If you're like most people, you'd list "O Holy Night" as one of your top three Christmas songs.Or at least that's what the pollsters at Zogby International say. (Campaign season is over, and pollsters have to ask about something.)They asked 2,330 adults last month to…
A hand recount of the Airway Heights ballots confirmed that Councilman Patrick Rushing defeated Mayor Matthew Pederson by two votes for the city's top elective spot.Final tally was the same as the machine count: Rushing 281, Pederson 279. There were 33 ballots that didn't have…
Spokane County commissioners shifted the source of funding for the Fox Theater this week but their attorney insisted the original plan to take some money from the county’s share of the hotel-motel tax was legal. Deputy Prosecutor Jim Emacio, the county’s chief civil attorney, said…
A generation after serving in Vietnam, Rep. Walt Minnick sat in the auditorium at West Point Tuesday surrounded by men and women in cadet gray uniforms being told by a president their lives could be sacrificed in another Asian country.“It was an honor to be…
Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich is running for re-election next year, so it's no surprise he was addressing a political group's luncheon Monday afternoon.Considering Knezovich is a Republican, some might be surprised the luncheon was sponsored by the Democrat Professional and Business Group. Even more…
Spokane County will have to come up with a new plan to give money to the renovated Fox Theater. The old plan, to take about $21,000 a year from the county’s share of the hotel-motel tax, isn’t legal, Board Chairman Todd Mielke was told Monday.The…
The results of this month’s Spokane County election were certified on Tuesday, but the counting isn’t over.Elections officials next week will recount by hand votes in the race for Airway Heights mayor.City Councilman Patrick Rushing’s lead over incumbent Mayor Matthew Pederson grew in the latest…
Spin Control will be on Thanksgiving hiatus, which is really just a fancy way of saying it's taking the week off.We'll be counting all the things we're thankful for (from family and friends to work we enjoy, and even the ability to end a phrase…
Northeast Spokane has an electoral problem that needs to be examined after the 2010 Census is complete. The problem isn’t who gets elected, but how few people do the electing.Results from this year’s general election follow a pattern evident in council elections since districts were…
A reader was wondering about lower turnout areas in the city of Spokane, specifically questioning whether the lack of certain candidates on the ballot was responsible for the lower turnout in the city's Northeast Council District, West Central and East Central.Probably not.This is a map…
Saturday Night Live has proved it can take shots at the Obama Administration just as it did at the Bush Admin.For those of you who went to bed at a reasonable hour, and either forgot to set your recorder or pushed the wrong buttons, here's…
A swath of central Spokane – roughly from the river to Wellesley Avenue – may have more women representing it in elective office than any place else in the country.Eastern Washington in general is unique in the country for having women in top offices. No…
Spin Control regularly reports the voter turnout in elections as a gauge of the relative strength of different areas or neighborhoods.But turnout is a percentage of the people who vote divided by the total people registered. Some areas that have high turnout don't have as…
Turnout in the city of Spokane for the Nov. 3 election averages just under 50 percent with just a few ballots yet to count.But it varied significantly around the city, as is typical for most elections. This map divides the city's precincts into four equal…
The latest numbers for Proposition 4 continue to show it getting hammered all over the city. It lost all city precincts, so the only real question was, where did it lose worse?
Rocky Treppiedi kept his District 81 School Board seat on the strength of his vote margins in the south and northwest parts of the district, which extends outside the city limits. Laura Carder did well in northeast Spokane, where she's run previously as a legislative…
Late vote counts didn't really change the landscape for the City of Spokane's Fire Bond proposal. It did well in some of the vote rich regions of south and northwest Spokane, but did poorly on the north side and East Central. There aren't enough votes…
Everyone join in, please:Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday dearWashington Staaaate.Happy Birthday to you.Washington as a state turns 120 today. Don't feel bad if you forgot to send a card. Once you get passed 100, birthdays aren't that big a deal…
Former GOP vice presidential candidate and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is expected to be autographing copies of her new book next month at the Coeur d'Alene Fred Meyer store.Palin, who already has a best-seller before her book is even released next week, is tentatively scheduled…
The only race that seems to be hanging fire still is the City of Spokane Fire Bond.As of Friday, it had inched up to a 59.43 percent approval rating, or 29,611 for20.215 against It needs to get to 60 percent.The county elections office estimates it…
Ted Sturdevant was named this morning the new director of the state Department of Ecology.Gov. Chris Gregoire announced the appointment to replace Jay Manning, who moved from head of DoE to be her chief of staff.Sturdevant has been with DoE for 7 years as director…
By late last week one question surrounding Referendum 71 was settled: The measure passed and the “everything but marriage” statutes go into effect for the whole state, after it was approved handily in most Puget Sound counties and hammered pretty badly elsewhere. That’s really just…
Incumbent Rocky Treppeidi inched a bit farther ahead of challenger Laura Carder in Thursday's vote count. But there's still a dramatic north-south split in the votes as shown in the map here.
Andy Billig, the president of the Spokane Indians baseball, wants to play in a different league. He’s running for the state Legislature in central Spokane’s 3rd District.As ballots were being cast and counted this week for the 2009 election, Billig filed papers with the state…
Spokane School Board incumbent Jeff Bierman is in a tight race with challenger Heidi Olson. As in the Treppiedi-Carder race, there's a distinct north-south split, as the map illustrates. Here's the latest tally, as of Wednesday evening:Bierman 17,344 (51,35%)Olson 16,431 (48.65%)
The Spokesman-Review's political team keeps a critical eye on local, state and national politics.
| Dec. 2009 | Nov. 2009 | Oct. 2009 | Sept. 2009 |
| Aug. 2009 | July 2009 | June 2009 | May 2009 |
| April 2009 | March 2009 | Feb. 2009 | Jan. 2009 |
