Few get day off for Reagan’s funeral

Most private businesses, including banks, will remain open Friday despite President George W. Bush’s declaration of a day of mourning for former President Ronald Reagan, who died Saturday. But some government offices around the Inland Northwest will close.

Federal offices will shut down, and there will be no mail service. Locally, both Spokane Valley and Spokane Regional Health District offices will also be closed.

Spokane, Spokane County and Washington state offices will remain open, as will Idaho offices, including state, Kootenai County and Coeur d’Alene governmental buildings. Services provided by those governments will continue on schedule.

It will cost Spokane County at least tens of thousands of dollars to stay open because contractual agreements with most of its union employees require that they get any national holiday off, whether it be a normal holiday or a surprise holiday like that declared by Bush for Friday. If they are required to work, they get holiday pay.

That extra pay could cost the Spokane County Sheriff’s Department as much as $40,000, said Undersheriff Larry Lindskog.

“The directive that we have from commissioners is that we won’t close any office, but there are a number of them that we may be able to cut down to minimum staffing,” Lindskog said.

Commissioners were adamant that county offices remain open and said department heads must find the money in their own budgets to handle the unexpected expense.

“It’s not an option to shut down the whole county,” said Commissioner Phil Harris.

It typically costs about $350,000 a day to operate the county, said Budget Director Marshall Farnell, who added that it’s too soon to estimate how much holiday pay will cost the county.

Spokane County Auditor Vicky Dalton said it will probably cost her office about $4,000 more than a typical workday.

After heated discussion, Harris and Commissioner John Roskelley voted Wednesday to also give employees of the four unions without the holiday clause in their contract and non-represented employees, like managers, a day off.

Those employees have until the end of June to take it.

Commissioner Kate McCaslin disagreed with that decision, saying that Reagan would want taxpayers served first.

“I think we need to minimize the cost to the taxpayer, and unfortunately that means some people won’t be getting a day off,” she unsuccessfully argued. “Ronald Reagan’s not yet buried, but he’s turning over in his coffin.”

The Spokane Valley City Council voted 6-1 at its meeting Tuesday to close the city’s offices Friday.

Deputy Mayor Diana Wilhite was the lone dissenter. She said denying people access to city services Friday wouldn’t be an appropriate tribute to the former president.

The politically conservative council briefly debated whether observing the day of mourning would be a sign of partisanship.

But Councilman Steve Taylor said, “If any other past president would die, I would think we would do the same thing.”

Then, the 28-year-old Republican said, “Although, Ronald Reagan was the best president ever. One of my earliest memories was watching the 1980 election returns.”

The Spokane County Health District is closing because of contractual agreements with its employees similar to those held by county workers.

Gov. Gary Locke’s office reported this week that only the Legislature can give state employees an extra holiday, and the Legislature is not in session.

City of Spokane officials said initially that they were waiting to see whether state employees were going to be given the day off, and would probably follow the state. Marlene Feist, a spokeswoman for the mayor, said they also checked labor contracts to see if the city was required to give any of its unions the day off for a national holiday. But with state employees remaining on the job, and no provisions in any of the contracts, Feist said the city would operate as “business as usual.”