Today's headlines:
- Before Spokane homeowners are able to rebuild after this month’s wildfires, they have to solve the asbestos puzzle.
- An Oregon foundation wants to help Spokane wildfire survivors who may have lost the ashes of loved ones.
- Spokane’s city library system faces a big deficit next year.
- Today, we talk with one of those wildfire survivors about what it was like to return to his home.
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If your home has been damaged or destroyed by wildfire, you must have it tested for asbestos before you’re allowed to move ahead with restoration.
Steve Jackson talked with a testing professional about the best way to do that.
Michael Johnson of Eagle Asbestos Testing says asbestos testing is required for all homes, no matter how old. He says most home construction companies phased out use of asbestos around 1980.
Michael Johnson: “In all the houses I tested that were pre-1980, about 80 percent of them came up hot. Anything after 1980, maybe one percent we find something.”
If testers find asbestos, homeowners must hire an abatement company to remove the contaminated areas. Johnson says some home insurance covers this, but not in all cases.
He urges anyone who is looking for an asbestos testing company to contact Spokane Clean Air for a list of approved testers. He also advises people to check the Labor and Industries website where they can find background information about contractors to make sure they are licensed and bonded.
I’m Steve Jackson reporting.
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When Spokane residents fled wildfires on August first, some left behind urns containing loved ones’ ashes. Now, a team of out-of-state “disaster archaeologists” will help recover those ashes.
Volunteers from the nonprofit Alta Heritage Foundation will arrive in Spokane next week. They’ll work alongside cadaver dogs to identify and remove previously cremated human remains from damaged homes.
Chelsea Rose is the director of the Southern Oregon Laboratory of Anthropology. She says that if her team doesn’t intervene, cleanup crews can combine cremated remains with toxic household waste.
Chelsea Rose: And it gets sent to a toxic waste dump. And that can be really an additional trauma on folks that just lost everything.
Alta has previously salvaged cremated remains from homes damaged in Oregon and California wildfires. This is their first time in Washington. Rose says they plan to train Spokane-area archaeologists so there is a regional presence in the case of future wildfires.
People who lost loved ones’ ashes in the fires can submit a request for Alta’s services at altaheritagefoundation.org.
Audrey Nelson will have more about this on the podcast later this week.
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The Spokane Public Library is facing a $2.3 million shortfall by the end of 2027.
Executive Director Andrew Chanse blames increased costs through inflation and interfund charges from the city.
The library has a budget of $14.5 million a year. Chanse says a $2.3 million spending cut would have big impacts.
CHANSE: When you look at how efficient we are, right, if we were to cut all Sundays throughout the system, all Mondays throughout the system, all the locations and close Central an additional day, say a Saturday, that would only make up for about 850 thousand dollars of that shortfall.
The library receives $9.7 million a year from the city, a number that hasn’t changed since 2024. The rest comes from a voter-approved property tax levy, grants and contributions from the Friends of the Library and the Spokane Public Library Foundation.
The library’s board of trustees is making its case to the public about the library’s importance to the community.
In a statement, the board said they decided that until they have more concrete information from the city of Spokane, it can’t decide yet about a potential reduction of hours or staff.
Chanse says the board may try to spread out the cuts over a longer period of time.
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A majority of Washington’s state Supreme Court seats – five out of nine -- will be up for grabs in November.
This month, voters narrowed four of the races to two candidates apiece. Three incumbents advanced, including Chief Justice Debra Stephens, a Spokane native.
The other two incumbents, Colleen Melody and Theo Angelis, joined the bench this year. They were appointed by Governor Bob Ferguson. Melody is also a Spokane native.
One of the challengers also has Spokane ties. Dave Stevens was a former deputy prosecutor in Spokane for 10 years. He’s now a superior court judge in Mason County. Stevens is running for an open seat. He’s a critic of recent state Supreme Court decisions, as KUOW’s Amy Radil reports.
Stevens disagrees with many of the court’s recent rule changes for criminal suspects and jury selection. He also accuses the court of working backwards from their desired real-world outcomes, rather than following the state constitution.
Dave Stevens: “And the consequences - that’s for the political branches, that’s for the legislature, that’s for the governor. They deal with the fallout. We follow the law.”
