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March 12, 2011 in City
Commissioner French touts fiscal health of Spokane County
The state of Spokane County isn’t as bad as it might have been and things are looking up, county commission Chairman Al French said Friday.
French told some 215 business and civic leaders that Spokane County finished 2010 in better financial condition than other counties in the state and the nation.
The county’s current budget was adopted with minimal use of reserves, French said in his State of the County address at a breakfast meeting of Greater Spokane Incorporated at the Mirabeau Park Hotel and Convention Center in Spokane Valley.
The county’s solid financial position enabled it to get a best-in-the-nation 2.75 percent interest rate last year on bonds to build a new $167 million sewage treatment plant. The lower-than-expected rate will save ratepayers $20 million, French said.
He said some people worried unnecessarily last fall – when he defeated incumbent Democrat Bonnie Mager – that having three “good-looking Republican men” as commissioners would eliminate disagreements.
French said he and Commissioners Todd Mielke and Mark Richard have disagreed twice, “and I’ve forgiven them both for being wrong.”
Actually, French said, Mielke and Richard have moved the county forward despite declining revenues. He cited efforts to overcome regulatory obstacles to the new sewage treatment plant and to overhaul the criminal justice system, among others.
Spokane County’s economy suffered because of housing industry problems elsewhere in the nation, and recovery of the industry should be a tonic, French said.
He said county commissioners won’t consider any fees that could impede the recovery, and they have “started the process of adjusting some of our zoning regulations to make us more business-friendly without jeopardizing our quality of life.”
Lean government budgets are here to stay, French said. All the county financial charts he showed his audience pointed down except the one for expenses.
“We need to be more aggressive in our pursuit of regional partnerships” to reduce costs, French said.
He said county officials have identified a “lucky 13” list of programs that are good candidates for regionalization.
They are: animal control, building permits, code enforcement, emergency dispatch, fire service, geographic information systems, law enforcement, libraries, parks, purchasing, road maintenance, snow removal, and solid waste collection and disposal.
If parks had been regionalized, Spokane and Spokane County wouldn’t have built water parks so close together that revenue “went down the drain faster than the water,” French said.
Spokane County Library District Director Mike Wirt said he was surprised to find libraries on the “lucky” list.
“I’m going to follow up with him,” Wirt said.
He said the district and Spokane Public Libraries studied consolidation last year – when library consolidation was on Spokane Mayor Mary Verner’s list – “and it didn’t pan out.”
Spokane spokeswoman Marlene Feist said she saw nothing on French’s consolidation list that city officials haven’t also considered.
“It’s great to have local government partners that want to look at this,” Feist said.
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Pat O'Leary on March 12 at 1:32 p.m.
Gee whiz, Al seemed to have missed a couple problems that may affect his rosey prognostications for our financial future.
We have the “Bigelow Gulch Road debacle”, a name coined by the Spokesman-Review, which may cost this county up to $19.7 million in denied federal funds. This, of course, was brought on by widespread abusive and inconsistent treatment of landowners by county agents. All of this was done on the watch of Richard and Mielke
Then, we also have the ongoing mess at the Spokane Raceway Park, which entails the debt of $1.2 that is owed to various contractors. Apparently, we must absorb this unauthorized debt for Bucky Austin, the ordained Raceway Park manager of Richard and Mielke.
There was also the tragic death of a contractor at the raceway, which I think we can assume, will entail a large lawsuit against the county for running an unsafe facility, this also happening with Bucky in charge
All of these problems were caused by, or a result of, incompetence by French’s pals on the commission….the two “good-looking Republican men” that he claims are doing such a stellar job. Keep up the good work, men. With you in charge, we can’t fail.
mistykira on March 12 at 8:44 p.m.
I would have to agree Pat, and now that Al has joined the other two there is no one there to speak out against the wasting of tax dollars and the gutting of land use laws. They are just three peas in a pod and not a conservative among them. French has even changed his tune and has flip flopped AGAIN and is now singing the Raceway’s praises just like his buds. Let’s see, he was for it before he was against it (to win the election) and now he is for it again. Unfortunately the real state of the county is not good and getting worse with the “Three Amigos” in charge. Spokane just can’t afford”conservatives” like French, Mielke and Richard–no matter how good looking they think they are.
yellowcat on March 13 at 9:46 a.m.
Unraveling the County’s regulations for the benefit of the business community will be good for our county? For who? The developers/corporations or the people who live here? That’s what Mr. French promised in his campaign — he would get rid of regulations. Sounds like he is sticking to that promise.
Spokane County’s criminal justice system has NOT been overhauled. The County has plans for a 1400 bed, $300 million jail but that is not an overhaul of the criminal justice system. In the $1.5 million report to the County, David Bennett said in his report, Spokane County Corrections Needs Assessment Master Plan Draft, available at http://www.spokanecounty.org/loaddoc.aspx?docid=1609
that Spokane has the most “Inefficient Criminal Justice system I’ve ever seen”. That assessment goes way beyond building a jail. No jail can be built until the recommendations by the jail consultant hired by the County are adopted by the County. We do not need a new jail; we need a new justice system. Read the executive summary in this master plan draft. The jail will cost each household $2000. It costs $11,000 per year to educate a student in school district 81; costs $48,000 to house someone in the Spokane County jail for a year. How do you want to spend your tax dollars? With violent crime in Spokane County is down 24% from 1995 to 2009, and with alternatives to incarceration, there are alternatives to building a new jail.
“Recovery of the housing industry should be a tonic.” That tonic is ten years out by estimates I read.
Note the audience for Al French’s speech. Reminds me of the comments I heard on a CNBC news clip with Larry Kudlow this morning that the Tokyo earthquake was good for the U.S. economy because the stock market didn’t slide. Can we think beyond profits to the business community? Shoud we we worry about quality of life or the tax burden of the PEOPLE that live in this County?
Regionalization worries me also. Compare the justice system of the Spokane municipal courts and the Spokane County. The municipal judges are making huge strides in reducing jail time, in using driver-relicensing programs as an alternative to jail time, in work crews, etc. What would the County do if they were in charge? I think they would build a bigger jail.
I worry that the county would close down libraries because they do not benefit GSI.