In brief: Three contractors vying for public facilities work

Three Spokane-area construction companies will compete for a contract to expand the Spokane Convention Center and adjacent riverbank area.

The Spokane Public Facilities District Board plans to choose the winning contractor by April, one year after voters approved a 90,000-square-foot expansion of the Convention Center.

The three design and construction teams are Garco Construction, ALSC Architects and LMN Architects; Lydig Construction and Integrus Architecture; and YLK-JV and Bernardo Wills Architects.

Voters last April approved extensions of two taxes to finance $65 million in work at the Convention Center, Centennial Trail and Spokane Arena.

At the Spokane Arena, officials have decided to replace existing seating with new space-saving seats that will allow for increased capacity from 11,447 to more than 12,000, meeting the NCAA’s minimum seating requirement for future men’s basketball tournaments. Replacing all the seats will save $400,000 from what was originally budgeted for the project, the district said.

Previously, the board had planned to pay for addition of seats on the upper portion of the west end of the Arena near the scoreboard.

Seating work will begin in late summer, the release said.

Mike Prager

Man with pants down tries to enter home

A man with his pants pulled down to his ankles tried to enter a South Hill home early Sunday.

The Spokane Police Department issued a public safety bulletin about the incident, which took place in the area of 31st Avenue and Manito Boulevard.

The man, described as a white male in his 20s, between 5 feet 8 inches and 5 feet 10 inches tall with a thin build, wore a two-tone jacket with a horizontal swoosh on the back, medium dark pants and a stocking cap with a fuzzy ball on top. Police said he didn’t knock on the door of the home but tried to open the door while his pants and underwear were pushed down to his ankles.

The resident looked out the bedroom window and spotted the man running to a stopped car. The man slipped in the snow and got into the passenger side of the car, which left heading west on 31st Avenue.

The resident followed footprints in the snow and said it appeared the man had approached about 15 to 20 other houses in the neighborhood, according to the police bulletin. The tracks ended at 29th Avenue and Bernard Street.

Anyone with information about the man is asked to call Crime Check at (509) 456-2233.

Lisa Leinberger