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Better Spokane, the local organization backing Props 1 and 2, is another political outlet for a group of wealthy business people. Better Spokane, like the Washington Policy Center, is  “a conservative political organization that identifies itself as a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) educational organization under tax guidelines in order to keep its donors secret and avoid paying taxes. is organized as a non-profit 501(c)(3).” (Quoting Shawn Vestal on WPC.) This is exactly the strategy of the rest of the web of conservative non-profits described in Jane Mayer’s book, Dark Money. A Journal of Business article from January, 2017, around the time of Better Spokane’s founding, provides some strong clues about its funding. The organization then had a single employee, Michael Cathcart, the executive director and a current conservative candidate for Spokane City Council in NE Spokane (District 1). Better Spokane has a Board of just six members. From the Journal of Business article:

Michael Senske, president and CEO of Pearson Packaging Systems, the West Plains-based maker of packaging equipment, is one of the board members. He says the organization is being funded through private donations.

“Several of us discussed creating an organization that would be engaged in creating an environment more conducive to income and job growth, as well as business expansion and retention,” says Senske.

The organization’s other board members are Ryan Gee, of Gee Automotive; Dave Clack, a retired Spokane businessman; business attorney Dennis McLaughlin, business attorney; and Fritz H. Wolff and his father Alvin J. Wolff, both of The Wolff Co. 

Senske says the three older members of the organization’s board, Clack, McLaughlin, and Alvin Wolff, act as mentors to its younger members. 

Fritz H. Wolff is CEO of the multibillion dollar real estate firm, The Wolfe Company. The Wolfe Company owns and operates 30,000 rental units nationwide. Mr. Wolfe, his company, and its history were featured on the front page of the Sunday Spokesman, October 20. in an article detailing the unprecedented intrusion of “independent” money backing Woodward, Wendle, Rathbun, and Cathcart. According to the Spokesman, in the last two years Fritz and Katie Wolff have contributed at least $211,000 to conservative groups and politicians, an amount that is likely comparative pocket change for them, money that could pay big dividends.

We cannot know the additional funds backing Better Spokane (that money is “dark”), but Wolfe, Senske (as R.A. Pearson), and Gee are prominent conservative donors to local Republican candidates and the PACs that are spending huge sums in independent expenditures in support of those candidates. The tax deductible donations to Better Spokane are above and beyond the overt political spending, additional money to buy influence in politics, money the Spokesman article doesn’t get around to discussing.

If passed, both Propositions 1 and 2 would, in the long term, offer a great return on investment for the members of Better Spokane’s Board. Prop 1 is meant as a blow to unions in contract negotiations. Prop. 2 is an attempt to buy income tax insurance, tax insurance mostly to shield the wealthy.

Proposition 1‘s title is “Charter Amendment Regarding Open Government and Transparency in City Government,” but the amendment only pertains to transparency in “collective bargaining.” Collective bargaining is code for unions. This is selective transparency. Any bargaining City officials might do with, for example, The Wolfe Company, would not be subject to this Amendment. “Transparency” has a nice ring, but when it is applied asymmetrically it is a tool. Consider the real purpose of this Proposition and vote NO.

Proposition 2 proposes a charter amendment prohibiting the City of Spokane from ever leveling a tax on income. Has anyone heard anyone propose such a tax? No. It would be political suicide, especially if the average wage earner in the City were made subject to an income tax. Michael Cathcart, in a radio interview on KPBX, admits there is no income tax on the City’s horizon. Proposition 2 is an advertisement to the wealthy: “Establish residence here. This is fertile ground to grow your wealth. See, the electorate here is so brainwashed they’ve declared they’ll never tax even the highest incomes! Moreover, they’ve made this declaration even without being provoked!” Vote NO.

Carefully consider the source and intent of these initiatives when you vote. While you’re at it consider that the developers and wealthy interests on Better Spokane Board pay Michael Cathcart’s salary. At least in 2017 Michael Cathcart was Better Spokane’s only employee. Who will he serve if he is elected to the Spokane City Council from northeast Spokane (District 1)? His opponent, Tim Benn, an ally of Mike Fagan and Matt Shea, is frightening, but probably less likely to be effective in pushing his agenda. I agree with the writers of the Progressive Voters Guide, “There are no good choices in [that] race…”

The members of the Board of Better Spokane have blown it’s cover with unprecedented Republican partisan political spending in this year’s Spokane municipal elections in support of deeply conservative candidates. The Journal of Business article quotes Michael Senske, “We’re a very nonpartisan organization…” What a joke.

