It’s never business as usual at Sequim PD

It’s never business as usual at Sequim PD Published on Wed, Aug 23, 2007 by Robert Spinks, Sequim (WA) Police Chief http://www.sequimgazette.com/spinks www.ci.sequim.wa.us/police

Editor's note: Today begins a monthly column written by Robert L. Spinks, chief of the Sequim police department. Its purpose is to inform Sequim Gazette readers about crime and law enforcement issues that lie behind our routine police and courts coverage.

Fall is in the air, school is back in session and the Summer visitors have returned home. It’s a time in Sequim when we can look forward to less crowded streets, quiet nights and an absence of loitering teenage crowds by the Transit Center.

However, as our community continues to grow and draw more new city residents we see that ground has broken for the largest apartment complex in Sequim with 173 apartments

that could easily bring over 400 new residents. Across the street is the site of the new Cineplex Center that will draw 250,000 new vehicle trips into town.

With the rapid growth of Sequim and its ever evolving status as a regional retail trade center, it is no surprise that the Sequim Police Department has seen double digit increases in calls for police service in recent years.

In 2006, 13,057 total incidents were handled by the local police – roughly one incident every 40 minutes, 24 hours of every day. The trend for 2007 is showing a slower growth in demand for police services with total incidents estimated to just crest 14,000 this year.

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I’m hoping that a combination of expanded police visibility in town, a proactive approach to responding to crime combined with our crime prevention efforts, a close working relationship with our regional narcotics task force, the roll out of a new Detective Unit this past March and a Traffic Safety Unit in October will push and prevent the double-digit increases in crime that the past two years brought.

Already we are seeing our Detectives clearing up more cases with successful arrests than ever before!

that all truck traffic is being operated in compliance with all safety and regulatory requirements. This is another program designed to enhance the safety of our community’s streets.

You’ll see the announcement of our new traffic safety program called, “Target ZERO.” We’re teaming up with the Washington State Patrol and the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office to target our enforcement efforts at driving violations that have been associated with injury and fatal collisions in the Sequim area.

We’ve assigned a Sergeant full-time to coordinate our traffic safety efforts that includes directed patrols, over-time enforcement, and the roll-out of a new enforcement focus – commercial vehicles.

The Sequim Police Department has now trained 3 officers as Commercial Vehicle Enforcement Officers (CVEO), so that along with their regular duties, we will now begin inspecting commercial trucks to ensure that heavy vehicles are safe and secure on both state, county and city streets. Because the WSP has only one Trooper dedicated to CEVO duties, the odds are against the driving public Page 2 of 2