Letters To The Editor

On incorporation: It’s later than you think

Do you have any idea what it takes to get someone’s attention?

Between November 1990 and November 1998, 14 communities, which either were boxed in by larger communities or adjacent to one, became incorporated.

For these reasons and others:

1. Threat of annexation.

2. No representation, to amount to anything, by county government.

3. Large contribution in sales and property tax money and no control of how, who, where, what or when it would be spent.

4. No representation on growth management (first phase of which will be in effect for the next 20 years).

5. Inadequate law enforcement or protection.

6. No representation on boards or commissions such as public health, sewage, water, public transportation, etc.

7. Cities and towns have lower taxes than the unincorporated areas they were once part of.

8. Being incorporated they are able to make zoning decisions that are in their own best interest. Where before those decisions were made down at the courthouse.

9. None of the new cites that have been contacted, since their incorporation, have any desire to return to the unincorporated county government they had before.

There can be no doubt that, piecemeal, Spokane intends to eventually reach to the Idaho border.

If your attention has been gotten, read “Standing Their Ground” (March 21 Regional section of The Spokesman-Review) and the stories on pages 2 and 20 of the March 27 Valley Voice.

It is later than you think. Vern Slichter Spokane