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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

In brief: Three school board seats to be contested in CdA vote

From Staff Reports

Coeur d’Alene voters will decide three contested school board races in the May 21 election. The candidate filing deadline was Friday.

Brent Regan, appointed to the board in December, faces challenger Christa Hazel in Zone 1.

Zone 4 incumbent Ann Seddon, appointed last May, will face challenger Dave Eubanks.

Tom Hearn and Bjorn Handeen are running for an open seat in Zone 5. Jim Hightower, appointed last September, is not running.

Court bailiff appointed to Bonner County Commission

Glen Bailey, a North Idaho court bailiff, was appointed Friday to the Bonner County Commission.

Bailey, of Cocolalla, was chosen by Gov. Butch Otter to fill the seat left vacant by Joyce Broadsword, a former state senator who resigned from the county commission in February to serve as a regional director of Idaho’s Department of Health and Welfare.

Otter chose Bailey over two other candidates picked by the Bonner County Republican Central Committee, including former Commissioner Cornel Rasor.

Bailey is a retired Air Force officer who moved to the Sandpoint area in 2002 to open a financial planning business, according to the governor’s office. He took a job with the Montana Air National Guard from 2004 to 2008, then was hired as a bailiff in Bonner County’s 1st District Court.

House OKs bill making initiative process tougher

BOISE – Only three of 12 North Idaho lawmakers supported it, but legislation to make it tougher to qualify initiatives or referendum measures for the Idaho ballot passed the House on Friday and headed for the governor’s desk.

Reps. Shannon McMillan, R-Silverton; George Eskridge, R-Dover; and Paul Shepherd, R-Riggins, voted in favor of the bill, which passed on a 45-21 vote. It requires signatures from 6 percent of registered voters in at least 18 of Idaho’s 35 legislative districts to qualify a measure for the ballot. The current requirement is just 6 percent statewide.

The Idaho Farm Bureau proposed the bill, saying it would give rural residents more of a voice. Opponents decried it as a move to silence the people’s voice after three historic referendums passed in November.

Examiner says man died from unknown accident

A man initially believed to have been struck and killed by a car has now officially been determined to have died from an accident, according to the Spokane County Medical Examiner’s Office.

However, investigators are still not sure of the type of accident, Spokane County Sheriff’s spokesman Deputy Craig Chamberlin said.

“We are still trying to determine the exact cause of the accident,” Chamberlin said. “Detective Mike Ricketts is still investigating this.”

Michael E. Dressel, 48, was found dead at 5:30 a.m. on Feb. 19. The body was located on a sidewalk near Evergreen Elementary School by a Spokesman-Review newspaper carrier.

Dressel had blood on his body and Spokane County Sheriff’s detectives had initially investigated the case as a homicide. According to his obituary, Dressel worked 25 years for Honeywell Electronics after graduating from Shadle Park High School in 1983.