SPOKANE – Mayor Jim West owes nearly $85,000 in legal bills from his fight to remain in office after a City Hall sex scandal prompted a recall effort, campaign finance documents show.
State Public Disclosure Commission documents filed Tuesday by the Committee for Spokane’s Progress show the anti-recall effort raised only $650 from five Spokane residents but listed more than $85,000 in debts, mostly owed to lawyers who unsuccessfully tried to quash the recall petition.
Meanwhile, Shannon Sullivan, the Spokane resident who filed recall paperwork in May, received about $19,000 in free legal advice from three lawyers who donated time to help prepare a response to West’s state Supreme Court appeal of the recall petition.
Documents filed with the PDC show the pro-recall Recall Signature Team committee collected $3,761 in cash donations and spent about $3,800 in August. All of the donations were for $250 or less.
Associated Press
Grays Harbor: Water district falsified tests
State health officials have placed Grays Harbor Water District No. 1, which serves the Grayland area, under a restricted operating permit after the district submitted false bacteria test reports to the Department of Health’s Office of Drinking Water.
In an apparent attempt to cut costs, the district has been taking monthly bacteria samples at the well, rather than throughout the system’s distribution pipes as required, state health officials said. The samples were then falsely labeled before being submitted to the state.
“We are appalled by this system’s disregard for the health and safety of its customers,” said Denise Lahmann, southwest regional manager for the Office of Drinking Water. “Fortunately, in this instance, no one appears to have been harmed.”
The Department of Health is considering what action to take against the individuals involved.
The Daily World
Yakima: Truant policy is labeled a success
Despite warnings that a controversial truancy policy would lead to racial profiling, police and school officials in Yakima and Union Gap have called its first year a success.
Under the policy, any youth who appears to be between the ages of 8 and 18 is fair game for being stopped and questioned by police if he or she is caught off-campus in either city during school hours.
While parents, various community groups and the American Civil Liberties Union are concerned about the policy, police and schools are working together to keep students in class and off the streets, school officials said.
Concerns about the policy have proven to be unfounded, they said.
“The issue of racial profiling is not an issue for this year, as the numbers do closely reflect our district student percentages,” said Rod Bryant, who oversees the Yakima School District’s attendance and truancy programs.
Associated Press
Shine: Falling wall kills man building house
A 41-year-old man helping a friend build a house was killed by a falling wall in Shine, near Port Ludlow on the northeast Olympic Peninsula.
Medics declared the man, Nykrem Torbjorn, dead at the scene.
Workers were lifting a 14-by-9-foot wall into place Tuesday when braces failed, Jefferson County Undersheriff Tim Perry said.
Another worker barely escaped by standing in a window opening.
Associated Press
Lakewood: Soldier arrested in 2 murders
A tip led Lakewood police to arrest a Fort Lewis soldier for investigation in the shooting deaths of another soldier and the wife of a soldier.
The motive may have been an attempted robbery, police said.
Spc. Jamaal Lewis, a 22-year-old Special Forces soldier who didn’t know the victims, was booked into the Pierce County Jail for investigation of first-degree murder. He is accused of shooting the two early Monday outside the Schooner tavern in this suburb south of Tacoma.
Killed were Crystal Hurley-McDowell, 23, and Jason Jowers, a 26-year-old man from the Army’s 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division. Hurley-McDowell was married to a Fort Lewis soldier stationed in Iraq.
Associated Press
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