Commissioner vows work on jail overcrowding

By Doug Nadvornick, Spokane Public Radio

Spokane County Commissioner Todd Mielke says one of the county’s biggest challenges this year will be to find a way to relieve overcrowding at the county jail.

<> Mielke made those remarks during his “state of the county” address this morning (Fri) in Spokane Valley.

The jail is the focal point of the county’s crowded criminal justice system. Mielke says, typically, the facility holds between 650 and 700 inmates. It was built to house 450.

“It is stretched to the seams to the point where we’ve gotta do something,” he said.

Mielke says the county commissioners haven’t yet decided whether to expand the current jail or to build a new one. He says the facility isn’t designed to efficiently meet the current needs and it may not be worth spending the money to remodel it.

Mielke says the jail houses a lot of people who don’t belong there. He says 60-percent of the inmates take medication for mental health problems, making it the third largest mental institution in the state.

“That’s not the most effective way, nor the most efficient way to serve those people. We have been working with our courts, with our judges to put together a mental health court to also look at alternatives to incarceration for the mentally ill and, again, to try to figure out how to serve their needs.”

Mielke says county officials will continue to use the Geiger Correctional Facility to house inmates and he says they’re intrigued by the idea of creating a spring-to-fall tent camp to house short-term non-violent offenders.

Prosecutors look anew at allegations against firefighter

By John Vlahovich
Spokane Public Radio

Spokane County Prosecutors are taking a second look at the actions of the city firefighter who resigned after last month admitting sexual involvement with a teenage female at a north side Spokane fire station.

Prosecutors say they’ll review their earlier decision not to file criminal charges against Daniel Ross. They plan to re-examine evidence forwarded to them by Spokane police.

Spokane Mayor Dennis Hession says he supports the decision.

Ross resigned from the fire department Wednesday after receiving notice of disciplinary action, including the possibility he’d be fired. During an administrative review, Ross admitted to having sexual relations with the teen he had met via the Internet.

Mayor Hession today again called Ross’ behavior unacceptable, saying it harms fellow city employees and the entire city.

Meanwhile, the police department internal affairs division is continuing its investigation of the department’s handling of the incident. Police detectives allowed photos taken of the young woman to be destroyed at the close of their investigation.

Firefighter resigns over sex with teen accusation

By John Vlahovich
Spokane Public Radio

A Spokane firefighter who admitted having sex with a 16-year-old has resigned. Meanwhile, members of the Spokane Women’s Coalition called Wednesday – International Women’s Day – for an outside investigation into police department procedures – and greater sensitivity to women by Spokane’s leadership.

Spokane firefighter Daniel Ross resigned after being told he faced disciplinary action, including possibly being fired. He was to have faced a formal disciplinary hearing Thursday.

Ross admitted to a sexual liaison with the teen-ager Feb.10^th while he was on duty at a north side fire station.

Meanwhile, a police internal investigation dealing with destruction of photos taken during that liaison continues

But a local women’s group wants more.

Members of the Spokane Women’s Coalition say deletion of the firefighter’s photos, reported to be sexually explicit, harkens back to the era when men ran things and protected one another.

Co-chair Kathryn Graham says this shows that more women are needed in leadership posts.

“If there were more women in decision making, more women in government, in the fire department, and in the police department, and if the men and women that are in the departments took some sensitivity training and some kind of courses in women’s studies and had an understanding of women being equal to men, then things would be different,” Graham says.

The coalition today called for terminating the firefighter, and – if internal investigation findings warrant – demoting or firing of the officers who permitted the photo destruction.

Spokane Mayor Dennis Hession agrees that police mishandled evidence in allowing the deletion of the digital photos. Still, he says, “…based upon what the prosecutor has told us that that in no way compromised any of the potential charges that could have been brought against the firefighter – criminal charges – but nevertheless, in terms of good police procedure, those things were not followed the way they should have done.”

However, Hession questions the coalition’s accusation that his administration is not sensitive to women’s concerns. He says he would welcome the chance to talk about any specific issues they have.

All you need to know for disaster now on the Web

By John Vlahovich
Spokane Public Radio

With the Hurricane Katrina disaster still fresh in their minds, regional emergency response officials stress that everyone should be planning how to survive a natural or man-made disaster in the Inland Northwest. A recent survey finds most people say they’re prepared generally. But when it comes to specifics, it’s a different story.

