Housing advocates urge local action on homelessness
Advocates for unhoused people in Spokane say they’re getting impatient with the lack of urgency shown by elected leaders.
Among those voices is Barry Barfield, the president of the Spokane Homeless Coalition.
Yesterday, he led more than a dozen people on a 5 a.m. trek through the snow from City Hall to the County Courthouse.
“People are dying on the street. Businesses are dying on the street," Barfield said. "And until we address it like a crisis, like an emergency, it’s just going to keep dragging on."
It was a symbolic march to show Spokane needs coordinated leadership to address the complex web of issues related to homelessness.
"What I would love is if our mayor and the five county commissioners were to get on board with this and say, ‘Yes, we think it’s a crisis.’ What do you know? We have three Republicans. We have three Democrats and we’re coming together to do something about this crisis," he said.
Still, he said, Spokane’s homeless problem is not due to lack of effort to solve it.
People in Spokane’s public and private sectors are doing all kinds of good work, he said, but they sometimes duplicate each other.
Gavin Cooley from the Spokane Business Association told the group that Spokane’s history shows local governments can be very effective in emergency situations if they plan and work together.
Extra screenings for patients at risk of breast cancer could get insurance coverage in ID
Idaho House lawmakers will consider requiring insurers to cover extra breast cancer screenings for high-risk patients.
Under the bill, patients with a family history of breast cancer, dense breast tissue or a genetic predisposition to the disease could get additional screening covered by insurance.
Several doctors testified advanced screening has helped save many lives and driven down the overall cost for treatment
Amy Manning runs IIIA, an insurer for dozens of Idaho cities and government agencies. Manning said the organization began covering all screening costs for breast, colon and prostate cancers five years ago.
"We have a 10% decrease in number of cancers and we have a 7.5% decrease in overall cost," she said. "Our cost in treating cancer is down $2 million from last year."
Idaho ranks last in the country in breast cancer screenings. One in three Idaho women hasn’t had a mammogram in the past two years.
The bill cleared a House committee Monday and now goes to the full floor.
WA high schoolers may start getting financial education
A Washington House committee has voted to require high school students take a financial education course before graduation.
The bill mandates school districts, charter and tribal schools begin offering courses by the 2027-28 academic year.
Students in the 2031 graduating class would be the first to have to meet new financial education standards.
The legislation is sponsored by Walla Walla Republican Representative Skyler Rude.
It received unanimous support, including from Democratic Representative Monica Stonier [STONE-year].
"The loudest voices demanding better financial education in our public school system has come from students as they are growing and starting to think about how they might make decisions down the road," she said. "Also coming from households where they, when asking questions at home about financial tools, access to banking strategies, how to save, find that they are sometimes without guidance."
The bill now moves to the full House of Representatives.
Federal wildfire prevention bill would just increase logging, conservationists say
The U.S. Senate is set to consider a bill meant to reduce wildfires on federal lands.
But conservation groups say it will increase logging and weaken public oversight.
The Fix Our Forests Act passed the House in January — right as wildfires were ravaging the Los Angeles area.
The bill would fast-track logging projects through environmental reviews meant to protect endangered species.
Republican lawmakers say those reviews stall necessary wildfire prevention work, like forest thinning.
Many Democrats initially opposed the bill, but shifted gears with this House vote, including Oregon Representatives Janelle Bynum and Val Hoyle.
Lauren Anderson, program manager with Oregon Wild, said it will effectively increase logging.
"It's trying to disguise itself as a legitimate wildfire strategy, but the actual purpose of this bill, and sort of the driver behind it was to do an end run around the Endangered Species Act," Anderson said.
It’s unclear when the Senate will vote on the proposal.
Former OR lawmaker up for Labor Secretary
Lori Chavez-DeRemer will testify Wednesday morning for the job as America’s labor secretary.
But the former U.S. Representative from Oregon is facing political headwinds.
In 2022, Chavez-DeRemer was elected as Oregon’s first Republican congresswoman. Her dad was a Teamsters member, and she backed pro-union policies in Congress.
With support from several large unions, she ran for reelection as a moderate on issues like labor and abortion but lost to Democrat Janelle Bynum.
Recently, Republicans have criticized Chavez-DeRemer’s pro-union views.
NBC news also reported that she worked at a Planned Parenthood clinic during her early 20s, though she told a senate committee that she does not “personally” support abortion.
Unlike most of President Trump’s cabinet nominees, some Republican senators have said they plan to oppose Chavez-DeRemer, so she’ll need Democratic support.
Chavez-DeRemer’s hearing is set for 7:00 a.m. PT Wednesday.
Indigenous nations sign cross-border salmon pact
U.S.-Canada relations are at their lowest in more than a century.
A trade war threatened by President Trump has Canadians boycotting American products and booing the Star-Spangled Banner at sporting events.
But relations among some Indigenous nations are getting closer.
Canadian and U.S. officials met in Portland last week to divvy up Pacific salmon catches for the year.
The Indigenous nations of salmon country met there also.
Pacific Northwest tribes and Canadian First Nations signed an agreement to work together to protect salmon, despite the international border that separates them.
"The border is there between our two countries, but the border is invisible to indigenous peoples. It always was and always will be," Ron Allen, chairman of the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe said. "We have that political environment that we work in, but we have a common cause."
The tribal leaders say they share an interest in having enough salmon around to support fishing and keep their cultures alive.
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Reporting contributed by Doug Nadvornick, James Dawson, April Ehrlich, Bryce Doyle and John Ryan.