Dan Hansen

Waiting for salmon 1. Arkie Andrew and his son, Tyson, 12, are among those on Hayes Island fasting and praying for the return of salmon to Kettle Falls. Photo by Sandra Bancroft-Billings/The Spokesman-Review 2. Tepees have sprung up on the drawn-down Columbia. Photo by Shawn Jacobson/The Spokesman-Review

A 20-year state transportation plan calls for spending $57 billion on roads, trains, buses, airports and ferries to keep up with Washington population growth. More than half the state money would go toward city bus systems, passenger trains and other public transportation. The plan doesn't include any money for local roads, which are the responsibility of city and county governments.

The death toll at an Okanogan County aqua-farm likely will hit 5,000 fish, due to massive water spills over Grand Coulee Dam. Ed Shallenberger, vice president of Columbia River Fish Farm, predicted last week he'd lose 3,000 of the steelhead he raises to sell to restaurants. But divers had pulled 4,771 dead fish from the farm's net pens by the end of the day Thursday. Fewer carcasses are found each day, Shallenberger said, and few of the 170,000 surviving fish show signs of gas bubble trauma.

British Columbia industries have cut pollution so much that Columbia River walleye and other fish no longer pose a health threat to people who eat them, Canadian biologists say. "This is a good-news story," said Carl Johnson of B.C. Environment, the provincial agency that tracks pollution. Just across the border in Washington, the state Department of Health isn't taking the Canadians' word for it. The state agency still advises fishermen to limit the number of fish they eat from Lake Roosevelt, the reservoir that stretches from Grand Coulee Dam to the Canadian border.

A ranger who helped ease tension between angry Alaskans and the National Park Service will try to do the same in northeastern Washington. Vaughn Baker will become superintendent at Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area, parks officials announced Wednesday. He replaces Gerry Tays, who was reassigned last month amid long-standing squabbles with property rights advocates, Indian tribes and officials from the counties that border the Columbia River reservoir.

Traffic on U.S. Highway 2 in Airway Heights will be rerouted for 3-1/2 hours Saturday morning, as police and firefighters stage a massive emergency drill. More than 100 people from at least 20 agencies will participate, said Ron Bassen, battalion chief for the Spokane Fire Department.

Dave and Carole Sykes figure Spokane's trolley buses give the city an edge over Seattle. "It's the neatest thing since plum sauce," Dave Sykes of Federal Way, Wash., said Tuesday, as rain pelted the window beside his seat on the trolley. "We rode it yesterday just to ride it." A growing number of Spokane residents apparently agree.

Workers remove dead and dying fish at Columbia Fish Farms. Photo by Colin Mulvany/The Spokesman-Review

People driving between Ritzville and Pasco won't take the newly improved U.S. Highway 395 if a group of highway advocates has its way. Instead, they'll travel the Thomas Foley Highway.

A plan to raise Upriver Dam would cause "significant" harm to the recreational uses and beauty of the Spokane River, a federal report concludes. The city of Spokane already has invested more than $200,000 preparing for the project, which once looked like a sure thing but now appears in jeopardy. There is no way the city could make up for the loss of four-tenths of a mile of mild white water, staff for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission wrote in a 76-page draft environmental impact statement.

They were cute, sure. But a green light at the corner of Fifth and Maple was no place for a pair of house sparrows to build their home, city workers decided.

Spokane's proposed impact fees would hurt home buyers and add hundreds of thousands of dollars to the cost of new commercial buildings, business representatives told the City Council on Monday. "Fundamentally, impact fees punish new growth," said Dan Kirschner of the Spokane Area Chamber of Commerce.

Road work on the South Hill's Grand Boulevard has narrowed the busy street down to two lanes. Photo by Shawn Jacobson/The Spokesman-Review

A Russian immigrant accused of poaching bears so he could sell their gall bladders sat quietly in federal court Monday, content to let his attorney do the talking for a change. "Meet Nikolay Senchenko, an American citizen naturalized in 1995," was how defense attorney Leslie Weatherhead began his opening statement. It was an apparent attempt to negate any bias the all-white jury might have toward foreigners.

State and federal wildlife agents are looking for clues to the 1995 shooting of a Washington grizzly bear. Sketchy information in a statement issued Monday is the first officers have told the public about the death of the 2-1/2-year-old male bear. It is the third Selkirk Mountain grizzly known to have been illegally shot last year. Biologists believe there are no more than 25 of the federally protected bears in northeastern Washington and North Idaho.

The lengthy witness list for a Russian immigrant accused of poaching bears includes a federal judge, a tow truck driver and Idaho mining magnate Harry Magnuson. But none of those people - who have little to do with the case against Nikolay Senchenko - likely will be called to testify at the trial. Senchenko, 46, represented himself during jury selection Monday and Prosecutor Tim Ohm's opening statements on Tuesday. He interrupted both those proceedings several times with objections U.S. District Court Judge Fred Van Sickle overruled.

Senchenko

Steve Goulding rolls a tire into place at Divine's Auto Service at 37th and Grand. Drivers were getting their studded tires removed. Photo by Shawn Jacobson/The Spokesman-Review

A Spokane County judge has dismissed charges of evidence tampering against a Geiger Corrections Center employee in a case that has cost taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars and continues to grow more costly. Michael Horstman was accused of staging events in a videotape used as evidence against corrections worker Sunny Pilkington, who was fired for allegedly hugging an inmate in 1992. Pilkington won back her job at a 1993 arbitration hearing and this week filed a harassment claim against the county, seeking at least $500,000 in damages.

Bowing to pressure from property rights groups, two Indian tribes and officials from five counties, the National Park Service has replaced the superintendent of Grand Coulee National Recreation Area. Park Service officials say they are reassigning Superintendent Gerry Tays in hopes his replacement will get along better with locals.

The Mariners haven't called, publishers aren't interested in the novel and the super model down the street is happily married. For most adults, winning the lottery is about the only fantasy left. Sorry to pluck the final daisy from the garden, but people who have already won say it's not all it's cracked up to be.

The pushy mimes in the state lottery's television commercials aren't the only "trouble with money." Some past winners of the Washington State Lottery are getting junk mail and telephone solicitations from companies that want a piece of their good fortune. "We've gotten three (offers) in the mail in the last three weeks," said the spouse of one Spokane winner.

Looking for the right job More than 1,500 people attended The Spokesman-Review's Career Fair Tuesday at the Ag Trade Center. Photo by Shawn Jacobson/The Spokesman-Review

It's spring! Time to tap into the savings account for the long-awaited trip to Disneyland, Graceland or Miami Beach. But while Inland Northwest escapees are plopped beside the pool, many of their cars will be sitting in a Spokane International Airport parking lot. The 3 million travelers who used the airport last year spent $3.8 million in its three public parking lots - an increase of $700,000 over 1994, according to figures released last week at a meeting of the airport board.