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Spin Control: A pundit’s political portending
As it does most years, Spin Control looks into the crystal ball for the first Sunday of 2015 to predict the year ahead. Regular readers might have the feeling they’ve read some of these predictions before. They probably have, but it doesn’t mean we plagiarized ourselves; we just predict the predictable … and what’s safer than that?
Plan funding divides STA board
Battle lines were drawn early by transit officials in a four-hour-long meeting Thursday afternoon, but the eventual 6-3 split sending a 10-year, $300 million project to the ballot wasn’t clear until the vote was called and hands were raised. Voters will decide in April if they want to increase sales tax by 0.3 percent to fund a plan that would extend hours and expand service to new areas, as well as fund a trolley-like fixed route between Browne’s Addition and Spokane Community College.
Shawn Vestal: True threat isn’t ‘other’; it’s those who fear others
What is the biggest threat to Spokane’s future? Politicians inciting riot? Profiteers destroying civil society? Ben Stuckart’s “dirty smear” on the Spokane Municipal Code, and the rest of the City Council majority’s “lawlessness”?
Spokane mayor’s wage would be set by panel under proposal
Spokane’s mayor would no longer have to be the highest-paid city worker under a proposal voters may decide next year. Councilman Mike Fagan is proposing to give the city’s Salary Review Commission the power to set the mayor’s wage, a change that would require approval from city voters. The idea was first proposed by Mayor David Condon after the blowback he received when he proposed giving himself a raise based on the city charter, which currently requires him to be the top-paid city worker.