Keep to the high ground,
Jerry

The Spokesman headline reads,”…trust amassed over broadcast career.” It’s a long article about Nadine Woodward’s mayoral candidacy. It appears on the front page of the Sunday, October 13, edition. It is worth reading and contemplating, along with the companion article on Ben Stuckart‘s candidacy.

On what are we supposed to base this trust? The Spokesman article offers an answer, “trust she’s earned over more than 25 years beamed into the living rooms of Spokane families.” I don’t see that as trust, I see that as facial recognition.

In the same article Ms. Woodward is quoted, “It’s really hard to run nonpartisan and only discuss issues that affect the city,” I agree. The voters of the City of Spokane who rejected Cathy McMorris Rodgers by a 14 point margin in the 2018 General Election may be skeptical of candidate wearing a visible “R”. Ms. Woodward must make sure Republican voters understand her Republican bonafides while she dodges issues to which Independents and Democrats pay attention.

Observe her strategy with WeBelieveWeVote, the locally grown far right litmus test folk, with whom she only garners a rating of 60%. Click here to see her survey answers on which the rating is based. The litmus test questions for which they docked her 40 points were four questions, one each on guns, abortion, marriage, and discrimination. She declined to answer, writing instead, “As a candidate in the nonpartisan race for Spokane Mayor, I will only focus on local issues that pertain to city government and not national issues.” [1]

Sorry, Ms. Woodward, guns, abortion, marriage, and discrimination ARE local issues. You can have personal opinions about those issues, but what we need to know is whether you, as Mayor of Spokane, plan to enforce the law through your supervisory role over the police department.

Ms. Woodward is a candidate for the office of Mayor, the executive branch of Spokane City government, the branch that “executes” the laws through its control of the police department. Reproductive rights–and their protection–ARE a local issue.

Although it has been little reported in the media the Planned Parenthood Clinic on Indiana Ave. has been the site of increasingly raucous, intrusive protests from the “The Church at Planned Parenthood,” a group that claims it is “worshipping” rather than protesting as a defense of its tactics of intimidation and disruption. So would Ms. Woodward, as mayor, make any effort to enforce a frequently violated noise ordinance? In response to question on that is from the Spokesman she “declines to comment.” [2] We are asked to “trust” in the TV face while the person behind that face declines to discuss real issues.

Is Nadine sympathetic to the “worshipers” or to the patients and medical staff they harass with their megaphones? Does she respect the rule of law around a noise ordinance or does she defer to the “worshipers?” She’s not saying. All we can do is look for clues.

“The Church of Planned Parenthood” (TCAPP) is the brainchild of Pastor Ken Peters of the Covenant Church. On the list of other pastors fueling TCAPP is John Repsold (click here and look at the bottom left of the page), the principal pastor of Mosaic Spokane. Thanks to the marvels of google search, we can read a Repsold sermon one paragraph of which addresses Ms. Woodward’s background with reference to reproductive rights. [At that sermon, use CMD-F and key in “Nadine” to locate the paragraph]. The paragraph is a recounting of a story Ms. Woodward told at a “Life Services” dinner at which she spoke several years ago. Life Services Spokane is a “pregnancy resource center” designed to steer woman with unplanned pregnancies away from the “trauma” and “shame” of abortion. [Under “-For Churches” they write, “Half of all women, even Christian women, will experience at least one unintended pregnancy by the age of 45. Of those, 40% will choose abortion.” The trauma and shame we are to imagine come from not accepting one’s fate as God’s intent for women, regardless of life circumstances or the condition of the fetus.]

Certainly, Ms. Woodward holds strong views on the issue of abortion, having spoken of her own at a public dinner in support of Life Services. Clearly, she, as mayor of Spokane, would face the issue of enforcing the law around intrusive, megaphone magnified, frequent protests. She’s not saying. We’re supposed to “trust” her TV persona. I’m not ready to trust her and I don’t think the other voters of Spokane should, either.

Keep to the high ground,
Jerry

[1] Ben Stuckart, Lori Kinnear, and Karen Stratton simply declined to participate in WeBelieveWeVote’s litmus test survey, Breean Beggs gamely waded in with lengthy, reasoned answers but refused to engage the litmus-test checklist–and got a zero rating for his effort.

