Rising crime not just a Tri-City, WA problem. More boots on the ground desperately needed

After a recent string of Tri-City homicides, it’s no wonder citizens are feeling uneasy.

The tragic shooting at the Richland Fred Meyer in early February shocked the community, and at the time we said the crime had cast a shadow making the Tri-Cities feel less safe than before.

The tragedy felt too close to home — any one of us could have been in the wrong aisle at the wrong time.

But since that terrible day, there’s been an unsettling flow of reported shootings and property crimes that have added to citizen concerns. There is a sense that the Tri-Cities is changing, and big-city issues like crime are becoming growing problems.

With five Kennewick homicides in two weeks and a skyrocketing number of car thefts plaguing the community, the past few months have become worrisome.

So it’s helpful to get a little perspective on what is likely going on.

First of all, this uptick in illegal activity is not unique to the Tri-Cities. It’s happening all over Washington state and across the country.

On a national scale, gun deaths have “climbed sharply” in recent years, according to the Pew Research Center. In 2020, the reported 19,384 gun murders were the most since 1968.

Taking into account America’s growing population and looking at the statistics from a per capita basis, there were 13.6 gun deaths per 100,000 people in 2020 — the highest rate since the mid-1990s, the Pew report said.

In Eastern Washington’s largest city, the crime rate has spiked so high that Spokane officials are organizing a new task force to address the rise in gun violence and related crimes.

There were 40 shootings in Spokane in the first few months of 2022, according to the Spokesman Review.

To compare, there were 52 shootings in Spokane in all of 2019, and 91 shootings in 2020, the Spokesman said. But in 2021, there were 151 shootings, and Spokane officials fear that this year could be just as bad or worse.

Unfortunately, the Tri-Cities — particularly Kennewick — is also seeing troubling trends.

While criminal activity fluctuates, the first quarter statistics in Kennewick show violent crime was nearly double an average year.

Property crimes jumped nearly 60% compared to the same period last year — driven by vehicle thefts along with increases in stolen property and vandalism.

Kennewick is the only Tri-City agency able to provide a quarterly update on crime statistics. And while Pasco and Benton County officials said they have not seen the same jump in violent crimes, they are being hit by a rash of stolen cars.

While Spokane is creating a new squad to handle its rise in certain crimes, the Kennewick Police Department won’t have to start from scratch.

Its special task force has been around a long time — it just hasn’t been able to function for several months.

Kennewick Lt. Jason Kiel told the Tri-City Herald that its Crime Apprehension Team (CAT) has been around for more than 15 years, but a shortage of officers has meant that members of that group have had to be pulled away for patrol duties.

But he said that in a matter of weeks there should be enough new officers on the force that the CAT will resume, however.

Kiel said that the bump in illegal activity likely isn’t from a rise in new people committing crimes. It is likely chronic offenders — a small group breaking laws over and over again. Soon, though, CAT will be organized again and will be working to get these criminals off the street.

Legislative changes in how police can respond to certain crimes have been blamed, in part, for the increase in crime throughout Washington state. Some of those were fixed this past session, but there is still some that need to be worked through.

Even so, more officers on duty are bound to help. It’s time to turn those rising crime rates around, and here’s hoping programs like CAT and the new Spokane task force will make the difference.