Spokane, Wash. ? Now we know how Reno feels.

The cable channel that televises the cop-show spoof “Reno 911!” has a new comedy called “Dog Bites Man.” It is set at fictional KHBX-TV of Spokane, and pokes brutal fun at the excesses of local television newscasts – which can range from apocalyptic warnings about pending storms to breathless reports of traffic backlogs that are already over.

The show- which airs on Wednesdays at 9:30 p.m. CDT – has not been embraced by Spokanites.

Jeanna Hofmeister, a local tourism executive, said she was contacted by “Dog Bites Man” producers to help find a television studio where they could conduct interviews for a documentary on the media.

Suspicious after seeing articles from Southern California about how the “Dog Bites Man” crew was duping people there into mock interviews with the show’s characters, she asked the producers if they were planning to do the same in Spokane.

“They never called me back,” Hofmeister said.

In the program, which started in early June and is scheduled for 10 episodes this season, the actors present themselves as legitimate reporters during interviews with real people. It isn’t until the interview is over that people realize the crew is part of a comedy show.

This undated photo provided by Comedy Central shows actors, from left, Andrea Savage, Matt Walsh, A.D. Miles and Zach Galifianakis as the employees of fictional Spokane, Wash., TV station KHBX in the new Comedy Central show called Dog

Executives at KREM-TV, worried the show was too realistic, aired a report urging people not to confuse the phony station with any real news organization in town.

Ginny Whitehouse, who teaches journalism at Whitworth College in Spokane, said the show’s producers asked her to provide students for what she was told would be a documentary on the media literacy of young people.

She was going to participate until she read an article in the local newspaper about the show. Whitehouse does not find it at all funny to try and dupe people with fake interviews that are “mean-spirited.”

Oregon’s attorney general’s office has sent two letters to the network, complaining about a “Dog Bites Man” crew that filmed at Portland State University in May under the guise of doing a documentary on media.

“Dog” creator-executive producer Dan Mazer, whose credits include “Da Ali G Show,” has never set foot in Spokane and knows little about the city. But he does pronounce the name correctly – “Spoe-KAN,” instead of “Spoe-kane.”

Mazer said the producers were made to feel so unwelcome in the city of 200,000 that they filmed exteriors in Portland, Ore., instead.