[2] From Planned Parenthood has drawn protests. Are those protests protected by free speech, or a safety hazard that violates city noise ordinance?

Stuckart said, “We should be equally enforcing the law, and if they are violating noise ordinances, they should be cited.”

Woodward declined to comment.

It is time to revalue diversity in public institutions in the State of Washington by voting YES on Referendum Measure No. 88 on the November ballot. YES on R-88 allows public institutions to once again consider applicant characteristics [1] without using them as the “sole or deciding” factor and without using quotas. A YES vote on R-88 partly repudiates the initiative that was Tim Eyman’s start in 1998 (I-200). Let me explain. R-88 is one part of an ongoing and mostly partisan argument over affirmative action, “…a set of laws, policies, guidelines and administrative practices ‘intended to end and correct the effects of a specific form of discrimination’.” The roots of the argument in favor of affirmative action go back to attempts starting in the 1940s, and, later, in the civil rights movement, to redress the glaring unevenness of the playing field between the races. Affirmative action has widened to include other groups sidelined in society by virtue of characteristics other than race. In the last fifty years Republican/Libertarian think tanks have framed an argument that turns affirmative action on its head, making it a partisan issue. Any affirmative consideration of an individual of one group is cast as inevitably discriminating against members of another group (implying a zero-sum game). According to this framing, considering a prospective student or public employee who is black for admission or hire with any preference whatsoever inevitably discriminates against students of, for example, asian heritage. Using people of asian heritage in this framing conveniently takes the spotlight off of white conservatives, the folks mostly pushing the argument. (Notice, of course, that ridding the world of affirmative action is an issue that curries favor with the white supremacist wing of the Republican Party.) Nine states have at some time banned affirmative action as part of this movement. It started with California (Prop 209) and Texas in 1996, followed by Washington (I-200) in 1998. I-200 was the first initiative put forward by Tim Eyman, a conservative activist known for pushing the Republican/Libertarian agenda in Washington State with a series of more than twenty initiatives and referenda. In 1998 Eyman’s I-200 “prohibited public institutions from discriminating or granting preferential treatment based on race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin in the areas of public education, public employment, and public contracting.” For nearly twenty years that prohibition prevented Washington State public institutions from using any form of affirmative action in its admissions or hiring practices. In early 2019 nearly four hundred thousand signatures were turned in for I-1000, an Initiative to the Legislature. (To be distinguished from an Initiative to the People.) I-1000 sought to adjust the details of Eyman’s I-200 to allow consideration of applicant characteristics [1] as factors in admissions, hiring, and contracting without using quotas and without using those characteristics as the “sole or deciding” factor in the decision making process. Tim Eyman, of course, filed a challenge to the ballot title of I-1000. But here’s where things get a bit convoluted. As an initiative to the legislature in Washington State, I-1000 first went to the legislature, where, to the surprise of many, it passed the Washington State House and Senate on almost strictly party line votes (Democrats For, Republicans Against) on April 28, 2019. (Had I-1000 not passed the legislature it would have appeared as I-1000 on the 2019 November ballot as an initiative to the legislature that the legislature had ignored.) Ordinarily, passage of I-1000 by the legislature would have been the end of it. Instead, and tellingly, a group called Washington Asians for Equality (and others) gathered signatures to effectively put I-1000 on the November ballot–but as R-88, an unusual demand “by the people” that a law passed by the legislature be submitted for a vote. (Such a referendum requires half the signatures to get on the ballot that either type of initiative [to the People or to the Legislature] requires.) Bottom line, a YES vote for R-88 is a YES vote for allowing public institutions to take applicant characteristics and the community goal of diversity into consideration once again. Jim Camden tried to explain the confusion around R-88 in a Spokesman article on September 27. He had some limited success. You might want to read Mr. Camden with what you’ve just read here as background.(The label on the heading photo for Camden’s article reads, “Referendum 200, on ballots in November,…” makes the confusion worse. They meant Referendum 88.) All of which brings me back to Tim Eyman. Mr. Eyman’s hand is evident in every measure on the first page and two measures on the second page of every Washington State 2019 General Election ballot this November. See [2] below for details. Mr. Eyman is not building with his initiatives, he is tearing down. For his destructive efforts he is lauded by Republicans for whom shrinking government by successive woundings and hamstringings is a Party goal. Like Mr. Trump, when challenged for his practices, he poses as the victim. His political action committee is “Permanent Offense;” his manner is permanent offensiveness. It is remarkable the corrosive effect one man can produce with twenty years of encouraged, funded effort. For more detail on Eyman I recommend a visit to “Permanent Defense” at https://www.permanentdefense.org/timeyman/, Reject Eyman and his tactics. Vote YES on Referendum Measure No. 88 and NO on Initiative Measure No. 976. Keep to the high ground, Jerry [1] The whole list is: “an individual’s race, sex, ethnicity, national origin, age, sensory, mental or physical disability, or veteran or military status” [2] Referendum Measure No. 88 is rooted in Eyman’s first Initiative, I-200, as explained above. Initiative 976 is Eyman’s most current insult. See my last post. All of the advisory votes that litter the first page of the ballot and spill over onto the second page are the result of Eyman’s I-960, passed in 2007 and declared partly unconstitutional by the Washington State Supreme Court in 2013.

