Sorted by date Results 301 - 325 of 2871
CHENEY – The City Council has approved a contract with Shamrock Paving to begin work on one of the city’s larger street projects this summer. The Washington Street Preservation project will remove the old asphalt and repave Washington from Oakland to 6th Street along with sidewalk and stormwater system improvements. Shamrock was the lowest of three bidders at $752,515, not including taxes, with the engineer’s estimate at $905,000. “It’s right around where we want to be,” Public Works Director Todd Ableman told the council...
Update 07/16/20 at 12:32 p.m. -- Kendra Gannaway has been located and returned safely to her family. CHENEY -- Police Department officials are asking for the publics help in tracking down a runaway missing from her home since Monday, July 13. Kendra Gannaway is a 15-year-old female who has run away several times in the past but has always communicated with someone in her family or with friends. Cheney Police Department Capt. Rick Beghtol said the last time she ran away was a...
SPOKANE – The Spokane Regional Health District (SRHD) has announced it is providing curbside COVID-19 testing at a number of school sites in Spokane. The testing, which began July 7, will be available Tuesday – Thursday through Aug. 27 from 12:30 – 2: 30 p.m. There is no charge for the tests, but individuals who have insurance are encouraged to seek testing at their primary care provider’s office. According to a July 2 news release, to be assessed for COVID-19 patients are advised to arrive early at the site as tests are done...
Update July 4 at 10:49 .m. -- Discharge of fireworks in Airway Heights are only allowed on July 4 from 8 a.m. to midnight on private property in the city limits. Sales are allowed from July 2 at 8 am until July 4 at 8 pm. OLYMPIA – For some on the West Plains, the noise level is about to get a bit sharper – that is if it hasn’t already. The sale and discharge of fireworks in jurisdictions that still allow them began June 28, according to the Washington State Patrol. Sales are...
AIRWAY HEIGHTS – Dutch Bros. Coffee Company announced that its Airway Heights location will be closed after two employees tested positive for the novel coronavirus and the disease it carries, COVID-19. According to a company news release, the first employee at the shop at 10117 U.S. Highway 2 took a COVID-19 test on June 24 and received a positive result on June 27. Prior to the test the employee worked midday shifts on June 17 and 18 and morning to evening shifts on June 1...
SPOKANE VALLEY – A small piece of history will pass through eastern and central Washington skies on July 4. Five World War II vintage aircraft owned by Hangar 180 air museum in Lewiston will be conducting a flyover over of the region beginning at 8 a.m. The flight takes them over southeast Washington, through the Tri-Cities area to Yakima, up to Ellensburg, back over central and eastern Washington to Lewiston and then up to Spokane where they will layover for an hour at F...
CHENEY – As of July 1, Cheney residents are technically without ambulance service. That was the day Spokane County’s five-year contract — of which Cheney and other jurisdictions are a part of except the city of Spokane — with American Medical Response (AMR) expired. Fire Chief Tom Jenkins said that, at least for now, the national emergency transport provider was not bound by any previous response time requirements and essentially free to charge whatever it wanted, although he hoped they would do otherwise. “My response...
CHENEY – The school district board of directors unanimously approved an $88.77 million budget for the 2020-2021 school year at their June 24 Zoom meeting. The budget consists of five separate funds, with the largest chunk being the just over $70.8 million general fund, which covers most operational functions. Finance Director Jamie Winegart told the board the district would be using some of the existing fund balance of $5.88 million to help maintain programs and keep staffing in place, but that they were in a “good fin...
CHENEY – The City Council approved the receipt of $372,300 in funding from the federal Coronavirus, Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act at its June 23 meeting. In doing so, Cheney became the last city on the West Plains to authorize the receipt of a portion the $2 trillion Congress awarded in April to help economies around the nation deal with COVID-19. Washington state received $2.95 billion of that funding, awarding cities and counties a portion on a per capita basis. The grant funding can only be used to a...
CHENEY – After two days of meetings — including one that featured some often contentious and angry public input — Eastern Washington University’s Board of Trustees approved a $270.44 million supplemental 2021 fiscal year budget that reflects an anticipated $22.54 million loss in revenue due to impacts of COVID-19. The board’s decision on June 25 came with a caveat, a provision that required administration to present its plan for allocating proposed personnel cuts and department changes to the board first before proceedin...
CHENEY – In a way, the COVID-19 crisis was Eastern Washington University’s perfect storm. Already engaged in a college realignment and facing declining enrollment, the pandemic that hit earlier this year has culminated recently in over 400 staff layoffs, a steep loss of revenue and Monday’s vote of no confidence in the university’s president. Realignment In 2008 – 2009, Eastern’s trustees endorsed a reduction in the number of degree/major options offered at the university. EWU Provost Dr. David May said there was no follow th...
CHENEY – A woman convicted of molesting an 18-month-old girl and who admitted to having as many as 15 other child victims has relocated to Cheney. Laura Faye McCollum, 62, was convicted of the molestation charge in 1990 and was civilly committed to the state’s Special Commitment Center on McNeil Island for violent sexual offenders in 2004. She was the first woman to be committed to McNeil. McCollum was originally released to an apartment unit in Lakewood south of Tacoma last June after a psychologist filed a report in Decembe...
