The city could incentivize reductions with rewards, like a rebate on utility bills. Or, it could take a firmer approach by raising rates on prodigious water users and implementing mandatory irrigation standards on new development. The city's Water Resource Collaboration Group is looking to cut consumption by 25%. 

Current regulations offer the Spokane City Council and Spokane County Board of Commissioners a potential path to holding some in-person meetings, but it remains narrow and unlikely.

As was the case during state and federal campaigns last year, candidates for city office are planning virtual events while weighing the risks of what were once staples of election season, such as knocking on residents’ doors.

Steve Salvatori was diagnosed last year with leukemia and placed on a clinical trial drug intended to defeat the cancer. That treatment hasn't taken, and while Salvatori is receiving chemotherapy in Florida, a 67th birthday in July feels like an outside possibility.

The Gonzaga Law School and Washington State University graduate has served two years as a court commissioner and has 17 years of experience in the legal system in Washington state. She was nominated by Mayor Nadine Woodward and confirmed by the Spokane City Council last week. 

For about two hours on Jan. 14, as winds whipped mercilessly and tossed down trees across Spokane, there was not a single fire department crew left to respond to emergencies.

Spokane City Council will still be doing business virtually to start 2021, but the new year will bring the return of an old pillar of its meetings – open forum.

A new Spokane Municipal Community Court branch in the East Central Neighborhood is an evolution in the reformation of the city’s criminal justice system, but one Spokane City Council member has questioned whether a community center and neighborhood pillar is the right home for it.

The Spokane City Council agreed Monday to contribute $1.1 million toward a new facility that will, in lieu of jail, treat people with mental health and substance abuse disorders who are arrested for low-level crimes.

Spokane City Council members largely agreed Monday on what federal policy changes Congress should enact, but one stood out.

Mark Wiener vividly remembers the Great Portland Fluoride Battle of 2013.

The Spokane City Council is barreling toward an initial vote on fluoridating the city’s water supply this week, but before it does so, those for and against the plan will be given an opportunity to offer their input.

Although nonbinding, the resolution would lay out the city’s template for criminal justice reform, prioritizing efforts that reduce crime while emphasizing opportunities for diversion from jail and rehabilitation for defendants.

It just became a little bit easier to get a table at Perry Street Brewing.

The Spokane City Council has put on hold policies addressing the tenant/landlord relationship, instead shifting focus to providing resources for those facing housing challenges caused by the coronavirus pandemic. But the work to establish new rules is continuing. 

The outline presented by Woodward to the Spokane City Council includes plans for regional collaboration with Spokane County and Spokane Valley. In addition to an emergency shelter, the city is looking to establish a "bridge shelter" that would require a referral and work to get people in their own housing. 

A new law will prevent the city of Spokane from closing a homeless shelter in which beds are occupied unless it has a replacement plan or shows there is vacancy elsewhere.

The Spokane City Council voted Monday to override Mayor Nadine Woodward's veto of a new law that bans the use of "Mosquito" devices – small speakers that emit a shrill, high-pitched noise meant to disperse the young and homeless from congregating or sleeping near a business. 

In their quest for police reform, elected officials in the city of Spokane may lean on their counterparts in the state Legislature for help.