I-976 is Tim Eyman’s latest destructive Initiative.

If you want to maintain and improve our transportation system in Washington State vote NO on Tim Eyman’s Initiative Measure No. 976. It’s the second item on November General Election ballot mailed out this week.

As always with an Eyman initiative, the framing is clever: “Rebel against registration fees imposed by that nasty, grasping government! They have no right!” This is the Republican anti-tax, anti-government orthodoxy best expressed by Grover Norquist, Republican/Libertarian lobbyist, founder and president of Americans for Tax Reform: “I’m not in favor of abolishing the government. I just want to shrink it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.” The Republican Party has promoted this line for decades: Taxes are bad. Taxes need “reform.” Let’s reduce taxes [especially on the wealthy, but don’t pay attention to that!]. Government is inefficient and corrupt and deserves to be defunded! (Psst! the wonderful private sector will do it better [and magically make a profit, too]!)

Auto registration fees are an integral part of how we currently fund a wide range of infrastructure and transportation in the State of Washington (See Voters’ Pamphlet). Eyman wants to take a wrecking ball to our complex but workable system solely for the purpose of messing with it–and using a visible fee as the excuse. He does so with no care for the cost of readjustment. Washington State has the most regressive tax system in the U.S. (see P.S. below). I could side with Mr. Eyman’s initiative if it were part of a comprehensive reform leading to a less regressive tax system, but Eyman is not a big picture, let’s-all-pull-together-and-make-government-work kind of guy. He is the initiative version of a soundbite, a quick poke at government for the purpose of inflicting damage. The state, counties, and cities need funds to build and maintain the roads we all drive on–and all the rest of the infrastructure of civilization upon which we depend. All I-976 would do is make the funding more problematic.

I-976 is one of twenty nasty but often deviously clever initiatives and one referendum sponsored over the last 20 years by Mr. Eyman. He is a conservative political bomb thrower from Yakima who now lives in Mukilteo, WA. I encourage my readers to review the history of this man’s efforts and legal problems assembled in Wikipedia. His bent and general demeanor is on display in the name of the Political Action Committee he founded: “Permanent Offense,” (Even more to Eyman’s real intent, the full name is PERMANENT OFFENSE — $30 TABS INITIATIVE — TERM LIMITS — GIVE THEM NOTHING, 2019.) Eyman’s first incarnation of I-976 (I-695, on the ballot in 1999) was later declared unconstitutional on multiple technical grounds by the WA State Supreme Court, but not before Eyman was recognized by the Conservative Political Action Committee in 2000 with the “Ronald Reagan Award” (Seattle Times), a sure sign of his destructive intent.

Eyman’s I-976 is purely meant to throw a monkey wrench into the way we struggle to fund transportation. Over six years it will rob the state and local governments of an estimated 4.2 billion dollars and over the 2019-21 biennium cost nearly 3 billion dollars to implement (Voters’ Pamphlet), never mind all the time and taxpayers’ money that was wasted on dealing with his 1999 initiative. Tell Tim Eyman we’re wise to him. Vote NO on I-976. Then let’s roll up our sleeves and deal with the broader tax structure issues of our state.

Keep to the high ground,
Jerry

P.S. The non-partisan Institute of Taxation and Economic Policy rates Washington State as having the most regressive tax system in the country: Their data show the lowest 20 percent of income earners in Washington State, families making less than $24,000, contribute almost 18 percent of their annual earnings to state and local tax coffers, while the top 1 percent (those making over $545,900) pay just 3 percent of their income. Explore that here.

