Public Periscope
A slip of the tongue, sort of
Jim West insists that it was nerves, not well-planned humor, that prompted him to misspeak while expressing gratitude to former Sen. Lois Stratton for her intro at his campaign breakfast Thursday. “Thanks for that interruption, Lois,” West said after taking the podium … As the crowd broke up, he tried to explain above the laughter that he really meant introduction … Thing is, the former senator had just finished telling everyone how she mentored the current senator during his early days in Olympia. Republican West was prone to talk long after his point had been made, said Democrat Stratton … So they worked out a signal: whenever he was speaking and saw her turn around and look at him, it was time to sit down and be quiet.
Help wanted
Wondering what exactly the strong mayor is going to do when he or she takes office next January? Some local civic organizations are, so they’ve scheduled some meetings this week and next to discuss the job requirements for that position and the new job of council president … The meetings to try to create job descriptions reflecting community expectations are a two-step process. Talk with your neighbors, then come to a citywide forum … The area meetings will be noon Tuesday at the Spokane Intercollegiate Research and Technology Institute, 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at Sacajawea Middle School, and 6:30 p.m. Thursday at North Central High School … The citywide meeting is 6:30 p.m. May 24 at the Spokane Arena’s Champions Room. All are sponsored by the Citizens League of Greater Spokane, Spokane Area Chamber of Commerce, the League of Women Voters and neighborhood organizations.
A politician with vision
U.S. Sen. Slade Gorton has a new look to go with his campaign for a new term. He recently had laser eye surgery, allowing him to shed his glasses and his staff to send out a new studio shot of the senator sans spectacles … “Please feel free to throw out those old photos of Slade with the bulky glasses,” his helpful staff suggested. Actually, Gorton’s glasses aren’t as bulky as they once were. Some extremely old political veterans will recall that Gorton adopted contacts to correct part of his vision when he hit the campaign comeback trail in 1988 … Two years earlier, Democrat Brock Adams had mocked Gorton’s thick lenses in a moment of bad taste captured on film in Spokane.
If they don’t pay, is election off?
Spokane County Auditor Vicky Dalton has informed the various cities and towns that they’re going to have to pay up for their voters. It costs money to put citizens on the books when they register and take them off when they move away, she said. State law says incorporated areas are supposed to pay their fare share … In the past, the city of Spokane paid some voter maintenance costs, but none of the other cities and towns paid anything. That means the voters in the unincorporated areas were paying more than their share … It’s all proportional, so the bill to the city of Spokane is $115,228; bill to Medical Lake, $1,800.
This week’s whine special
“We can conduct a thousand prescribed burns and the public will never know about it. We lose one, and we get all the press, and that’s unfortunate.” - John Fort, director of the National Interagency Prescribed Fire Training Center in Tallahassee, Fla., as the federal government’s purposely set fires raged through thousands of acres near Los Alamos, N.M., and the Grand Canyon.