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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Park Place Incorporation Effort Folds Due To Disinterest

One of the five efforts to form small cities in the Spokane Valley is dead.

Ray Perry, leader of a group that wanted to create a city of 9,000 people called Park Place, said this week his group had abandoned the cause.

Lack of interest is the reason, Perry said. Proponents were having trouble getting people to sign petitions in support of the city, and many business owners within the proposed boundaries were ambivalent, he said.

“People just don’t want to do it,” Perry said. “There’s more opposition than anything.”

Park Place would have surrounded the town of Millwood on three sides and included about half the Yardley industrial area in the far west Valley.

The lack of interest is not surprising.

Residents in the area have given efforts to form a single Valley city cool receptions in past elections.

In 1994, only 44 percent of the voters in Park Place said yes to the incorporation of a single city.

In May of this year, that number dropped to 41 percent.

“It’s not total apathy, but it’s close,” Perry said.

Another of the efforts may be in trouble.

Susan Winchell, a planner with the state Boundary Review Board for Spokane County, said she’s heard that interest in the Hillcrest Park campaign also is waning.

That proposal calls for a city of 20,000 in the southern portion of the Valley, to include the Chester and Ponderosa neighborhoods.

Jon Trechter Jr., a chemist and leader of the Hillcrest Park movement, refused to discuss the future of his campaign.

“It’s not a matter that’s open to discussion at this point,” Trechter said. “I have no comment.”

Residents in Hillcrest Park have overwhelmingly rejected past incorporation attempts.

In 1994, 40 percent of voters in the area supported a single Valley city. Last year, 36 percent did.

The three other incorporation campaigns - Opportunity, Evergreen and Dishman - are still alive.

Proponents have until late December to gather the signatures of 10 percent of the registered voters living within the proposed cities to qualify for an election.

It’s unclear what would happen to those campaigns if county residents vote Nov. 7 to combine Spokane’s city and county governments.

Three times since 1990, Valley voters have rejected incorporation.

, DataTimes