Council To Consider Payment For Downtown Riverfront Land

The Spokane City Council will consider a proposal Tuesday to take money from a special account to help pay for a piece of riverfront land.

If approved, the council will take $500,000 from an account made up of reserves and interest earned by dollars collected from local improvement districts.

The money would go toward a $1.9 million payment to Steve and Leslie Ronald for their land just north of the downtown library.

Other money for the land will come from the Parks and Recreation Department, the arterial street fund, the library fund and the sewer fund.

In other business, the council plans to set a Feb. 2 hearing on a $389,440 block grant for the Police Department.

The federal dollars are given to all cities based on their crime rates and population, said Dave Ingle of the department.

Spokane plans to use the money to upgrade computers, help the county hire a juvenile prosecutor and pay the salary of an accountant to oversee grants.

Council members are moving their regular meeting to Tuesday from the usual Monday due to the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday today.

A briefing for the council will begin at 3:30 p.m. in the lower-level conference room of City Hall, 808 W. Spokane Falls Blvd. The council meeting will start at 6 p.m.

, DataTimes