Letter explains early education cuts
Gov. Butch Otter sent a letter to the co-chairs of the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee on Monday responding to legislative inquiries about cuts he’s making in several early childhood programs, including Parents as Teachers.
Otter said in the letter that the decision to eliminate federal welfare funds for “Generation of the Child” programs was “difficult,” but driven by concerns over rules for spending the federal funds.
JFAC members were given copies of the letter and briefed on it while on a bus tour in north central Idaho, but took no immediate action on it. “We just listened and that was the end of it,” said House Appropriations Chairwoman Maxine Bell, R-Jerome.
Sen. Joyce Broadsword, R-Sagle, said, “I am pleased that the governor has acknowledged that it is a valuable program.” Broadsword said she remains hopeful that some alternative funding for Parents as Teachers can be identified.
Post Falls
Open house focus is transportation
The public is invited to an open house Wednesday in Post Falls about transportation issues and projects in the Rathdrum Prairie and Spokane Valley.
The open house will be 5 to 7 p.m. at the Post Falls Public Library, 821 N. Spokane St., with the Kootenai Metropolitan Planning Organization and Spokane Regional Transportation Council.
The agencies are conducting a transportation study in an area that includes Sullivan Road in Spokane Valley, Highway 41 in Post Falls, State Route 290 and the ridge along Mica Peak.
The open house will address the study’s boundaries, upcoming projects and the effects of future growth.
For more information, visit www.kmpo.net or call 1-800-698-1927.
Billings
Woman waives extradition hearing
A woman held in the Yellowstone County jail on a probation violation agreed Monday to return to Idaho on first-degree murder charges.
Tyrah Brown, 25, waived extradition proceedings on a warrant issued by authorities in Bonner County.
She was arrested recently in Florida on a Yellowstone County warrant for probation violations. The first-degree murder warrant from Bonner County was issued after she was returned to Montana from Florida.
The warrant also charges Brown with theft.
She is charged in Yellowstone County with violating the conditions of her probation from a 2003 felony escape conviction.
Idaho authorities allege Brown and her husband, Keith Allen Brown, shot 48-year-old Leslie Carlton Breaw of Priest Lake, Idaho, to death on Jan. 23. Keith Brown is in custody in Idaho on the murder charge.
In an April telephone interview with the Daily Bee newspaper from jail, Keith Brown said the shooting was an accident. He said he was trying to get control of a .22-caliber rifle held by Breaw and the man was shot in the struggle. Brown said he also was shot in the leg.
Keith Brown was arrested in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., on March 20, accused of using Breaw’s debit card, and was returned to Idaho.
Tyrah Brown, picked up at the same time, was sent to Montana on the probation warrant.
– From staff reports