Today's headlines:
- We have an update of Washington’s largest wildfire, which is burning on the Colville Indian Reservation.
- The Northwest has just finished celebrating Climate Week. AI data centers represent one of the most active climate-related issues.
- Summer camps are providing interesting things to do for students and adults. Spokane Colleges is holding a series of sessions to give high school students a chance to experience potential careers, including baking.
- We’ll talk with Washington Fourth District legislative candidate Hillary Pham, one of four people hoping to replace Suzanne Schmidt in the state House of Representatives.
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A large area north of Grand Coulee Dam remains under evacuation orders as crews try to stop the advance of the Kaiser Canyon fire on the Colville Reservation.
The fire has charred more than 60,000 acres. Fire spokeswoman Bethany Osgood says a national incident management team will take oversight of the fire this morning.
“That’s a very large overhead team that can bring additional resources, air support, build a camp, support the firefighters, the town of Nespelem and the people who live and work here," she said.
Aircraft from eastern Washington have been brought in to scoop water from the Columbia River and drop it on the flames.
Evacuation shelters are open at Lake Roosevelt High School, the Omak Community Center and the Omak Longhouse. Large animal shelters are open at the Okanogan County Fairgrounds, at the rodeo grounds at the Omak Stampede and the Range Riders Rodeo Grounds in Grand Coulee.
To the east in Ferry County, the Modrite fire has charred about 64-hundred acres north and west of the Columbia River. Level 1 and 3 evacuations are in place there too.
Officials overseeing the fire suppression efforts in Boundary County in North Idaho plan a community meeting tonight at 6 at Mount Hall Elementary in Bonners Ferry.
They will share information about the current work on the Upper Smith and the Turner fires. The Turner fire is about half contained. It’s about 700 acres in size and more than 200 people are there fighting it. Officials say they have a line around the entire fire. Level 2..or get ready to go…evacuations remain in place there.
The Upper Smith fire continues to smolder in steep terrain. Officially, it’s zero percent contained. Nearly 300 people and a lot of heavy equipment and aircraft are there battling it. It’s not growing quickly and officials report making steady progress. Some road closures remain in effect there.
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Climate Week has just wrapped up in the Pacific Northwest, with hundreds of events in Washington, Oregon and British Columbia. A hot topic this year was AI data centers and their impact on the grid. KNKX environment reporter Bellamy Pailthorp has more.
Climate Week brings together innovators, researchers and policy makers. James Hove is with the non-profit advocacy group Climate Solutions. He spoke at a discussion about AI-data centers and communities… and said he was surprised by the willingness of big tech and utilities on the panel to consider regulations… like requiring disclosure of projected water and electricity use.
“Everyone on the panel talked about data transparency and flexibility, and those things, and those we believe are critical for our grid planning and for transparency, so we know ratepayers aren't being hurt. So it was great to hear that.”
A spokeswoman for Microsoft said the company supports transparency and tariffs to make sure data centers are “paying their way.” The company’s sustainability report shows a 25% increase in its greenhouse gas emissions last year.
Data center legislation is expected to once again take center stage in Olympia when lawmakers reconvene in January.
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Summer camp means different things to different people.
For some, it’s a chance to go outside and do something physical.
Spokane Colleges give high school students a chance to try out prospective careers.
Earlier this month, about 10 students visited SCC’s Inland Northwest Culinary Academy to learn how to bake cakes and artisan breads from instructor-chefs such as Curtis Smith.
“Crazy enough, they're doing some math today. So we're teaching them how to take recipes that we do in industry that might make 20 pounds of something and see if they can do the math to make just a little bit so they can do it at home," he said.
Students learn how to make raised donuts. Instructor Greg Richards helps them lower racks of fritters and maple bars into the hot oil to let them cook. Then they lift them out and put them onto a rack to cool.
One of the students is Rose from Colville, who called the camp a good learning experience.
