Moses Lake examines gangs, city image

MOSES LAKE - A recent Seattle Times feature story prompted a lively city council discussion about Grant County gangs and how local law enforcement agencies are combating the problem.

"The article was very negative on our whole community - the county, the city of Quincy and Moses Lake," Councilman Richard Pearce said about "Gangs in small-town Central Washington," a July 30 article by Seattle freelance writer Claudia Rowe.

Pearce and other council members at the Aug. 8 meeting were bothered by Rowe's depiction of the region as a place where gangs are steadily moving in. The article overemphasized the gang issue and failed to adequately address how local law enforcement agencies are working to curb the problem, Pearce said.

"I wish it would have been a little more represented from the law enforcement side or someone else besides (Rowe) running around looking at these things they claimed they were doing as gang members," he said.

Pearce also felt Rowe gave too much credence to gang members interviewed for the article.

"She took all their testimony as the gospel truth about being legitimate, dyed-in-the-wool gang members and I'm not sure if they were," Pearce said. "I wonder if they were just pot-smoking people who ran around the community and found places to smoke pot."

Mayor Jon Lane said the article was brought to his attention by a number of concerned citizens.

"My response was, I don't doubt that the story she printed was the truth, because she spent some time with a gangster and if you look for those things they're probably there," he said. "But I think that was just part of the story, just half of the story. There are so many more good things that are going on in the community dealing with it."

Moses Lake Police Chief Dean Mitchell expressed his own dissatisfaction with how the community was represented in the story and outlined law enforcement programs geared toward combating gangs. He cited a strong school resource officers program, a new street crime unit consisting of two dedicated police officers and a county-wide task force formed specifically to deal with gang crime.

"One thing I can tell you is that we are not standing idly by," he said.

Grant County Sheriff Tom Jones, who was also at the meeting, concurred with his counterpart in rebuking the article.

"They absolutely took that entire story and made it what they wanted to sensationalize based on a couple of young individuals that drove them around the city of Moses Lake and the rural surrounding communities," he said. "We're just going to continue to work forward in a positive manner and closely with the city of Moses Lake to curb this issue."

While she agreed much is being done, Councilwoman Karen Liebrecht said the "unflattering" article should not be dismissed outright.

"Nobody wants something negative to be said about their community, but I think we can't turn our nose away from it," she said. "I think we have to deal with the fact that there are problem areas in Moses Lake and Grant County. You can't deny that they're there, but is it a predominant thing in our community? No it's not."

Liebrecht went on to say the article offers the city an opportunity to better publicize their efforts to confront gangs.

"Even though this is a really negative article I think it can be used to our good," she said. "The community has no idea what Moses Lake is doing to combat this. They need to know there are programs out there to deal with this and we are working diligently to rid our community of this. We also need to be more harsh on those groups of people that are determined to live this lifestyle."

Councilman Bill Ecret questioned the timing of the feature story, suggesting it and past news articles reflect badly on the community just when the region is in the running for major projects or new businesses.

"I would just emphasize the fact that our council is working hard to make sure we paint a positive light upon our city," he said. "I would appreciate our citizens would as well stick up for your city and your county and be proud of what you have here because you've got a really nice place to live."