Broadmoore Park site of tree party
A tree planting party is planned for Oct. 14 at the new Broadmoore Park in Hayden. Community members are invited to learn the basics of tree planting at 9 a.m., followed by practice an hour later.
Parks commission member Gary Fleshman-Kubodera said the park has been in the works for nearly three years. The park is located between Prairie and Hayden avenues on Atlas Road.
Post Falls
Third to be closed for sewer work
Third Avenue will be closed in Post Falls on Friday between Henry and Post streets for sewer work.
The closure will last from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Traffic will be detoured to Second Avenue.
Spokane
Police say man ‘grabbed’ girl
Spokane police Wednesday arrested a man they said had “grabbed” a 5-year-old girl at a grocery store.
The suspect, Spokane resident Richard P. Becka, 55, was booked into jail on suspicion of third-degree child assault.
Becka let go of the girl when her parents called police, Sgt. Tom Lee said.
“At this time, we do not believe Becka was trying to kidnap the child,” Lee said in a press release. “However, the investigation will continue.”
Lee said the incident occurred at the Albertsons store at Northwest Boulevard and Maple Street. Becka followed the family into the store and grabbed the girl after trying several times to strike up a conversation with the family, Lee said.
Becka left the store on foot, but the parents followed him while directing police with a cell phone, Lee said.
The girl was unharmed.
Olympia
Driving schools ordered to close
The Washington Department of Licensing moved Wednesday to close 41 driving schools, including the Quality Driving School in Spokane Valley, unless their owner sells them.
All 41 are owned by Pierce County resident Gary Probst.
According to a Department of Licensing press release, Probst is ineligible to own the schools because of guilty pleas in a general court-martial on charges of signing false documents, wrongfully appropriating government property, wearing unauthorized decorations and falsifying a claim.
Probst is also facing a felony charge of evading sales tax payments on 15 vehicle purchases.
Students now enrolled in the schools can finish their courses, as long as they are completed by the end of the year.
“They’re probably getting training that meets the bare state minimum,” said Licensing Department spokesman Brad Benfield of students enrolled in Probst’s schools.
Probst has until Feb. 15 to sell the schools and relinquish all financial interest in them.
His daughter, Malia Orbino, has also agreed to relinquish her driver training school licenses in the 19 schools they partner in and to not reapply for driving school licenses for 10 years.
The schools’ new owners, however, would have to reapply for the school licenses.
Spokane
17th Avenue closed for repairs
Seventeenth Avenue will be closed today between Perry and Hogan streets for water line repairs.
Traffic will be detoured to neighboring streets.
Seattle
Museum to return statue to tribe
A sculpture depicting what tribal lore says was a Canadian Indian tribe’s first male ancestor is being returned to British Columbia. The sculpture has spent a century at the University of Washington’s Burke Museum.
The 4-foot-tall granite sculpture depicts the medicine man T’xweltse (Til-wil-aht-sah), who was turned to stone thousands of years ago, according to the Chilliwack Tribe’s history.
It was taken from the tribe in 1892 and displayed for a time at a dime-store museum. It was donated to the Burke Museum in 1904.
The Chilliwacks, part of the Sto:lo Nation of Canada, enlisted the help of Washington state’s Nooksack Tribe to claim the stone under the Native American Graves Repatriation Act.
Last year, the Nooksacks filed a formal claim asking that Stone T’xweltse be returned as “an object of cultural patrimony.”