Jim Camden

The Washington state auditor is being asked to help resolve a $2 million dispute between Spokane County and the city of Spokane Valley over law enforcement costs. But discussing the audit is creating a dispute within the dispute.

The overall taxable value of property in Kootenai County fell by $1.2 billion in 2008, the second straight year the county has experienced a decline. In Spokane County, most property values either declined or held steady.

The Oregon Legislature voted this week to ban automatic dishwasher detergent with phosphorus, to which we in Spokane can say, “Welcome to the 21st Century.” And, “Good luck with that.”

A pair of Spokane police officers are starting a local chapter of an organization that honors World War II veterans by sponsoring trips for them to the nation’s capital. Officer Tony Lamanna, who describes himself as “passionate if not obsessed with World War II history and veterans,” said he and partner Tim Moses have received approval for the Inland Northwest chapter of Honor Flight, a national organization based in Springfield, Ohio. He’d heard about the organization sometime after it started in 2005 and was wondering early this year how it was doing.

The Spokane County Planning Commission recommended some changes Thursday to the rules covering housing developments in rural parts of the county but deadlocked over one of the hottest topics. The commission split 2-2 on whether to bar so-called cluster development in areas zoned for “small-tract agricultural” use, such as Green Bluff. It had the same split on a proposal to require conservation easements, which would essentially bar later development, on open space that is used to calculate the number of homes that can be built in a cluster on a tract of land.

The Spokane County Planning Commission recommended some changes Thursday to the rules covering housing developments in rural parts of the county but deadlocked over one of the hottest topics.

Hoping to trim payroll costs, Spokane County will begin encouraging early retirement for eligible employees. As an incentive, the county will help with the cost of medical insurance for those taking advantage of the voluntary program until Medicare kicks in.

Practically everyone attached to state government in Washington is being forced to cut back. Universities are canceling programs, and students are facing higher tuition. Schoolteachers are getting layoff notices. State employees are looking at lower wages or higher benefit costs or both. State government has a general hiring freeze.

The U.S. Army is investigating soldiers who bought degrees from an illegal diploma mill that was based in Spokane and resulted in prison time for its operators. It’s also warning soldiers to be wary of phony diploma schemes when they sign up for education and tuition assistance.

A Lilac princess got a standing ovation for her essay lauding veterans, and local military and public safety personnel were honored Thursday at the Lilac Festival’s annual military appreciation lunch. Natale Szabo, of Medical Lake High School, read an essay that thanks veterans for protecting her range of freedoms, from the ability to wear what she wants to living in a country where people elect their leaders and criticize them once in office.

County commissioners are balking at changes Spokane city officials want to make to a plan to buy the YMCA building in Riverfront Park partly with taxpayers’ money. Commissioners told city and county parks staff Tuesday they are reluctant to agree to some changes in their offer to use the Conservation Futures fund to pay off bonds to buy the building. The purchase would be a way to prevent it from being turned into condominiums in what many consider an integral part of Riverfront Park.

Eight Air Force security officers who have been killed in Iraq or Afghanistan are pictured on a memorial at Fairchild Air Force Base.

Mayor Mary Verner must be tired of media events at City Hall. And we in the local news media are grateful she’s willing to leave the fairly bland backgrounds at Spokane Falls Boulevard and Post Street and take the show on the road. During the big snowfalls, the mayor was wont to hold press conferences outside the buildings from which the plows and sanders were dispatched. Last week, when talking about problem bus benches, she headed out to Monroe and Indiana, to hold forth on the topic in front of a couple of bus benches.

Spokane County faces a series of deadlines for decisions on a new jail. One is Aug. 11, which is the last day county commissioners can decide to put measures on the November ballot to ask voters to raise their property taxes for a bond issue worth hundreds of millions of dollars to build a new jail. They could also ask voters to raise their sales taxes by as much as two-tenths of a percent to pay for the jail’s operation.

Work began Wednesday on a $6.2 million building that will be the new home of the altitude chamber at Fairchild Air Force Base. The building, which will be the offices of the Aerospace and Operations Physiology Training Flight, is expected to be completed in June 2010, said Master Sgt. Lynn Howard.

Residential sewer rates in Spokane County could go up between $2.50 and $10 a month next year, and by as much as $18 a month by 2013, depending on how government officials decide to pay for changes to the wastewater treatment system. A range of options was described Tuesday to Spokane County commissioners, who must decide how to pay for a $148 million treatment plant along with another $105 million in improvements to the sewage system.

Spokane needs to come up with a plan to replace the bus benches scattered around the city with a standard design and more sensible placement, Mayor Mary Verner said today.

A draft version of the military’s specifications for its next air tanker should be out by the end of May, Air Force officials told a regional delegation Thursday. The Air Force’s “request for proposal,” the formal invitation for companies to bid on the tanker contract, is expected by late summer.