Stevens received backing from the state Republican party. Two other candidates were endorsed by Democrats—King County Superior Court judge Jaime Hawk appears poised to move to the general election with Stevens.
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Matthew Kincanon is one of hundreds of Spokane wildfire survivors. His Indian Trail house was one of the more than 800 structures that burned. He wrote about his experience for FAVS News.
Kincanon and his parents fled to a relative’s house in Deer Park when they saw the fire was headed their way. In the middle of the night, he and his dad were unable to sleep, so they got in their car and drove back to Spokane to check on Matthew’s house.
Matthew Kincanon: The entire neighborhood was gone. And I actually had a hard time seeing what my house was. I knew where one of my neighbor's houses was because of a tree and a burned out car.
And we were trying to, which rubble pile of ash is mine. But we found it when we saw a small green utility box out in front.
I could not tell you all that was going through my mind. It was just shock, horror, disbelief. And it was just slowly hitting me all at once that I had lost everything.
And I thought I was keeping it together okay. I hadn't broken down or I was just trying to keep my composure. But it wasn't until I called my fiancee to give her the news.
Literally, as soon as I heard her answer, words didn't come out of my mouth. Only a cry of pure anguish and agony. My dad even had to take the phone from me to give the news to my fiancee and also tell her that I was just not available to talk at the moment.
And we were actually at my dad, my parents house at that time, just grabbing some things that we were not able to grab before we fled. And that's when I just broke down. I was in the living room and I just, one second I was just holding the phone about to talk to my fiancee.
Next thing I know I was just on the ground just in pure anguish because it reality hit me.
DN: We're only two and a half weeks later. How are you feeling now?
MK: You know, I'm actually doing okay. Every day gets a little easier and there are actually many reasons why I'm actually doing okay compared to I was before because on that Sunday when I lost everything, I had no idea what I was going to do next or how I was going to rebuild or where I was going to go from there. But the thing that really surprised me that just lifted my spirits was this tremendous amount of love and support that I got from my friends and community. As soon as I posted on Facebook that my home was gone, Tracy Simmons of FAVS News reached out to me asking if she could start a GoFundMe for me.
DN: And you work for Tracy. I mean, you're a freelancer for her publication.
MK: Yes. I've been a freelancer for her for nine years now and she was also one of my professors at Gonzaga University.
DN: So she wanted to create this GoFundMe page for you.
MK: Yep. And I thought that was incredibly kind and generous. And when she started, I thought, oh, it'd be nice if maybe like a thousand dollars came in. But then thousands came in from people I didn't know, from high school friends, college friends, people I had interviewed before, people in the community that I knew. And the amount of love and support I got was just beyond overwhelming. I really thought I was going to be facing the smoldering ashes of my home alone. But I just realized there that, no, I had my family. I had my friends. I had a whole community behind me that I did not realize until now was going to stick by me no matter what. And that's because there was one gift in particular that stood out to me.
It was a blanket from a friend of mine, Barry Moses. He just checked in on me one day saying, hey, I want to come see you, see how you're doing. And so we scheduled a time to meet. And I thought he was going to just give me a hug, ask me how I was doing. I would just give him an update. And then he told me that he had something for me in his car. And he went in and pulled out this blanket and told me it'd be a prayer for me and my future home and everything. And really that, I broke down crying when I got that because to receive a gift that special from a citizen of the Spokane tribe, I mean, blankets are incredible symbols in the indigenous communities. And it's a great symbol of love and care.
And to just know that there was this great amount of care for me just completely floored me. And when I got that blanket, I thought this is something I'm going to cherish and respect for the rest of my life. And that was also something that helped make this a lot easier too because I now sleep with that blanket every night. It helps me feel safe.
DN: You can hear more of Matthew Kincanon’s story on the most recent Inland Journal program.
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SPR News Today is a production of Spokane Public Radio.
Reporting today was contributed by Steve Jackson, Audrey Nelson, Lisa Leinberger, Amy Radil and Doug Nadvornick, today’s host and producer. Web support is provided by Anna Gyure Havlek.
Thanks for listening. This is SPR News.
