Spokane County commissioners learned Tuesday that preliminary planning for a new jail will cost more than twice as much as expected – at least $736,690 and as much as $1.2 million. "Isn't that a lot more?" Commissioner Bonnie Mager asked rhetorically.
Spokane County commissioners balked Tuesday at a unanimous Planning Commission recommendation against amending the county zoning code to allow gasoline convenience stores in rural areas. Commissioner Bonnie Mager's motion to adopt the Planning Commission recommendation failed to get a second. Instead, commissioners decided to conduct their own public hearing on the issue.
A state board has deferred action on rival proposals to rename Squaw Creek in Spokane and Whitman counties as a potential compromise has emerged. Four descendants of pioneer farmer John Paulson persuaded the Washington State Board on Geographic Names to add John Paulson Creek to two other names under consideration. The Coeur d'Alene Tribe, which had suggested Awtskin Creek, threw its support to Paulson.
Stevens County commissioners will conduct a third public hearing Monday night on a proposal to open many county roads to all-terrain vehicles. The idea is to encourage tourism by making it easier for ATV riders to go between small towns and recreational areas.
Ill-fated planning decisions on Five Mile Prairie and the West Plains are clinging to Spokane County commissioners like flypaper. The Eastern Washington Growth Management Hearings Board ruled last year that commissioners improperly expanded "urban growth areas" without required studies and consultation.
Spokane County suffered a major setback Thursday in its legal fight to keep the city of Spokane from annexing 135 acres of commercial land on North Division Street – land that generates nearly $1 million a year in taxes. Superior Court Judge Maryann Moreno ruled that landowner agreements not to oppose annexation in exchange for city water and sewer service are enforceable.
The Spokane County Sheriff's Office will receive a life-saving tool from a manufacturer of cancer-causing products. County commissioners approved a deal Tuesday that will allow the Sheriff's Office to receive a six-wheel all-terrain vehicle from the U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co., whose brands include Copenhagen and Skoal.
A dancer whose body and career were shattered in a February 2001 crash is entitled to seek damages from the man who led a caravan of speeding vans through Adams County on icy U.S. 395. The Washington Court of Appeals in Spokane has overturned a ruling by an Adams County judge that the lead driver had no duty to Yong Tao, who was thrown out of the second van in the three-van convoy when it slid off the road and rolled.
A proposed road name change in northern Spokane County aims to eliminate confusion over a parallel set of North roads. Commissioners will conduct a public hearing at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday on a petition to call one of the thoroughfares Yukon Road.
A $5.65 million federal lawsuit on behalf of a Spokane County Jail inmate who was murdered by his cellmates in October 2004 is to be settled for $180,000. County commissioners approved the settlement Tuesday without comment. It now goes to a U.S. District Court judge for final action.
Spokane County commissioners don't care what Squaw Creek is called as long as it's called something else. Commissioners voted 2-0 Tuesday to tell the Washington State Board on Geographic Names that they have no objection to either of two proposed new names.
A Grand Coulee middle-school teacher and reserve police officer was in jail Monday on a charge of stalking a 15-year-old girl while awaiting trial on charges that he raped her. Okanogan County Superior Court Commissioner Bud Gardner set bail at $25,000 on the stalking charge, but revoked 50-year-old Vernon E. Heizer's bail on the original charges.
Lake Coeur d'Alene's Squaw Bay is now Neachen Bay. The name change is among eight that have been approved by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names in an effort to rid the Coeur d'Alene Tribe's traditional territory of offensive "squaw" names, the board's research chief, Jennifer Runyon, said Saturday.
Gonzaga University freshman Kevin O'Toole knew why he was among some 200 GU "pilgrims" who walked nine miles Saturday in the footsteps of the Rev. Joseph Cataldo, the Jesuit missionary for whom the Mission of the Sacred Heart at Cataldo is named. "It's cool to go with people of the same faith and to share your religious values," the Napa, Calif., native said. "That's part of why I came to Gonzaga. It's a community."
Bob Webb got an unpleasant surprise recently when the Spokane County assessor's office discovered he doesn't have quite enough property to qualify for a timber-related tax break. He was among 19 property owners who were notified late last month that they were being booted out of the "designated forest" program that greatly reduces the assessed value of land used to produce timber.
Spokane attorney David R. Hellenthal has agreed to an 18-month suspension for misconduct that included setting himself up to receive a client's $170,000 fortune if the client died. Hellenthal also admitted helping a young woman obtain all of her elderly, disabled husband's money with no assurance she would take care of him.
Spokane County commissioners agree Squaw Creek's offensive name needs to be changed, but they're split on what to do about a replacement. They decided to wait until next Tuesday to decide what to recommend to the Washington State Board on Geographic Names.
Spokane County commissioners were like deer in a headlight this week when asked to weigh a controversial proposal to give Squaw Creek a less offensive name. Commissioners mostly wanted someone else to make the decision.
Acknowledging there's no such thing as free money, Spokane County commissioners voted this week to hire a grant czar. Tentatively, the new manager will be paid $50,630 to $68,318 annually to make sure there are no costly mistakes in handling millions of dollars worth of state and federal grants the county receives every year.
Lake Coeur d'Alene's Squaw Bay may soon have a new name designed to recognize the area's Native American heritage without insulting native women. The Idaho Geographic Names Board voted 4-2 on July 27 to ask its federal counterpart to rechristen the well-known waterway as Neachen Bay.
BONNERS FERRY – Thank goodness there wasn't a kissing booth at Saturday's Bonners Ferry Farmers Market Garlic Festival. "I'm going to hate myself after this," Gail Cathcart said as she prepared to judge the festival's garlic cook-off. "Last year, it took a full box of Altoids – and it didn't help much."
A prostitute who hooked up one of her Spokane customers with her cocaine supplier has been sentenced to nearly as much prison time as the supplier. Dona Reyes Heit, 37, was recently sentenced to two years – just four months less than drug supplier Larry Howard Booth, 31, of Pasco, got last year in a U.S. District Court plea bargain.
Fourteen-year-old Brad Baker was having a little trouble keeping his backside where it belonged Thursday at Spokane Raceway Park. To put it bluntly, his butt was on the wrong side of his motorcycle.
Washington's Public Disclosure Act requires more than "substantial compliance," the state Court of Appeals says in a strong new affirmation of the open-government law. "Administrative inconvenience or difficulty does not excuse strict compliance," the Spokane branch of the court said in a recent opinion written by new Judge Debra Stephens.
Former Spokane County Commissioners John Roskelley and Kate McCaslin are urging voters to reject a 0.1 percent sales tax for police, fire and other emergency communications. Roskelley confirmed Wednesday that he and McCaslin wrote a statement against the tax for publication in the November general election voters guide. He's a Democrat; she's a Republican.
