 and the most since 2012, which had 231.

Councilwoman Jessica Roberts asked Cooper if council could receive a breakdown of the cases that were filed in Medical Lake. Cooper said her office could provide those numbers. City Attorney Cynthia McMullen added that misdemeanors and gross misdemeanor cases remain in Medical Lake.

When Roberts asked about the increase case filings, McMullen explained that many of the filings come from Eastern State Hospital and incidents at the facility were “not being reported for a period of time.”

“The other thing is we’ve had more traffic enforcement in the city,” McMullen added.

In other items, council approved a five-year public defender services contract with Sean O’Quinn at a cost of $12,000 a year. The public defender contract was included in the city’s agreement with Cheney. However, McMullen said public defenders cannot be hired by the courts and “must be done under a separate contract.”

“Mr. O’Quinn is doing a great job,” McMullen said.

McMullen added that the contract does not cover co-defendant or conflict public defenders. The court will appoint a conflict public defender for $250 a case.

Council also appointed Mayor John Higgins as the city’s representative for the Spokane Transit Authority board of directors. Councilwoman Elizabeth Rosenbeck will serve as the alternate.

In old business, council approved the second reading of an ordinance that sets salaries for officers and city employees. Salaried, hourly and part-time employees received a 2 percent increase for 2017.

Al Stover can be reached at [email protected].