In brief: County will study impact fee options

The Kootenai County commission will meet with local taxing districts Thursday for a presentation on how the county could charge impact fees to help pay for the area’s growth.

Tom Pippin, of BBC Research and Consulting of Denver, will give an impact fee crash course on what the county needs to do to start charging the fees, which would be assessed on residential and commercial building permits.

Commissioner Todd Tondee said the commission then will decide whether to hire a consultant to study how much development is affecting county infrastructure such as roads, parks and fire protection. The study would sort out how much revenue the fee system should generate and how the county could spend the money.

The commission hopes to work with nearly 20 taxing district to contribute money, perhaps $10,000 each, to the study. The 6 p.m. meeting will be at the Kootenai County Administration Building, 451 Government Way. For more information, call (208) 446-1600.

– Erica Curless

Post Falls

Deputies scour river for missing woman

Kootenai County Sheriff’s deputies spent Tuesday afternoon searching the Spokane River near Post Falls looking for a woman who may have tried to kill herself.

Deputies said the woman, a 28-year-old mother of four, called her husband Monday evening claiming she was going to hang herself from a bridge, said Capt. Ben Wolfinger.

Officials later found her car at Falls Park, along with some of her possessions, a bottle of alcohol and rope near a bridge owned by Avista.

Officials at the Post Falls Dam were planning to close the spillway to allow searchers to better comb the river for the woman.

– Christopher Rodkey

CdA skate park to get new half-pipe

The Coeur d’Alene Skate Park is getting a new concrete and steel half-pipe ramp to replace a wooden ramp in need of constant repair.

The new $23,000 half-pipe will last longer, the city said Tuesday.

Coeur d’Alene will pay $13,000 of the cost, and the rest will be donated by ACI, Interstate Concrete, Gordon Concrete Cutting and Forest Steel.

The Parks Department crew will tear out the old ramp this week and complete construction of the new half-pipe by June 1. Crews also will repair the pyramid transition area.

The park is just north of Memorial Field, off Mullan Avenue. For more information, call Recreation Director Steve Anthony at (208) 769-2250.

– Erica Curless