CHENEY – Saying “It’s time to have the courage of our convictions,” members of the Eastern Washington University Faculty Organization are planning to hold a no confidence vote on university President Dr. Mary Cullinan. The vote is scheduled for Monday, June 22 at the Faculty Senate’s regular meeting. The move stems from evaluations of upper administrators conducted by faculty in February, the results of which were released by Faculty Organization President Julia Smith and former organization President Kelly Evans on June 2...
SPOKANE – Spokane Regional Health District (SRHD) officials have announced that a COVID-19 testing site has been established in Airway Heights. The site is in partnership with Multicare Rockwood Clinic and is located at the organization’s clinic at 10414 W. Highway 2, Suite 10. The Airway Heights testing location is open beginning Friday, June 19, and is available to residents from the city and the surrounding areas. The latter includes residents of the West Plains and even further, SRHD media coordinator Kelli Hawkins said....
CHENEY – The goose has landed! DB Davis owner Dell Davis's pronouncement may not have the poetic sounds of astronaut Neil Armstrong's famous statement trumpeting mankind's first landing on the Moon, but to Cheney Depot Society member Sue Beeman, the words announcing the end of the depot's move were just as sweet. "Whew! What a day," Beeman said in a June 18 email. "I'm doing a bit of basking in the success of the moment today!" She and other members of the society have every r...
Medical Lake High School held its commencement exercise last Saturday night at Holladay Field – drive-in movie style. Vehicles were escorted into rows, maintaining the six-foot social distancing requirements between rows as part of COVID-19 measures. Valedictorian, salutatorian and class speaker messages were videotaped and shown on a big screen. Graduates were driven up to the stage in golf carts to receive their diplomas and then returned to the families....
CHENEY -- Members of Eastern Washington University overwhelmingly approved a vote of no confidence in President Dr. Mary Cullinan during a meeting today, June 22. In an news release, Faculty Organization President Julia Smith said the vote was 35-2 in favor, with four abstentions and one absence. The Senate is comprised of 40 voting members, with two additional officers also eligible to cast a vote. Smith may vote to break a tie. The move stems from evaluations of upper administrators conducted by faculty in February, the...
CHENEY – St. Paul’s Episcopal Church has announced that it is resuming in-person services this Sunday, June 18, for the first time since closures and social distancing measures were enacted in late March to combat the spread of COVID-19. It is the first church in Cheney to resume some sort of regular service. According to information provided by church secretary Susan Durrie, the church has instituted measures following state guidelines for resuming services, along with other steps. St. Paul’s is requiring the use of masks...
WEST PLAINS – School districts in Washington finally received some guidance on resuming in-person operations this fall with the release of the state’s “Reopening Washington Schools 2020: District Planning Guide” on June 11. The guidelines are a mixture of rigidity and flexibility, but are focused on one single goal expressed by state K-12 Superintendent for Public Instruction Chris Reykdal in his letter at the beginning of the report. “To be very clear, it is my expectation that schools will open this fall for in-person instr...
CHENEY – Spokane County is not going forward in its reopening from COVID-19 restrictions any time soon. That was the verdict delivered to the City Council last Tuesday night by City Administrator Mark Schuller. It’s also the verdict presented at a Monday morning, June 15, press conference by Spokane Regional Health Department Health Officer Dr. Bob Lutz — verdicts reinforced over the weekend by a state Department of Health report showing COVID-19 transmission on the rise in Eastern Washington. Schuller told the council that...
MEDICAL LAKE – While the bulk of this year’s Founder’s Day has been canceled due to ongoing concerns about the spread of COVID-19, at least one event has found a way to continue — albeit in a new format. Instead of pounding the streets and trails in and around Medical Lake, the annual Trailblazer Triathlon has moved to an online/virtual format that participants can compete in from the comfort of their neighborhood, favorite trail or park. Registration and competition began June 1, and runs through 11 p.m. June 30 — that’s wh...
In several past columns I’ve written about the need to preserve history. I’ve editorialized to preserve history, it’s often necessary to maintain that which we find offensive so we may remember and learn from the experience, hopefully not repeating the errors of our ancestors. As part of that, I’ve defended preserving symbols of the former Confederacy such as statues and flags. I’ve argued that, while painful, those elements remind us of periods of our national formation and psyche that we hope to not repeat. I’ve chan...
AIRWAY HEIGHTS – The City Council voted to advance approval of the final plat of the Arrowleaf Townhomes development out of their study session Monday night, June 8, for final consideration at the upcoming regular meeting June 15. In doing so, the council agreed the development had met all of the conditions set aside under law and in a proposed preliminary plat adopted via resolution on Feb. 4, 2019. Arrowleaf Townhouses is a single-family (R-1), duplex (R-2) subdivision east of Craig Road between Ketchum Drive and W...
CHENEY – Despite uncertainties with the economy, the Cheney School District’s ending fund balance has remained relatively stable. While tracking less than it did in 2017-2018 and 2018-2019 beginning in February and running through April, the reserve cash fund needed to help pay operating costs is still above $3 million — a level it might approach at the end of this month. But after dipping to just over $4.5 million in March at the beginning of the COVID-19 school closures and economic shutdowns, the fund saw a resurgence in A...
WEST PLAINS – Construction is alive and well on the West Plains. That was the verdict at a May 28 West Plains Chamber of Commerce virtual meeting on the state of economic development — and continues to show evidence of validity in mid-June. Al French, Spokane County Commissioner and board chair of S3R3 Solutions, told the meeting that several developers filed plan reviews for projects, mostly Airway Heights and Spokane International Airport. That work has taken place even in the face of ongoing restrictions and lim...
