Nicholas Deshais

Spokane city leaders scored two big wins tonight with passage of a park bond that will revitalize Riverfront Park and a levy that will continue the street reconstruction program it began a decade ago. Spokane voters handed city leaders a big win, and a chance to shape Spokane for decades to come, with the overwhelming approval of a bond to revitalize Riverfront Park and a levy to extend the massive reconstruction of city streets that began 10 years ago.

The man who brought Expo ’74 to town. A doctor who delivered thousands of babies and helped stop a bridge from being built over the lower Spokane Falls. The region’s native language. All of these are candidates for the name of the plaza that opened next to City Hall this spring. The former parking lot is now a geometric, basalt-themed home to various levels of seating and viewpoints of the falls. The plaza, a joint project between the city and Avista, connects Riverfront Park to Huntington Park, which was constructed last year by the utility company when it was celebrating its 125th anniversary.

Debbie Detmer has worked for more than 15 years to get the homeless into homes. Most recently, as executive director of Salem Arms Community Housing, she’s helped find homes for people disabled by mental illness.

The windows and doors are boarded with plywood, the siding is fading and falling off and the yard is littered with soggy mattresses. No crystal ball is needed to see that the abandoned fourplex at the corner of North Napa Street and East Fairview Drive has a dim future. “It’s a health hazard,” said Spokane City Councilwoman Amber Waldref. “It’s a blight on the neighborhood.”

There was a moment in last week’s sole debate between state Rep. Matt Shea and his challenger, Josh Arritola, that summed up the race between the two Republicans. Arritola dispensed with a question regarding his disbelief in the human impact of climate change and pivoted to a recitation of fees connected to an off-road vehicle law Shea sponsored.

Concerns over proposed pay increases for Spokane Mayor David Condon and a majority of his 13 cabinet members are threatening to derail budget discussions at City Hall, as the mayor and City Council members forcefully argued their cases in dueling news conferences on Friday. Standing in front of a C.O.P.S. shop in the West Central neighborhood Friday morning and flanked by four council members, Spokane City Council President Ben Stuckart said a proposed $7,000 pay increase for Condon was “utterly ridiculous” and vowed to craft “a new budget that reflects the community’s values.”

Spokane Mayor David Condon already makes more money than Washington Gov. Jay Inslee. Next year, if his proposed pay raise gets approved by the City Council, he’ll make more than his former boss, U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers. The $7,000 raise will bring his annual pay to nearly $180,000, and the increase is part of the mayor’s proposed 2015 city budget released this week. He’s not the only one set to receive a bump in pay. The 14 people in Condon’s Cabinet, including the mayor, are getting on average a 2 percent increase in pay.

Twenty minutes before a Republican debate in Spokane Valley, the Greenacres venue filled to capacity and late-comers were being turned away. The room, packed with 150 people, became stifling with heat. It didn’t take much longer for things to heat up between the candidates.

If there’s one thing Jim West would want to be remembered for, it’s probably pavement. In his race to become Spokane’s mayor in 2003, West promised to remake the city’s pockmarked streets into ribbons of smooth asphalt.

Willy Water has left the building. For 45 years, the 15-foot tall Willy held up a concrete glass of water, cheering the surrounding area just east of Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center.