Do your homework and then talk it up. That’s what democracy is all about! Ballots go into the mail today in Spokane County (and Washington State) for the 2019 General Election for municipal and school board candidates–and a confusing bunch of advisory votes and initiatives. The deadline to turn in your ballot is Tuesday, November 5 at 8PM. Don’t leave your homework until the last minute. You can maximize your effect on this election by understanding what’s being voted on–and the best way to do that is to look at it ahead of time and informing yourself. For all Washington residents who are registered to vote, now is great time to visit MyVote.wa.gov and enter your name and birth date to see your voting particulars. On the first page that appears check to see if your Registration is “Active” and contact them if it is not. (This page should also show the address to which your ballot is/was mailed, an address that could be different from your address of Registration. When I checked this time the mailing address did not show. I have contacted Secretary of State’s office.) To preview the ballot you should receive in the mail, click “Online Ballot.” Then you can either print a copy of your ballot to look at (click “Print and Mark”) or you can save as a pdf on your computer. (How you do that depends on your particular computer/printer setup.) Inspect your ballot. Thanks to that pox on our governance, Mr. Tim Eyman, there are a dozen “Advisory Votes” that take up most of the first page and part of the second page. They are a waste of ink and everyone’s time. One must suspect that Eyman’s purpose was to discourage people from voting: homework overload. You can safely check all these “Advisory Votes” as “Maintained”–or you can just ignore them. They have no effect. Here’s what the Progressive Voters Guide has to say: Because of a Tim Eyman initiative, the Legislature is required to submit any bill it passes that closes tax loopholes or raises revenue to a non-binding advisory vote. The Legislature had a historically productive 2019 session, resulting in a record number of advisory votes on the ballot. We hope the Legislature will change the law to remove these meaningless measures in the future.  One useful thing you can do for your friends, neighbors, and acquaintances is to mention these advisory votes and the fact that they can be safely ignored. The votes made on a ballot are counted even if you only vote on one candidate or one measure. Don’t put off your homework because it looks daunting thanks to Mr. Eyman. That’s what some would like you to do. It’s a strategy… In Washington the first two issues on the ballot statewide are Referendum Measure No. 88 (concerning discrimination and affirmative action) and Initiative Measure No. 976, an attack on infrastructure funding penned by Tim Eyman. I recommend YES on 88 and NO on 976. More on both of these in a later post. The only other issue on the ballot statewide is Senate Joint Resolution No. 8200 (second page of the ballot after all the Eyman “Advisory Votes”). It asks us whether we support a Washington State Constitutional amendment that would make provisions for government continuity in the case of natural disasters. I recommend a YES vote. This is simple foresight in governance. For more detail click here. Voters may be dismayed by this ballot’s daunting presentation–and put it off to another day. Do your homework early. Talk up your findings with your fellow citizens. This is your power as a citizen of this state. Keep to the high ground, Jerry

Here’s the link:  https://www.facebook.com/events/910350509334324

The headline of an online article by Adam Shanks (from the Thursday, October 3, Spokesman) reads: “Spokane backs Boise’s appeal of homeless camping ruling to Supreme Court.” I’ve pasted the article at the end of this post. It is worth reading. As you do, ask yourself exactly who, what actual human beings, caused “Spokane” to “join” this brief?

“Spokane” did what? “Spokane” is spending our money, my money, to challenge a U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling [the “Martin Decision”] that said a city cannot criminalize people sleeping out of doors on public property unless there are other places for them to sleep?  This doesn’t sound like the sort of thing on which my City Council member or my City Council President would want to waste money, time, and energy. In contrast, this legal challenge does sound like something Republican Mayor Condon and candidate Nadine Woodward would spend the City’s money to pursue. If your attitude toward the homeless in Spokane is to run them off or jail them, the Martin Decision is a roadblock. For Condon and Woodward, it follows that spending the city’s time and energy challenging the Martin Decision is superior to working on a plan to keep people from freezing to death on the streets of Spokane this winter.

Our City of Spokane government functions in these fractious times a lot like the federal government, “The Spokane City Council was not informed the city was participating in the brief.” This is executive overreach in a microcosm.

“Spokane” in a news article like this one fails to capture reality: “Spokane” is shorthand for a government made up of elected individuals whom we have entrusted to do the right thing. It behooves us to pay attention not just to what “Spokane” does, but to which of our elected officials is actually responsible. If the executive branch, under the direction of the “strong” mayor, is acting unilaterally it is unfair to assume the City Council agrees–or that it has even been consulted.

