Mike Prager

1. Workers at Wilcox Family Farms milk processing plant keep an eye on the production line. From left are Greg Hartung, Lori Chase and Rick Smith. Photo by Kristy MacDonald/The Spokesman-Review 2. J.T. Wilcox comes from a family long involved in food production. Photo by Kristy MacDonald/The Spokesman-Review

The cost of improving 57th Avenue from the Palouse Highway to Perry is rising like stormwater on Moran Prairie. Spokane County is asking for $700,000 to help finance the purchase of eight acres of land to build an evaporation pond. Their request will be considered Monday by the Spokane Regional Transportation Council, which has the authority to distribute federal road money to local agencies.

Much of Moran Prairie may be outside the city limits, but residents living in the area want to organize a city neighborhood council. Leaders of the Moran Prairie Neighborhood Association will hold a meeting tonight to talk about joining the city's 14 other organized neighborhoods. The meeting is at 7 p.m. at the Moran Prairie Grange.

Money for a new stormwater system on Moran and Glenrose prairies will be collected, at least in part, from people who live there, county officials said last week. It could cost $11 million to $13 million for what county officials are calling a "backbone" system of collector pipes, ditches and retention areas. One of the toughest issues is going to be the financing, said Bruce Rawls, director of utilities for Spokane County.

Bus riders in downtown Cheney will soon have a place to get out of the wind and rain. The Spokane Transit Authority is planning to build a $250,000 superstop on the main highway through the city. The STA superstop is being built in conjunction with a city-sponsored park-and-ride lot as well as other street improvements.

The signs were posted in 1996 at Medical Lake's two main highway entrances to the north and south. Earlier this week, the number of arrests so far in 1998 was one. Photo by Kristy MacDonald/The Spokesman-Review

The case of the fire that charred Jake's Steak Pit in Medical Lake two months ago still hasn't been solved. But Police Chief Christopher Elg said he believes he knows who might have some answers. Elg is seeking to interview a former employee of the restaurant for information about what might have started the blaze in an upper story storage area.

Clara and Bob Miller own and run a mom-and-pop hardware store at 29th and Regal called Miller's Trustworthy Hardware. Photo by Kristy MacDonald/The Spokesman-Review

Spokane's County Commissioners have ordered a review of transcripts from a 1990 road hearing to see if residents on Browne Mountain are being charged unfairly for paving. A group of property owners along 57th Avenue east of Glenrose Road said they believe a developer should have paid a higher portion of the street-paving costs. Some of the residents are facing assessments as high as $12,000.

1. A Southwest Airlines 737 lands at Spokane International Airport with the help of approach lights on Runway 3. New technology at the airport is helping airlines combat delays and cancellations caused by fog and low visibility. Photo by Christopher Anderson/The Spokesman-Review 2. Capt. Lyle Parker of Alaska Airlines sits in the cockpit of a McDonnell Douglas MD-80 flight simulator at the air carrier's operations center in Seattle. Pilots train there under conditions that simulate fog at Spokane International Airport. Photo by Jason Clark/The Spokesman-Review

About 35 business owners in Airway Heights are working together to promote the West Plains city and enhance its trade. They are forming a new Airway Heights Business Association. "People keep thinking we are some kind of little unimportant area here," said Joyce Surina, one of the business people involved in the association.

Would-be developers at the edge of Glenrose Prairie are mired in legalities as thick as the mud from the washouts that damaged their property. A year ago, the Spokane County commissioners decided to exclude the developers' 35 acres from suburban-style housing under the emerging growth management plan. About the same time, repeated storms sent torrents of water across the land and left deep gouges on the sloping property.

A proposed gravel quarry near Airway Heights would be less than a quarter-mile from wells that supply a cluster of homes along Balmer Road. At least one resident living in the area is objecting to the new pit for Spokane County. R.L. Duncan said he fears that opening the pit could cause water to drain from the small aquifer serving the Balmer Gardens Water District of about a dozen homes.

Moran Prairie neighborhood activists are losing patience with city and county government. They are concerned that rapid growth is ruining southeast Spokane, and they are frustrated by what they call a business-as-usual attitude from government officials. Urban flooding, strip commercial development and crowded streets are among their worries.

The inventory of industrial property on the West Plains is increasing by 74 acres this year. A developer has nearly finished the planning for 37 lots near the Medical Lake interchange on Interstate 90. Dick Edwards said he plans to market the property to small manufacturing and distribution businesses that want easy access to the freeway.

The Cheney City Council on Tuesday approved new cuts for the city's 1998 general budget but refused to eliminate jobs. The council voted to use $40,000 from the city's cash carry-over to continue the police department's drug education program in schools next fall.

The Cheney City Council violated the state's Open Public Meetings Act earlier this month, the city's attorney said. The violation came on Jan. 13 when the council met in executive session to discuss the possibility of budget-cutting layoffs. Mayor Amy Jo Sooy said she was not aware of the narrow restrictions on holding executive sessions to talk about personnel matters.

Airway Heights officials tried to keep a wrap on a condom caper last summer, but word has gotten out. A large number of used condoms was found in the septic tank at City Hall in August. "It's an office building and you don't expect to find something there like that," said Elsie Patten, a resident in the city of 4,150 people.

Don Jacobson says he can't compete with what he calls the "three-minute rose," imports that are picked early and don't last very long. Photo by Kristy MacDonald/The Spokesman-Review

Residents living in the Manito Park area are meeting tonight to organize a neighborhood council. The meeting will be at 7 p.m. at Wilson Elementary School, 911 W. 25th, to consider bylaws and boundaries. If the residents succeed in forming the council, Manito would become the 12th neighborhood in the city to organize.

The director of the community center in Airway Heights said she was only trying to help people but got the bum's rush instead. Director Carol Craft was escorted from her office last Friday after the city took control of the community center. Airway Heights Mayor Brian Grady and Police Chief Jim Nettles served her with a seizure order on Thursday and helped her carry personal items to her car.

Cheney's fire ladder truck will continue to operate and parks will stay green this summer despite city budget problems. Mayor Amy Jo Sooy has refused to accept proposals to park the ladder truck and let park lawns turn brown to save money in the 1998 city budget. City Administrator Jim Reinbold said the city could lose one or two employees this year, and maybe more in coming years, as Sooy seeks to cut back city spending.

Spokane County wants to mine 5 million tons of rock from a quarry near Airway Heights. The county's Division of Engineering asked the county hearing examiner on Wednesday to approve a zone change for 49 acres of land at Hayford Road near Balmer Road. The county's site is next to a large Shamrock Paving Co. gravel pit, said Don Shultz, county road engineer.

Debra Harmon was appointed to a vacancy on the Airway Heights City Council last week. She fills a seat left open when former Councilman Brian Grady was elected mayor. Grady defeated former Mayor Don Harmon, Debra Harmon's ex-husband, last November.