Local emergency responders say that their agencies are ready should disaster strike. They emphasize, however, that individuals need to develop their own survival plans.

That means having food, water, medical and other needs on hand in the home and in the car to keep family members alive and well until help arrives.

As Spokane County Sheriff Mark Sterk says, “Even though we’re ready to come and respond, we still depend on you as citizens to be prepared to at least hunker down and be able to survive the first 72 hours without us responding to your front door.”

A recent survey of 300 area households found nearly two-thirds claim they are at least somewhat prepared for an emergency situation. But nearly a quarter admit they don’t actually have their home stocked with supplies. Nearly half admit they don’t have an emergency kit in their vehicle.

In addition, more than half said they had no plan for contacting or gathering family members during an emergency.

Help is available. Ray Tansy, who co-chairs the local disaster committee, says everything the public needs to know about preparedness can be found in three clicks on the Internet.

“The latest individual family preparedness handbook, with everything in it, you can order it off the web site. People with disabilities; special things for them are on there. Every single fire district, every law enforcement agency,” says Tansy.

The web site in question is Spokane-prepares-dot-org.

'Hidden hands' keep Idaho humming

By Elizabeth Wynne Johnson
Northwest News Network

There’s a saying: “The hands that do the work are hidden.” That’s increasingly true in the posh mountain resorts of the Northwest, where soaring prices and long commutes are putting ever more distance between the workers and the players.

Twenty-one year old Efrain Patlan works for a Sun Valley company that salvages building materials from tear down and renovation projects. Today’s haul includes two pairs of dramatic, nine-foot tall wood-framed glass entry doors.

All the activity means a healthy appetite for labor, much of it from Mexico and Peru. Some are legal, many aren’t. The migrants do construction jobs, clean the hotel rooms, work behind the scenes in restaurant kitchens.

This salvage operation is Efrain’s primary full-time job. Here in the Wood River Valley, wages are good. This job pays $17 an hour. But with cost of living in a resort town, that’s nowhere near enough to get by. So like many here, Efrain works multiple jobs.

“Sometimes I work Monday to Monday,” he says. “Sometimes I clean snow, break ice, move furniture around… all kinds. The only thing is, you gonna have to work.”

One job pays the rent, the others help cover the rest: from cell phone to medical bills, to repair bills to keep his old car running. As expensive as it is here, it’s better than what he left behind in Mexico, because here there’s money to be made.

Efrain made the four-day drive to Idaho when he was 14. His home, Lamanga de Valle de San Tiago is more a loose cluster of ranches than an actual town.

“They have one, two, three, four, five streets. That’s it,” he says.

He says when he left, there were maybe 400 people there. Now he says it’s down to fewer than 200. Most of those who left are right here in Idaho. They follow family and neighbors in a one-way migration to a different life, one that starts with nothing.

Today, home is a comfortable townhouse-style condo in Hailey, Idaho. Efrain gets a break on the $900 a month rent for doing odd jobs around the complex. It’s furnished with high-end castoffs that he gets for a good price because of his job doing renovation salvage: couches and crystal lamps. He watches Discover Channel in Espanol on a big-screen TV he got for $100.

Efrain is the exception rather than the rule. The dearth of affordable housing for workers means most either cram together in trailers, or commute from as much as two hours away.

For many, the arrangement is temporary. It’s what some locals here refer to derisively as “the Mexican retirement plan.” Efrain himself is building a house in Valle de San Tiago.

The irony? “It’s like here. I come here and I go to ask for work. I go there and the people come to me, ask me for work.”

Working hard to build a home he’ll hardly ever see? Turns out Efrain does have something in common with his wealthy American bosses.

He came thinking this would be temporary for him. But now he’s determined to do his climbing here. He considers himself no longer purely ‘Mexican,’ not quite ‘American’ either.

“I’m like half and half. Half my heart is here and half of my heart is there. To live here is probably more possible than to go back to Mexico,” he says.

With no end in sight to the demand for their labor, the number of ‘hidden hands’ is certainly growing and becoming a permanent part of life in this mountain valley. One reason Efrain’s likely to stick around: now he has a wife and a nine-month old baby boy.

