Voices

Friends and family of longtime Spokane Valley resident Ruth Bradley are invited to attend a celebration of her life at 2 p.m. next Saturday at Opportunity Christian Church, 708 N. Pines Road. Bradley’s daughter, Lois Debenham, said her mother doesn’t like funerals but likes it when long lost friends and acquaintances come to funerals to share their memories. “That’s why we’re doing this,” Debenham said. “She does not want a memorial service or funeral when she dies.”

Monday Fire District 8 – 6 p.m. at Station 81, 6117 N. Palouse Highway.

More space, a combining of related departments, owning their own facility rather than leasing and better security are the reasons the Idaho State Police is constructing a new building at 615 Wilbur Ave. (at Mineral Drive), Coeur d’Alene. To be named the Linda Huff Building, after a trooper who was shot to death in the ISP parking lot about 10 years ago, about 80 employees will move into the single-level, 40,000-square-foot structure in July. The departments include patrol, investigations, forensics, dispatch, commercial vehicle inspectors, evidence, officer training and support staff.

Despite facing costs associated with a new police department building, Liberty Lake Police Chief Brian Asmus fought to keep his 2009 budget limited to a 4 percent increase. He accomplished the feat in large part by extensively trimming some areas of the budget and by asking for two new reserve police officers.

There is a train museum just across the Canadian border in Cranbrook, B.C., that will leave visitors who love trains with an irresistible desire to return again. Train companies like the Canadian Pacific Railway used to spare no expense in building luxurious passenger cars. Now, the museum staff and volunteers spare no expense or time to rebuild and restore cars to their magnificent, original newness. The history and the labor of love found here is amazing.

Saturday “A Few Good Men” (Drama) – 7:30 p.m., Lake City Playhouse, 1320 E. Garden Ave., Coeur d’Alene, 667-1323.

There will be no Spokane Valley City Council meeting Tuesday, when City Hall will be closed for Veterans Day. Some council members will be in Orlando, Fla., for a National League of Cities conference Tuesday through Saturday.

The possible adoption of a right-of-way regulation, Ordinance 373, and a six-month zoning moratorium on impact home based businesses filled the Millwood City Council meeting with concerned citizens Monday. “I’ve been on the council a little over 16 years,” Councilman Glenn Bailey said to the crowd of more than 30 people. “And tonight I sense some input that’s valuable for us more than I have ever seen in a meeting of Millwood Council in the past.”

For the week of Nov. 10-14 Monday – Chicken alfredo, vegetables, whole wheat bread, peaches.

I noticed snow on some of the area hills this past week, and it’s finally sinking in that wintry weather could be upon us any day now. As folks tend to look at the weather forecast and zero in on those subfreezing temperatures, I’d like to remind you all that snowy weather can occur even when temperatures are forecast to be well above freezing. Recently, one of my children (I should cut her some slack, she’s only 6 years old) mentioned something about snow being frozen rain. As a good meteorologist mom, I corrected her by saying that snow is not frozen rain, but rain is merely melted snow. With the exception of the tropics, all precipitation begins as snow high up in the clouds. When a meteorologist is trying to determine what type of precipitation will fall, the key question is how far down in elevation will the snow make it before it melts. It is just as important to look at how temperatures are expected to evolve in the vertical as it is to see the changes in the horizontal.