Starting this month, when residents of nine Spokane County precincts call their commissioner, they can call him Al. Not Todd or Mark.

Prosecutor Steve Tucker said Tuesday that he sees nothing in a petition to recall him except “rumors and hearsay, and ‘facts’ that are not true.” The petition for a recall election was organized by Shannon Sullivan, who led the successful recall drive against Spokane Mayor Jim West in 2005.

Oops: Man's errant torch exposes marijuana grow

Residents of the Volunteers of America women’s shelter at 111 W. Third Ave. were forced outside in 28-degree weather for 15 to 20 minutes. Spokane firefighters ushered them back inside as cleanup work continued.

Kristen Cosby has no patience for quarrels among Stevens County judicial officers. Cosby’s mother was the victim of an Oct. 3, 2009, homicide. Her father, Craig Raymond Cosby, is the suspect.

Spokane County will stand behind two sheriff’s deputies who broke a Spokane Valley man’s rib and punctured his lung when they were dispatched to help him in September 2009. County commissioners voted this week to defend Deputies Glen Hinckley and Walter Loucks in a federal civil rights lawsuit and pay any punitive damages, which aren’t automatically covered under the county’s liability insurance.

The Spokane historic preservation office will get only $5,000 from Spokane County in the $136.6 million 2012 budget county commissioners adopted Wednesday. The county has given $20,000 a year to the office since at least 2009, but will shift $15,000 to the Fox Theater next year. The money will reduce a multiyear county pledge to help restore the landmark theater as a regional performing arts venue.

Spokane County’s Boundary Review Board will be dissolved Jan. 31 as an expensive anachronism. County commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday to close the $220,000-a-year office on grounds that changes in state law leave the board little room to balance competing interests in major annexations.