Apologies for century-old lynching final given

By Tom Banse
Northwest News Network

122 years after the fact, Washington State and British Columbia are making amends for the lynching of a Canadian Indian boy. The event nearly started a cross border race war.

Washington politicians, a B.C. provincial minister, and numerous tribal elders formed a "healing circle" - chanting and drumming together in the ornate Washington State Capitol Rotunda.

The ceremony followed legislative passage of a resolution expressing "the deepest sympathy" to the descendents of 14-year-old Louie Sam.

In 1884, a vigilante mob of Americans rode across the border near Sumas, Washington. They grabbed the native teenager from Canadian custody and hanged him from a tree. Louie Sam had been accused, wrongly it turns out, of the murder of a shopkeeper on the U.S. side of the frontier.

State Senator Cheryl Pflug became emotional as she took the Senate floor to declare regret and sorrow for what happened long ago.

She said, "One of things I've learned as I have grown older is the importance of being able to let the words 'I'm sorry' roll off your tongue when you are."

A Grand Chief of the Sto:Lo Tribal Council listened from a seat of honor in the state Senate. Fellow tribal leaders from the Canadian border region including a family descendant of Louie Sam looked on from the Senate Gallery.

Grand Chief Clarence Pennier wore a cedar bark headpiece and a distinctive woolen cloak. He thanked the body, first in his native tongue. "It makes us feel good," he continued in English.

In an interview later, the Grand Chief said some Fraser Valley natives never fully let go of the injustice, despite the passage of time. By recognizing that "a wrong was done," he said politicians are "making it right."

"It closes the door... and it opens others by making sure that we can establish relationships with each other," said Pennier.

An historian from the University of Saskatchewan brought the gruesome lynching back to light. Professor Keith Carlson was commissioned to unearth the true story while he worked as a consultant for the Sto:Lo a few years ago. Carlson recalled the tribal passions ignited on this day in 1884.

"The majority of the people wanted to charge across the border and kill the first 120 Americans they found to balance off the people who had been involved in the lynch mob,” Carlson said. “Some of the older men thought it was appropriate to go across the border, find one American, bring him back to the same tree and lynch him on that tree."

Carlson said when the Canadian government got wind of the reprisal plans, it assured tribal leaders that it would seek justice if they held back.

The professor unearthed the notes of two provincial detectives who went undercover in Nooksack, Washington to investigate.

"They gathered all this evidence that clearly showed that Louie Sam was innocent of the original crime and the names of the American men who killed the shopkeeper and to cover up their crime organized the lynch mob to cover their tracks," said Carlson.

No one was ever prosecuted for either the murder or the lynching.

Technically, the resolution passed Wednesday is not a formal apology. But the effect is the same. That was evident as Washington's Lieutenant Governor Brad Owen handed over the parchment to the visiting native chief, saying, "It is meant to further ensure that such a tragedy will never be forgotten nor repeated."

Washington Senate votes to study health care rolls

By Doug Nadvornick, Spokane Public Radio

The Washington Senate has voted to authorize a study of the people who are enrolled in state-subsidized health care programs.

The study is, in part, a response to charges that large companies like Walmart refuse to provide affordable health benefits to many employees, driving them to government-funded plans.

Yakima Senator Alex Deccio says the study will show how many working people are enrolled in the state’s Basic Health Plan.

“We need to find out and get rid of all the rhetoric and all the anecdotal reports and let’s find out who really takes advantage of the Basic Health Plan, which, for the most part, is paid for by the taxpayers of the state of Washington.”

At least one state, Maryland, has targeted Walmart. It requires the giant retailer to pay a certain percentage of its payroll for health care benefits, or reimburse a state fund for providing subsidized care for that company’s employees. Several other states have considered or are considering similar bills, including Washington, although legislative leaders in Olympia refused to bring it to a vote.

Washington House approves supplemental budget

The Washington House today (Wed) approved its version of a supplemental budget that allocates money for schools and colleges, for health care and other social services. The budget adds to what lawmakers agreed to spend in last year’s two-year budget.

Federal Way Democratic Representative Mark Miloscia says, with the strong economy, the state can afford to spend money for pressing needs.

“I’ve been here eight years and I look at one criteria in deciding whether to vote for a budget or not is whether it serves the common good, whether it serves the poor and vulnerable, the most in need in our society, and I’m glad to say today that, of my eight budgets, this is the best budget I’ve voted on.”

