Jonathan Brunt

The Spokane Transit Authority is asking voters to maintain the sales tax they approved four years ago. But this time, there may be no going back.

Racing enthusiasts turned out in force Tuesday evening to thank county leaders for buying Spokane Raceway Park. "It's the greatest thing that's happened around here for a long time," said Norm Ellefson, who was among the dozen or so people who testified during a Tuesday evening meeting of the Spokane County Commission.

The one-block street that is the closest link between the Monroe Street and Post Street bridges will be repaved. The Spokane City Council voted 5-2 Monday to move ahead with a full repaving of Bridge Avenue between Lincoln and Monroe streets.

Having agreed Thursday to spend about $4 million to buy an Airway Heights racetrack, the county must now persuade voters to spend an even bigger sum. And opinions differ over whether the acquisition of Spokane Raceway Park will hurt the county's chances of increasing taxes later this year for some big-ticket law enforcement needs.

One of two wells at Spokane Raceway Park is contaminated with a chemical thought to cause cancer, according to samples taken by Spokane County. The results indicate that anyone who buys the property, set to be auctioned today, might have to pay for an environmental cleanup. On Tuesday, Commissioners Todd Mielke and Mark Richard voted to participate in today's auction to purchase the raceway and prevent its closure.

Sticking a plastic flower in a crack pipe will no longer be a way around the city's ban on drug paraphernalia. The Spokane City Council on Monday approved legislation greatly expanding the definitions of drug paraphernalia. The rules were written with the intent of outlawing drug pipes marketed as novelty items with plastic flowers inside. But the rules go further, including items such as blenders, balloons, straws and spoons.

As many as 2,000 inmates could be held in a new jail complex adjacent to the Spokane County Courthouse, the top choice of a committee looking at locations to build a replacement for the aging Geiger Corrections Center. If that location is selected and voters approve it, a new jail tower would be built on the county campus just north of the current Spokane County Jail.

Disagreements over roles and job duties apparently led Mayor Mary Verner's chief of staff to resign. "I believe that the chief of staff and city administrator had difficulties resolving their approaches to their roles here. I expected them to work through those difficulties, but that didn't work out," Verner said in her first public comments about the announced departure of chief of staff Mark Earley, whose last day on the job will be April 11. "I'm disappointed, but I respect both Mark Earley and (City Administrator) Ted Danek."

Despite repeated claims from Spok- Animal C.A.R.E. that it doesn't want to perform animal control services, Spokane City Council members have put a regional animal control plan on hold in hopes that the nonprofit group will change its mind. SpokAnimal officials have told city leaders for more than two years that they want to stop performing Spokane's animal control duties, which they have done by contract since 1984.

Less than a year after voters narrowly rejected a tax for emergency communications equipment, Spokane County commissioners hope they will change their minds. Commissioners decided last week to place the one-tenth of 1 percent sales tax on the May 20 ballot. Money raised would pay for communications equipment and Crime Check, the 24-hour countywide crime reporting center that was discontinued at the end of 2004 because of budget cuts.

In a sea of depressing economic data, the city of Spokane has some good news. Spokane's Chief Financial Officer Gavin Cooley reported this week that the city ended 2007 with $6.7 million more than expected.

More people are taking the bus. A lot more.

The law firm representing the family of Otto Zehm is critical of Mayor Mary Verner's suggestion that the city doesn't need a full-time police ombudsman.

If citizens want Crime Check, they'll have to tax themselves, Spokane City Council members said Monday night. The council voted to endorse a second attempt at passing a one-tenth of 1 percent sales tax to pay for emergency communications equipment and Crime Check, the 24-hour countywide crime reporting center that was discontinued because of city budget cuts a few years back.

State legislators want Spokane to go it alone this year in enforcing groundbreaking limits on phosphates in dish detergent. The state Senate this week approved a House bill that eliminates or weakens the strict phosphate restrictions that were supposed to become effective in two other counties July 1.

Two years after shattering attendance records for the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Spokane leaders want to do it again. Star USA, the Spokane sports promotion business that successfully landed the 2007 championships, is working on a bid to host the event in 2010, just a couple of weeks before the start of the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, B.C.

Spokane can't afford a full-time police ombudsman, says Mayor Mary Verner. Instead, Verner has proposed contracting for ombudsman services to keep costs lower.