It is time to quit accepting that a city, state, or country “did” something. The “doing” happens within a municipal, state, or federal government that is composed of individuals with mindsets and agendas, individuals we have put in office with our votes. It is time to pay attention to what they do and vote accordingly.

I don’t want my tax dollars spent on a legal challenge while the need to keep people from freezing is ineptly addressed by a mayor and a wannabe mayor. When the ballots come out later this week vote for Ben Stuckart for mayor of Spokane. Let’s get the executive and legislative branches of government working together rather than at cross-purposes.

Keep to the high ground,
Jerry

Spokane backs Boise’s appeal of homeless camping ruling to Supreme Court
by Adam Shanks
Thu., Oct. 3, 2019, 5 a.m.

Spokane’s struggle with homelessness has, indirectly, reached the Supreme Court.

As the city of Boise waits to hear if the U.S. Supreme Court will weigh in on limits imposed on the enforcement of homeless camping laws, Spokane and Spokane Valley have entered the debate.

Spokane and Spokane Valley’s own efforts to enforce laws against public camping are chronicled in a brief, filed last week on behalf of a number of organizations and in support of Boise’s quest to overturn a federal appeals court ruling issued in 2018.

“Our goal was to have a greater impact by working together on this,” said Marlene Feist, a city spokesperson.

Boise has appealed a U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling issued in the case of Martin v. Boise, which found the city’s enforcement of laws against camping on public property amounted to cruel and unusual punishment and violated the constitution.

The 2018 ruling set a standard that cities cannot enforce rules against camping or lying on sidewalks if they do not first provide adequate shelter for those who can’t afford or provide their own.

“As long as there is no option of sleeping indoors, the government cannot criminalize indigent, homeless people for sleeping outdoors, on public property, on the false premise they had a choice in the matter,” the decision authored by Circuit Judge Marsha Berzon stated.

Boise appealed the decision in August to the U.S. Supreme Court, which has yet to decide whether to take up the case. The decision’s effects have been felt by cities throughout the West that are grappling with homelessness.

Spokane is one of dozens of individuals, cities and organizations to voice its opinion to the Supreme Court through an “amicus curiae,” or “friend of the court,” brief.

Spokane is the first of four cities cited in a brief filed by the National League of Cities, Washington State Association of Municipal Attorneys, Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs and several other organizations.

The groups argue that the decision takes away a tool in cities’ multifaceted approach to mitigate the effects of homelessness. The Martin decision fails to define what it means by “adequate” or “sufficient” shelter, the brief states, nor does it make clear how cities can practically keep a daily count of their homeless populations.

“Providing sufficient beds to comply with Martin could hijack municipal budgets well beyond what is appropriate in light of other municipal responsibilities,” the brief states. “But if local governments do not comply, they may be left with encampments that are beyond their reach.”

In Spokane, the brief contends that the Martin decision has inhibited the city’s ability to use Community Court to connect homeless people with social services by limiting the city’s ability to issue criminal citations.

It also argues the decision has hampered Spokane’s ability to enforce its laws against camping on public property. The city spent about $100,000 to clean up homeless camps, of which about 500 were reported last year.

“At one encampment along the Spokane River, city staff recently found a garbage pit fifteen feet across and four feet deep, containing multiple five-gallon buckets filled with human feces,” the brief notes.

Feist said the city reviewed and provided comment on the brief, including “information on how we use enforcement of sit-and-lie to direct people to services, particularly through community court.”

The Spokane City Council was not informed the city was participating in the brief, according to Council President Ben Stuckart.

Councilman Breean Beggs noted that the city’s laws against camping on public land and sitting or lying on downtown sidewalks during the daytime predate the Martin v. Boise decision and adhere to its standards.

“Even if Martin goes away, our camping code says you can’t arrest people for camping if there’s no shelter. That preexists Martin,” Beggs said.

City officials have repeatedly said the laws comply with the Martin decision as written, because they make exceptions when the city does not have adequate shelter capacity.

“However, the decision injects a number of uncertainties into the interpretation of enforcement. We want clearer direction from the courts,” Feist said.

Beggs also said that many of the people who attend Spokane Community Court to access social services – including mental health and substance abuse treatment – do so voluntarily, not because they were criminally cited.

About half of the people who present at community court – held at the Spokane Public Library’s downtown location every Monday – are there voluntarily, Therapeutic Courts Coordinator Seth Hackenberg estimated.