Democrats say they’ll spend about 600-million dollars and leave almost a billion dollars in reserve accounts to fund state pensions and other necessities. Republicans dispute those figures, saying the money in the reserve accounts can easily be accessed for unnecessary programs.

Spokane Representative John Serben says Republicans don’t feel they have a stake in this budget because the majority Democrats didn’t include GOP leaders in the final negotiations.

“I think that just goes to show that we don’t have the opportunity to properly review these budgets,” he said. “We get them; 24 hours later we vote on them. I’m just not sure why we do this, Mr. Speaker. I know when this building was built many years ago, there was a glass ceiling right above this chamber. Well, I can see that glass ceiling is gone now and I think we need to do something to let some sunlight back in.”

The Senate was due to vote on the budget this afternoon.

The passage of the budget will be one of the legislature’s last acts of this session. Lawmakers are scheduled to adjourn either tonight or tomorrow (Thurs).

Washington Senate approves felony DUI bill

Today (Wednesday) could be the final day of this year’s Washington legislative session.

Lawmakers are making last minute changes to bills and passing those bills between the chambers. One such bill, sponsored by Spokane Representative John Ahern, would make Driving Under the Influence for repeat offenders a felony.

The bill got a late start in the legislative process, getting through the House of Representatives only last week. Republicans tried to bring it directly to the Senate floor for an immediate vote, but were rebuffed. The bill, though, got a quick hearing and vote of approval in the Judiciary Committee on Monday, setting the stage for last night’s consideration.

Seattle Senator Adam Kline, who chairs the Judiciary Committee, gave it a quick endorsement.

“We’re one of the nine states that does not yet have a felony D-U-I law. We’ve discussed doing this. I myself have talked about doing this bill before. The fiscal note has been the obstacle. But I think it’s about time we overcame that and passed this bill.”

Ahern’s bill would make a fifth D-U-I within a seven-year period a felony, subject to much more stringent penalties, up to ten years in prison. Officials estimate more than 400 repeat offenders a year would be sentenced to much longer terms of incarceration, increasing the cost to the state. This bill calls for the state to allocate money to cover those costs.

Whatcom County Senator Dale Brandland, a former county sheriff, says it’s the right approach.

“For many, many years, we’ve been tough on D-U-Is and we’ve handed the bills to our counties and we’ve said, ‘You pay the bill. We’ll pass the law, you pay the bill.’ You felt it was important and you stepped up and you paid for it and I want to thank you very much.”

The Senate then sent the bill to the governor’s desk with a 45-to-nothing vote. The only gripe came from Kent Senator Stephen Johnson, who complained the new law wouldn’t take effect until next year.

Senate approves WASL alternatives

By Doug Nadvornick, Spokane Public Radio

The Washington Senate on Monday approved changes made by the House to a bill that would allow alternatives to the state student assessment test.

The bill authorizes the state superintendent to determine other ways to assess students who fail the WASL twice so that they can still graduate from high school.

With this year’s sophomores the first to be required to pass the tenth grade WASL in order to graduate, there’s been pressure in Olympia to find ways to help the students who don’t pass. Some wanted the state to throw out the requirement that links WASL passage and graduation. That didn’t happen, but lawmakers did require Superintendent Terry Bergeson to develop new ways of assessing students who don’t pass the test. They approved the use of grades, scores on other standardized tests and portfolios to measure student mastery.

Kent Republican Senator Stephen Johnson calls it a retreat from setting the WASL as the mark for students to reach.

“Now we’ve said this year, for the first time, you really don’t have to pass it at all,” he said. “We want you to give it a try a couple of times to see if you can do it. If you can’t, we’ll just do it based on grades or we’ll do it based on a portfolio of your work product or your homework. Really, if you turn the clock back about 15 years ago, that’s how we graduated people anyway, on the work they’d done in their class and their grades, so how are we doing it much different? I think we’re slipping and sliding back to where we were.”

East King County Republican Senator Cheryl Pflug disagreed.

“I’m convinced that the amendments now before you for concurrence actually increase the rigor,” she said. “They give us a better confidence that alternative assessments will have equal rigor, which has long been the concern of this body.”
The state superintendent’s office is required to have ready by the fall alternative assessment methods.

The Senate vote was 38-to-eight. The bill now goes to the governor for her signature.