Federal grant will help Spokane adjust to climate change
A Spokane climate consortium is celebrating a $20 million grant aimed at helping the community improve its response to heat and wildfire smoke.
The grant comes from the Environmental Protection Agency’s Environmental and Climate Justice program, and is funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act. Spokane’s consortium has four partners, including Gonzaga’s Climate Institute, led by Brian Henning.
“This grant is going to make it possible to launch climate resilience work at historic levels, levels that we have not seen before in Spokane,” Henning told SPR News. “So we’re really excited to be leading this group of partners, including Spokane Neighborhood Action Partners, or SNAP, the city of Spokane and the Carl Maxey Center in this effort to greatly expand the climate resilience work that’s being pursued in our community.”
The Maxey Center will receive $900,000 to install a solar array and battery backup to power its building when the electricity is off. The city plans to use $8 million to install solar panels and backup batteries at two libraries (Downtown Central and Liberty Park) and two community centers (West Central and Northeast) so they can continue to serve as cooling or warming centers if power is interrupted.
The grant will fund other projects, Henning said, including $8 million SNAP will use to install electric heat pumps, improved HVAC systems, air quality monitor and air filtration systems in 300 low-income homes.
STA board set to hear broader perspectives in CEO search
It looks like public input will play some role in the search for the Spokane Transit Authority’s new CEO.
In a meeting earlier this month, transit board chair Al French opposed formally involving STA employees or the public in the process. He and Spokane Valley Mayor Pam Haley argued previous searches didn’t include such input, and that private businesses don’t typically allow employees to serve as active partners in executive hiring processes.
But at a meeting Thursday, French changed tack, offering a compromise in which a panel made up of STA leaders, community members and representatives from tourism, business and transportation agencies would act in advisory role for the transit board.
But French stuck to his bottom line argument: only the board is empowered to choose STA’s next chief executive.
“We are elected to make these decisions,” French said. “I am fine with a citizens advisory committee that wants to meet with the candidates and make a recommendation…[but] we will be making that decision as a board.”
STA board member Dan Dunne put forth a proposal that combined elements of French’s plan with modifications from fellow members Kitty Klitzke and Zack Zappone. It called for designating the STA board’s four-person operations committee as the CEO search task force, hiring a consultant to help the committee with a national candidate search, producing a draft job description, and recommending the specific makeup of the community advisory panel.
The board approved Dunne’s motion unanimously.
Current Spokane Transit CEO Susan Meyer was hired in 2005. She announced last month that she plans to step down at the end of the year.
Washington campaign finance agency will keep ballot initiative investigation in-house
Washington’s Public Disclosure Commission decided not to forward a campaign finance complaint to the attorney general’s office.
The complaint alleged Brian Heywood violated state campaign finance laws in his effort to create and secure conservative ballot initiatives aimed at shrinking or demolishing recent laws supported by the legislature’s Democratic majorities.
A coalition of progressive groups alleged Heywood’s PAC, Let’s Go Washington, failed to disclose the money it paid to gather signatures for the initiatives, concealed the identity of a campaign vendor and inadequately reported in-kind expenditures from Heywood.
The complaint was filed a year ago, but the agency has issued no findings or a ruling on the allegations.
The groups that filed the complaint, including Planned Parenthood, a chapter of the Service Employees International Union and Washington Conservation Action, said the probe was taking too long. With the November election drawing near, they wanted the PDC to hand the case to the attorney general’s office.
The PDC declined that request. PDC chair Allen Hayward seemed unconcerned with the pace of the probe, saying the agency would address the complaint between now and the November election.
After the PDC’s decision, Heywood issued a statement in which he touted his success in getting three initiatives on the ballot, criticized the groups that complained, and pledged to persuade Washington voters to back his initiatives this fall.
Idaho’s AG tries to spike November ballot initiatives
Idaho Attorney General Raul Labrador is asking the state supreme court to stop a ballot initiative that would change the state’s elections.
The measure would implement a primary election similar to Washington’s, in which voters select finalists from among all candidates. The top four candidates would go on to the general election. The initiative would also institute ranked choice voting for general elections.
Labrador alleges organizers used deceptive practices to get signatures by saying the initiative would create an open primary and de-emphasizing the ranked choice voting component.
“This is the only check that we have on the initiative process, is to make sure the laws were followed adequately,” Labrador said this week.
He says the measure also violates the Idaho Constitution’s single-subject rule, which allows legislation to apply only to one area of law.
Labrador’s office is asking justices to expedite the lawsuit, because county clerks receive copies of their ballots from the Secretary of State’s office in early September.
In a statement, Idahoans for Open Primaries spokesman Luke Mayville called the suit a political stunt and said Labrador is trying to interfere with the November election.
Conditions still in place for a record fire season
Hundreds of thousands of acres of forestland across the Pacific Northwest continue to burn under record-breaking dry conditions.
A heat wave, a series of lightning storms and human activity have set more than 60 fires ablaze across Oregon and Washington.
In just 48 hours, fire fighters counted more than 2,000 lightning strikes.
Over the weekend, half a million people were under fire danger warnings.
US Forest Service spokesperson Holly Krake says some national forests have had 75 days without rain -- and fire season runs for another three months.
“This is really shaping up to be a monster fire year across the Pacific Northwest,” Krake said.
While temperatures are expected to cool by the end of the week, the lack of moisture means forests and grasslands are likely to remain critical for wildfire.
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Reporting was contributed by Brandon Hollingsworth, Owen Henderson, Doug Nadvornick, James Dawson and Kristian Foden-Vencil.