Tenino Police Chief Don Moody addresses an audience at Tenino High School in December 2016.
At this time last year, the Tenino Police Department was on the brink of collapse with only one officer and no police chief.
“We were down to nothing,” said Tenino Mayor Wayne Fournier. “Our vehicles were barely on the road. We were kind of barely hanging on by a wing and a prayer.”
What a difference a year makes.
The Tenino Police Department is starting 2017 on much stronger footing, with a full roster of officers and its first new vehicles in 20 years.
“The rebuilding process we’ve gone through for the past eight months, we’ve accomplished a lot and we’re really proud of it,” said Chief Don Moody, who took the helm at the department in May after previously working for the city of Yelm.
On Saturday, the police department plans to celebrate what Fournier called a “new beginning” with a meet and greet starting at 11 a.m. to show off its two new officers and three brand new Ford Interceptor SUVs.
The celebration comes only a few days after the 39th anniversary of the line-of-duty death of Tenino Police Office John Dowies, who died Jan. 18, 1978. While the timing was accidental, Fournier said he appreciates the coincidence.
My grandpa was chief then,” he said. “It’s kind of really special for us to plant the flag on Saturday and say the police department is not going anywhere.”
Tenino’s two newest police recruits — Craig Klumper, who most recently worked as a corrections officer for the Lewis County Jail, and Jonathan White, a Graham resident currently in training at the law enforcement academy — will bring Tenino’s police force up to three full-time officers and Moody.
On Tuesday, Moody said the SUVs, purchased for about $120,000 total, were just about to receive their city of Tenino decals.
“All my officers are really excited,” he said.
The city had previously bought used vehicles from the Washington State Patrol in the past, but recently bought three brand new vehicles.
Moody said the city researched the issue and found it spent up to $110,000 in the past five to seven years on repairs and parts for its used vehicles.
“They’re money pits because they’re so high mileage you just end up throwing money at them,” Fournier said.
The new vehicles will also improve officer safety, he said.
“The police department is an important part of our community and we’re going to make investments in that,” he said.
Moody declined to take sole credit for the improvements at the small police department.
“It wasn’t me alone,” He said. “I don’t want anybody to sit here and say the chief did all this stuff.”
However, he and city officials and staff spent the better part of 2016 literally and metaphorically cleaning out the station, or “cleaning the decay away so new growth could begin,” as Moody put it.
He said he had to clear away a 20-year backlog of evidence, old computers and vehicle parts from the station, along with other detritus from the past two decades. The department has also updated its policies and procedures
“It’s just a very exciting time for the whole city,” Moody said.
In the next year, Moody said he’s looking forward to continuing to implement the changes to the department, training its new officers and exploring the department’s role in emergency management and area schools.
