Regional News

The Deer Park school board voted Monday night to join a few other Spokane area school districts in adopting a hybrid format for the academic year.

That means parents will have the option of sending their children to school. They’ll also have the option of keeping their kids at home.

A firefighter who helped put out a recent wildfire in north-central Washington has been diagnosed with COVID-19. It’s the third state Department of Natural Resources firefighter diagnosis this fire season. 

In response, land managers are asking people to avoid starting fires to help keep crews safe.

UPDATED: The Deer Park School District has voted to allow in-person instruction for students, joining Mead and East Valley as Spokane-area districts that will have students in classrooms as the academic year begins.

Tonight [Monday] the Mead school board will decide whether to postpone for a couple of weeks the start of the academic year.

They're part of the debate between those who believe opening schools is too risky and those who say not opening them is also risky. 

Near Walla Walla, Washington, off U.S. Highway 12, stacks of baled straw are plunked down in jagged rows. They cut boxy midday shadows amid the crew-cut stubble. It’s harvest time.

Driving through Mattawa July 29, onlookers witnessed a seemingly jovial scene that sounded like a block party. But among the gritos of the mariachi and the dancing residents of Mattawa, they heard expressions of anger and frustration. 

It’s a labor demonstration. And a political one.

Part of the battle for local health officials in monitoring the coronavirus is getting enough testing and personal protective equipment for health care workers.

The Spokane Regional Health District relies almost exclusively on the state Department of Health for its supplies.

Health Officer Bob Lutz says that supply chain has been somewhat spotty. But he hit the motherlode last week with a shipment of about 125-thousand KN-95 masks.

Today [Monday] is the final day for small businesses and non-profits to apply for Covid-related aid through Spokane County.

The county allocated $10 million from the federal CARES Act to help small businesses and non-profits with their operating costs.

The coronavirus is forcing event organizers to find new ways to stage their events.

The Coeur d’Alene Marathon will take place as usual later this month.

But race director Ryan Hite says what is normally a one-day event has been extended to three days, August 21 through 23.  

“There’s not going to be a big after party. There’s not going to be a beer garden," Hite said.

In early June, as Gov. Jay Inslee was overseeing a phased reopening of the state, his budget office signed a contract with the elite international consulting firm McKinsey & Company to provide access to a “Governor’s Decision Support Tool.” That tool was meant to aid Inslee’s decision-making as he gradually unlocked the economy.

But access to McKinsey’s customized COVID-19 risk tool didn’t come cheap. Under the contract, the state initially agreed to pay for eight weeks of access to McKinsey’s services and proprietary data sets. The cost to taxpayers: $165,000 per week. And that was McKinsey’s government discount rate.

Spokane public health officials reported 53 new coronavirus cases on Friday. It’s the sixth day out of the last seven that the case count was 75 or fewer. And it was less than a third of Thursday’s record of 170 new cases.

Health Officer Bob Lutz says the Thursday count appears to be an outlier in the recent trend.

The police reform discussion in Spokane is about to ramp up.

Spokane city officials on Thursday announced they’re ready to begin a community-wide dialogue on policing. They say that will include, at a minimum, the mayor and city council, police leadership and social justice advocates.

Washington Governor Jay Inslee announced new regulations Thursday for long-term care facilities, such as nursing homes, that give families better visiting options. These facilities, where people with vulnerable conditions reside, were put on lockdown as the pandemic began to spike this past spring.

Another new daily Covid record for Spokane County. Today [Thursday] the health district reported 175 cases, about 30 more than the previous one-day high.

The spike came during a period when the daily trend had seemed to stabilize. The average for the five previous days was about 65 cases per day.

Walking into the vast B Reactor chamber at the Hanford Site, Tri-Cities musician Denin Koch felt the pull of history and innovation.

Washington Governor Jay Inslee has released what he calls a “decision tree” to help school districts decide how to teach students this fall.

The governor has three levels of recommendations, including for districts in counties with higher Covid spread rates.

The Spokane County Sheriff’s Department and Spokane chapter of the NAACP have announced their agreement to study racial disparities in arrests in the county.

Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich, Spokane NAACP President Kurtis Robinson and Spokane NAACP Vice President Kiantha Duncan explained the project at a news conference on Wednesday.

It’s good to be an incumbent if you’re a state legislator in the Spokane area. Incumbents in the Third, Sixth, Seventh and Ninth Districts all advanced beyond Tuesday’s primary election to the November general election.

That also extends to the Fourth District Senate race, where the longtime incumbent, Republican Mike Padden, won a strong majority in a three-way race.

Washington U.S. Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers has taken another step toward serving a ninth term.

She cruised to a big lead in her race against four candidates, winning about half the vote. Her apparent opponent will be Democrat Dave Wilson.

In legislative races, two Democrats made a strong showing in Spokane Valley.

Democrats Lori Feagan and Lance Gurel lead four-way races with Republicans.

Feagan took 40% of the early vote in a race for the seat that Rep. Matt Shea now holds.

Here are the results from Spokane County, eastern Washington county, legislative and congressional races after the first night's release of ballots.

Here are the statewide results from the Washington Secretary of State's office.

Okanogan County is eastern Washington’s latest area of concern for COVID-19 cases.

Eight people, at least two of them foreign H-2A farmworkers, have died in the county. That’s considered a lot for the geographically large yet relatively sparsely populated county of about 42,000 people.

The recovery in airline travel seems to have hit a plateau in recent weeks, according to Transportation Security Administration checkpoint screening numbers. With the end of coronavirus pandemic seemingly beyond the horizon, the near future is turning grim for workers in the airline and airports sector.

Multiple airport tenants in Seattle and Portland issued layoff notices in the past week. But in a possible sign of optimism over the long term, the Pacific Northwest's major airport operators, the ports of Seattle and Portland, are continuing with big budget construction projects.