“It’s frustrating that we weren’t consulted, because the report that they put together, we could’ve made it a complete and accurate report,” Beggs said of the brief.

Stuckart lamented the use of the criminal justice system to connect people experiencing homelessness with social services.

“The best way to get people services is inside a shelter once they have their basic needs met,” Stuckart said.

But neither council member has called for a repeal of sit-and-lie or camping laws. Stuckart said camps were a sign of a “public health crisis.”

“The way to get rid of them is to have housing available and shelter available, not to go with cops and give them (citations),” Stuckart said.

Spokane Valley, meanwhile, funds shelters and services that are available outside its borders.

“As a result, Martin’s requirement that a jurisdiction have shelter space available in order to enforce its laws has effectively frozen Spokane Valley’s efforts to enforce the ‘no camping’ regulations in its parks,” the brief states.

Spokane Valley Mayor Rod Higgins said the city contributes more than $1 million in federal and state grant funds to services for homelessness and housing, which it funnels through the county to the city of Spokane. He said Spokane Valley should be able to send its homeless population to beds in Spokane it helps pay for and that the court’s decision has created an “untenable” situation in Spokane Valley.

He said Spokane Valley parks aren’t meant for camping or as a place for people to live full time. The large number of people living in parks, some of whom have weapons, has made many residents feel unsafe and avoid visiting them.

“It opens the door for unreasonable use of our public facilities,” Higgins said. “It’s called camping, but I call it squatting.”

Reporter Rebecca White contributed to this story.

“We’re a growing city, we have to keep up with our roads. Who wants our 20 minute commute to now become a 45 minute commute? I do not support traffic calming projects & road diets.” Nadine Woodward, LWV forum, Tuesday June 25. (Watch on youtube at 14:30. At 14:08 in the same video listen to her misuse statistics to foster fear.)

Dear Group,

Spokane as a city is blessed with a great park system, thanks to the foresight of city government in the early 20th century. The city funded a parks department and hired the Olmsted Brothers firm to produce a  landscaping plan for the city. One result was Manito Park, the crown jewel of our park system. Keep that history in mind.

Spokane Valley parks? Not so much. If your vision of Spokane Valley is the east Sprague strip mall corridor with five lanes of high speed traffic, then your vision may be closer to the truth than you knew.

The numbers: 82% of City of Spokane residents live within a 10 minute walk of park. Only 22% of the residents of the City of Spokane Valley live within a 10 minute walk of a park. Those are numbers worth committing to memory. (They come from extensive research done by the Trust For Public Land that you can explore in detail by clicking that link.)

Those numbers quantify what I already felt: Spokane is a great city, a city to which I am always glad to return when I’ve been away, a great city where I can still walk, bike, or run without fearing for my life, a great city where I can walk to park.

The difference between Spokane and Spokane Valley is a difference in planning and vision–and following through on the plan.

What is Ms. Woodward’s vision? “Who wants our 20 minute commute to now become a 45 minute commute?” Don’t stick to the plan that has made East Sprague and North Monroe feel like a place you want to go, a place you might walk without fear of being run over. Don’t interfere with my speed! For Nadine, the city is something to drive through from your home in ‘burbs, not live and walk in.

Contrast that to Ben Stuckart’s detailed vision for livable neighborhoods:

In my time on Spokane City Council, a resident has never asked for a mini-freeway to be put through their neighborhood. Not one. Yet some Mayoral candidates believe they can yell “road diet” and convince you that a driver’s ability to speed through a neighborhood to get to a destination 15 seconds quicker should trump your comprehensive plan, your neighborhood plan and the viability of our small businesses. But, the days of suburbanist planning policies that decimate our neighborhoods are over.

This vision is engrained in Ben Stuckart. Unlike Nadine, Ben was born and grew up in Spokane. He graduated from Gonzaga University. Ben’s father Larry (1949-2014) had a lifelong commitment to the livability of Spokane’s neighborhoods. Larry Stuckart served in many roles at SNAP (then the Spokane Neighborhood Action Program) for decades and served as Executive Director for 18 years. Public service and a deep love of Spokane run in Ben’s family.

The November 5 election (ballots drop next week) is about what Spokane wants to be. Vote for Ben Stuckart for mayor if you want a mayor with heart, vision, and know-how. Vote for Woodward if you want sprawl, fast driving cars on neighborhood streets, and no leadership experience.