Erica Curless

Alexis Milliken, 6, didn't need to look at the words. "I already know this one," Milliken said before bursting into "America the Beautiful" with more than 200 other people gathered at Fairmount Memorial Cemetery for the Memorial Day service.

Katie Brodie was sending Kootenai County Commission Chairman Dick Panabaker to an early retirement but Commissioner Rick Currie gets to keep his job. Brodie, a former county planning commission chairwoman who raised a record-breaking $24,540, was edging out Panabaker by 174 votes with 95 percent of the precincts reporting in Tuesday's Republican primary election. Challenger Rich Piazza had 26 percent of the vote while Mike Piper received 8 percent.

Ballots packed with contested races are expected to bring many North Idaho voters to the polls for Tuesday's primary elections. In several Kootenai County races, voters won't have to wait until November to find out who gets the job, because five contested seats only have Republican candidates running.

A few have drunken driving charges. Another was arrested for having cocaine and later became a drug informant. A jury found another guilty for hitting his neighbor with a rake, while the neighbor held a baby. Yet these people aren't the typical bad boys – they are local lawmakers seeking re-election.

The question of how to lower property taxes had all the candidates, even the incumbents, stumped. Yet the candidates for the two Kootenai County Commission seats on the May 25 Republican primary ballot promised to give it a try, or at least attempt to keep property tax rates at bay, during Tuesday's Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce candidate forum.

It's winner takes all in the May 25 Republican primary race for the District 3 Kootenai County Commission seat. Three candidates are fighting against Commission Chairman Dick Panabaker for his job — Republicans Katie Brodie, Rich Piazza and Mike Piper.

Kootenai County Commission candidate Katie Brodie has raised $24,540 in her bid for office, which is probably the largest amount ever reported on a single campaign finance disclosure for a county race, election officials said Wednesday. Brodie, a former Kootenai County Planning Commission chairwoman and assistant for the local job recruiting agency Jobs Plus, is the first candidate to turn in the sunshine report that shows all money raised, and spent, between January 1 and May 9. Candidates have until Tuesday, seven days before the May 25 primary, to turn in the reports.