“Definitely a lot more than I thought went into bread, a lot more, because, like, all the kneading and the proving and everything, that was a lot more than I thought. But I learned a lot about it, so it was super fun," she said.
Spokane College summer camps dive into topics such as electronics and journalism.
Many of the subject have been featured for years. But the baking camp was a first, says Emily Shervey, who coordinates these summer sessions.
“Especially for kids, they don't think of culinary or baking as an option all the time, so this is a great gateway and just a path that they can take. Even if they don't end up liking it, at least they tried it and don't have to commit to a full program to see if they like it," she said.
This week’s session is devoted to manufacturing and engineering,
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A former aide to Spokane Valley state Representative Rob Chase seeks to become her former boss’s seatmate in Olympia.
Hillary Pham is one of four candidates running to replace Republican Representative Suzanne Schmidt.
Pham is an Air Force veteran who served at Fairchild. After leaving the service, she worked in the Spokane County Treasurer’s office before joining Chase. She says that experience gives her an advantage over the other candidates.
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Hillary Pham: I’m going to be effective and efficient. I'm going to hit the ground running if elected. I know how things work, and I definitely want to make sure that Washingtonians stay in Washington, that we keep our state more affordable, and that I can share these stories, especially being in the 4th district, a border district, how impactful this gas tax is on everyday lives. People are traveling out of their way, 20-30 minutes. They think it's worth it every week to go fuel up in Idaho, and we can't let our business go over there.
And I just met with Spokane Realtors as well, and 80% of the builds in this region is now happening in Post Falls, Idaho, in North Idaho. So there was about 50 or so permits in the city of Spokane, but over 500 building permits in North Idaho.
DN: So as a legislator, what are the sorts of things that you would do to try to reverse that and change that?
HP: Of course, government spending is just way out of hand, and so we really need to do a deep dive and hard look at what we're spending money on, and is it necessary? Because the constitution, the state constitution outlines very clearly what the scope of responsibility it is, and I feel like it's self-imposed what other programs that the government has taken on that is not really a government necessity.
It can be handled, I think, a lot of the social services are handled greatly by the non-profits, by generous donors, those that are not taxed so heavily end up giving a lot more, and there's research on that.
And also, we have a very strong faith-based community out here. I think the churches are doing a good job, too, of taking care of their neighbors and communities, too. And so sometimes it's divestment of what government programs that are existing and really honing into what government is good at, and that's limited, limited scope versus just expansion.
Also, I think I'm seeing in the news that the majority party is starting to notice how the projected tax revenue is not as high as they predicted, and that it's really hurting constituents who can't afford basic necessities in our state and so I think there finally is going to be a swing in the pendulum there where hopefully these stories that are happening in eastern Washington prove more effective and gonna move the needle more for cutting those taxes or doing something about the spending, really hoping that with the correct communication that we can turn things around.
DN: What did you think about the millionaire's tax, quote-unquote, that was approved this year?
HP: I would say that it is a gateway to expansion of taxing all, and we've seen that through failed legislation, not gonna name specific names, but there was a campaign that would have hurt a lot of healthcare professionals in our region. We are known to one of the top employers to be in healthcare, and those that were earning over $125,000 per year would have had to be taxed, and that would drive away our workforce that is already very low and hard to recruit and retain providers and healthcare professionals in our area.
So I think it's detriment to the industry, to workers, to people that need these services, and so I don't know what it is or how we can quite reverse something so significant like this except by the initiative process that the people are signing on, which I've heard is successful this year, and we may see it in the ballot.
That’s Fourth District state House candidate Hillary Pham. This interview was recorded before the Secretary of State’s office announced that Initiative 645, to repeal the millionaire’s tax, will indeed be on the November ballot.
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SPR News Today is a production of Spokane Public Radio.
Reporting was contributed by Tom Lee, Bellamy Pailthorp and Doug Nadvornick.
Doug Nadvornick hosts and produces the show.
