Cheney's emergency needs and challenges

Increases in booking fees and emergency response times, combined with the potential for a large turnover in command personnel are three of the challenges faced by the Cheney Police Department in its 2019 budget.

The department was recently blindsided by a memo from Spokane County informing them that booking fees at the county jail would be increasing by 30 percent in 2019. Cheney Police Chief John Hensley told the City Council during his budget presentation at the Nov. 13 meeting that the increase was so “out of the blue” that the department didn’t find out about it until its $3.262 million bu...