Valley Residents To Again Vote On Incorporation

For the fourth time this decade, county taxpayers will pay the bill so Valley residents can decide whether to form cities.

Spokane County commissioners on Tuesday agreed to put proposals to form the cities of Opportunity and Evergreen on the ballot. The small cities are portions of larger proposals voters rejected in 1990, 1994 and 1995.

“It seems like they just keep voting it down and it keeps coming up,” said Commissioner John Roskelley.

Elections officials say it will cost about $14,000 to put the issues on the Feb. 4 ballot. The two proposed cities could be the only items on the ballot.

Incorporation backers first planned to put their cities on the ballot last May.

They postponed the election because county Auditor Bill Donohue said the vote would be by mail, a move that would save taxpayers about $6,000. Incorporation backers feared the convenience of the mail ballot would lead too many opponents to vote.

A two-year law giving the auditor authority over elections expired in June.

County commissioners did not discuss requiring a mail-in ballot Tuesday. Commissioners Steve Hasson and Phil Harris opposed a mail-in ballot in May.

The proposed city of Opportunity would be bounded by Interstate 90 on the north, 16th Avenue on the south, Argonne Road on the west and Evergreen Road on the east. It would have about 19,000 residents.

Evergreen would include about 15,000 residents, living between the Spokane River and 24th Avenue, Evergreen and Barker roads.

Although incorporation has proven unpopular in the Spokane Valley, six new cities have formed in crowded King County in the 1990s. The most recent was Maple Valley, in a semi-rural area east of Seattle, where voters supported incorporation by a wide margin in November.

, DataTimes