Kennewick Police Gives the Lowdown on Stay-at-Home Order

There have been a lot of questions concerning the "Stay Home, Stay Healthy" order and the Kennewick Police Department is getting swarmed with questions. They've luckily broken down all of your questions and answers into a simple press release.

KPD Lieutenant Aaron Clem prepared this statement:

With Governor Inslee's "Stay Home, Stay Health" order announced last night we are receiving several inquiries about what enforcement of the order will look like and what the role of law enforcement will be. During this trying time in our State, enforcement means engagement and education.

Law enforcement's primary role is to help educate people about how to comply with orders to stay at home.  We are not being asked to detain, arrest, ticket or establish checkpoints for compliance.  Any rumors of strict law enforcement or "martial law" are not true.

We view our role more as one of education. Educating residents on how to keep themselves safe, how to keep their families safe and most importantly, to keep the rest of the community safe, especially our vulnerable populations. When officers encounter people not complying with an order, we will remind them, as appropriate, of the recommendation and restrictions.
We understand some people need to carry out essential services such as:
Safety and security
Food, water, shelter
Health and medical
Energy (power and fuel)
Communications
Transportation

Any rumors of individuals or businesses needing "passes" or "licenses" to conduct essential services are not true.

Our community has shown they understand the severity of the situation and are doing all they can already to keep themselves, their families and neighbors safe and healthy.

Concerning Governor Inslee’s “Stay Home, Stay Healthy” order, no law enforcement agencies have any desire to make any arrests or take anybody to jail for violations.

Rest assured, we will continue to serve you every minute of every day and as other crimes are committed within the City of Kennewick we will always enforce the laws that keep people safe.

For more information on Washington State’s response to the coronavirus please see their website here.

To see a list of “Essential Critical Infrastructure Workers” click here

If we all follow some common sense, we should all be fine and hopefully, this will all blow over in the next few weeks and things can get back to normal. Be Healthy!