Ken Olsen

Alice Taylor is worried that she won't be able to give her six children land that's been in the family since 1906 if new subdivision rules are passed. "We always wanted our children to have this piece of property," Taylor told Kootenai County Commissioners Monday. "It has roots ...(and) it's nice to have the children close. "Is there a chance for an exemption for me?" asked Taylor, who lives near Hayden.

Suburbs keep encroaching on Bill and Marilyn Steinpreis. Photo by Craig Buck/The Spokesman-Review

He's used a 3-ton U.S. Air Force camera to capture Soviet satellites skipping across the sky. D.E. "Sam" Sears Sr. also spent 20 years nursing millions of tree seedlings for the U.S. Forest Service. Now he wants to spend some time helping Coeur d'Alene solve its problems by serving on the City Council.

A local businessman and longtime member of the City Planning Commission is adding his name to the City Council race.

The plaque may not read "Latah County Memorial Floating Outhouses." But Coeur d'Alene's southern neighbor will be sure it gets credit for helping relieve boaters' bladders at Lake Coeur d'Alene's Windy Bay. "We always ask for (projects) to be identified as funded in part or full" by the Latah County Waterways Committee, said Tom Townsend, association chairman.

How do you spell impact fees in North Idaho? R-E-F-U-N-D. Bombarded with lawsuits, defeated in court, and largely unsuccessful in getting builders to donate the money, Hayden and Coeur d'Alene are writing refund checks instead of building new roads, sewers and other infrastructure with impact fees. Hayden was set to argue one of its cases before the Idaho Supreme Court when the court held session in Coeur d'Alene in October. It instead decided to surrender.

The River City's swimming pool drought is about to end. Post Falls contractor Kevin Bettis is planning to build a community pool as part of the River City Medical Campus on Idaho Street. Bettis may complete the indoor pool as soon as next spring, said Monte Risvold of Tomlinson-Black North Idaho, real estate agent for the medical center.

Ron Edinger can't fathom the word "quit." So, after nearly 26 years in city politics, he's running for another four-year term on the Coeur d'Alene City Council. It's the sort of thing that prompts his fellow council members to joke that he will be on the council long after they are gone - as in forever.

Opponents of Blackwell Island development have 28 days to decide whether to take their fight to District Court. They suffered a stinging set of defeats at the hands of the City Council on Tuesday in their efforts to keep a 291-space recreational vehicle park and commercial development from being built over an old dump. The Hall family, which has owned the island for 30 years, says the area needs more RV parks.

A controversial recreational vehicle park will be built on Blackwell Island - a move many fear will trigger massive expansion of the city south of the Spokane River. The City Council voted 4-2 late Tuesday to annex the 40-acre site despite overwhelming opposition from people who testified in a lengthy public hearing. Only councilmen Ron Edinger and Dan English opposed the measure.

More than 400,000 tons of mud, trees and debris plugged the North Fork of the Boise River with torrential slides in late August. Culverts 18 inches wide grooved mountains. A stretch of the North Fork road now is the river channel. Prime trout streams are sluggish mud piles.

There's hope for saving a historic cedar grove at Upper Priest Lake after an eleventh-hour meeting Friday, both sides agree. "We just agreed to work out the problems and proceed," said Jim Palombi, timber manager for Riley Creek Timber Co. Kerry Arneson, U.S. Forest Service public information officer, said it's "certainly not a no-go situation."

A building under construction last January now houses offices on Northwest Boulevard in Coeur d'Alene as commercial construciton continues to boom. File/The Spokesman-Review

Adam Herbst, a Kootenai County resident who lives near Rathdrum, shows a piece of L-P siding removed from his home after it deteriorated and was eaten by woodpeckers. Photo by Jesse Tinsley/The Spokesman-Review

Kootenai County Clerk Tom Taggart, a Democrat, will resign to become the county's first administrator. Photo by Jesse Tinsley/The Spokesman-Review

People worry they won't get adequate warning when trichloroethylene pollution increases in city water. Some don't trust what they are being told about the health risks of drinking water that contains traces of the solvent, they told state and federal officials Wednesday night. Some are worried about who will pay for cleaning up the drinking water.

The East Curlew Creek and Copper Butte timber sales are expensive invasions of a roadless section of Eastern Washington forest, a lawsuit filed Wednesday charges. Taxpayers will lose at least $125,000 on the Copper Butte fire salvage sale, says the suit filed in U.S. District Court by the Kettle Range Conservation Group, Inland Empire Public Lands Council, and Northwest Ecosystem Alliance. The Forest Service predicted it would get $170 per thousand board feet in the Copper Butte sale, said Sara Folger of the Public Lands Council. After two tries, the agency hasn't been able to get $41 per thousand board feet.

Five more sites will be scrutinized by the Environmental Protection Agency in the search for sources of an industrial solvent in the city's ground water. Meanwhile, the city is going to idle a well this winter that shows traces of trichloroethylene pollution in hopes the problem will subside.

Two uniformed city police officers will be assigned to the high schools for the first time ever, the City Council decided Tuesday evening. The council decision was unanimous, despite earlier opposition from Councilwoman Dixie Reid.

An environmental activist was convicted of three misdemeanors in U.S. District Court in Coeur d'Alene Tuesday for protest antics in connection with the Cove-Mallard timber sales. Steve Wandrus, 41, of McCall, Idaho, will be sentenced Oct. 11. He was charged with threatening a U.S. Forest Service officer, interfering with Forest Service operations Aug. 2, and entering a closed area of the national forest June 27.

An environmental activist was convicted of three misdemeanors in U.S. District Court in Coeur d'Alene Tuesday for protest antics in connection with the Cove-Mallard timber sales. Steve Wandrus, 41, of McCall, Idaho, will be sentenced Oct. 11. He was charged with threatening a U.S. Forest Service officer, interfering with Forest Service operations Aug. 2, and entering a closed area of the national forest June 27. Wandrus and an unnamed accomplice stormed into an office at the Red River Ranger District on the Nez Perce National Forest and interrupted an official meeting, said Robert Amon, a spokesman for the Cove-Mallard Coalition. He walked into the ranger's office because he had no success getting Ranger Ed Wood to respond to his complaints, Amon said.

Homeowners in moist climates have complained for five years that Louisiana-Pacific's house siding grows mushrooms, swells, cracks and falls apart - long before its warranty expires. Now problems are appearing in Spokane and Coeur d'Alene, not far from a Chilco, Idaho, plant where the company's Inner-Seal siding was made for six years. L-P says the siding covers the majority of homes built in the Pacific Northwest since 1989. The siding is still made in Michigan and Minnesota and is still being installed here.

The first signs of deterioration in Louisiana-Pacific Corp.'s Inner-Seal house siding may be difficult to detect, say people who deal with the product. The siding is found on thousands of homes across the country and the company has paid more than $46 million in claims to about 17,000 homeowners. Inner-Seal comes in two types.

It's been a terrible year for Louisiana-Pacific Corp. In June, a federal grand jury in Colorado indicted the company on 56 charges of everything from tampering with pollution control equipment to lying about emissions, and mail and wire fraud. Each count carries a maximum fine of $500,000.