Spokane Valley joins Spokane in the fight for fair board representation

Welcome to CIVICS, where we break down the week’s public meetings throughout the Inland Northwest, so you can get involved and fight for the issues you care about.

Some things that stick out to us this week include:

Central Valley School District is holding a special session to pass a resolution and letter that would ask both the Washington state legislature and the US Congress to ban transgender and nonbinary kids from participating in sports on the teams that align with their gender, instead restricting them by their sex assigned at birth.
Spokane City Council will discuss indefinitely postponing their parks levy at the Public Infrastructure, Environment, and Sustainability Committee meeting today.
Spokane Valley could get in on the SREC negotiation fun with their own letter requesting board representation.
The Spokane Transit Authority has two public hearings this week — on the 2025 budget and their Connect 2035 strategic plan — and will also get an update on the CEO search process.

Important meetings this week:

Spokane City Council

🌶️🫑/5 peppers

Fire drilling fire funds

The Spokane Fire Department (SFD) has spent $750,000 more on overtime than they originally anticipated. In order to ensure SFD stays under budget, council will vote on a Special Budget Ordinance to move $750,000 out of SFD’s capital expenditures budget, delaying those budgeted capital projects and balancing the 2024 year budget.

Small elephants? Big crime

Ten small elephants worth of litter gets dumped on Spokane’s streets every single month. Tonight, the Spokane City Council will do a first read of an ordinance that would increase the penalties for littering:

A $50 fine for litter equal to or less than a cubic foot
A misdemeanor for litter bigger than a cubic foot but smaller than 10 cubic yards
A gross misdemeanor for dumping more than 10 cubic yards.

Agenda here
Monday, November 18 at 6 pm
City Council Chambers – Lower Level of City Hall
808 W. Spokane Falls Blvd.
The meeting is also live streamed here.

Spokane City Council Study Sessions

Agenda here when available.
Thursday, November 21 at 11 am
City Council Chambers – Lower Level of City Hall
808 W. Spokane Falls Blvd.
The meeting is also live streamed here.

Public Infrastructure, Environment, and Sustainability Committee

🌶️🌶️🌶️🫑/5 peppers

Sayonara, sunset date

Mayor Lisa Brown’s administration is proposing an ordinance that would continue a 1% utility tax created by former Mayor Nadine Woodward that was scheduled to expire at the end of 2024. This proves Council Member Michael Cathcart’s point that sunset dates on taxes are basically fake unless they’re included in ballot language — because a future council could vote to overrule previous council action — which was his main argument against Brown’s Proposition 1. Brown wants to keep this utility tax in order to protect the General Fund, as her administration works to manage the massive budget deficit they inherited due to the previous administration’s liberal use of one-time funds for ongoing expenses.

Punting on Parks

After being repeatedly pushed back, the long-awaited citywide park improvement and safety levy could be deferred indefinitely, “to allow for a partnership with Spokane Public Schools (SPS) for a citywide neighborhood investment.” The ordinance removing the levy request, which doesn’t have any details as to what the potential partnership with SPS would look like, is sponsored by Council Members Betsy Wilkerson, Jonathan Bingle and Kitty Klitzke.

Thorpe Road request

The Washington State Department of Natural Resources owns 160 acres on Thorpe Road, which is currently a conservation area within the city of Spokane boundaries. The land is potentially going to be “transferred via land exchange,” to private developers, which means the state department of natural resources could trade the 160 acre parcel for a different piece of land. The Spokane City Council has heard complaints from various stakeholder groups, including tribal communities, that their voices weren’t considered during the state’s public process. Council will discuss a resolution asking that the sale or transfer of the land be delayed for 180 days to “provide an opportunity for various organizations and tribal communities to weigh in.”

Agenda here
Monday, November 18 at 1:15 pm
Council Chambers in the Lower Level of City Hall.
808 W Spokane Falls Blvd, Spokane, WA 99201
The meeting is also live streamed here.

Central Valley School District (Special Meeting)

🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️/5 peppers

A recent letter drafted by Central Valley School District’s board begins, “As an all-women school board, the Central Valley School District board of directors recognizes the shoulders on which we stand and the long history of civil rights battles which women have fought in order to enjoy equal opportunities in our society, including the ability to participate in competitive sports.”

The language of civil rights is increasingly invoked on both sides of the debate about transgender rights — especially the debate around sports.

Tonight, the CVSD board will do just that — calling a special session to vote on legislation asking the government to ban transgender kids from participating in sports, unless they play on the team that matches their assigned gender at birth. The Washington Interscholastic Activities Association (WIAA) is the governing agency that determines transgender kids’ participation in sports.

After deciding not to send a letter denouncing trans kids’ participation in sports last week, in part, because they thought it wasn’t a clear enough signal of their feelings, Central Valley School District is back with a special meeting tonight where they plan to hold a vote on a resolution and a new letter. While the agenda item is titled “Equal Opportunities and Safety in Competition,” the letter and resolution are both just titled “Female Sports.”

The resolution states a belief that Washington’s current interpretation of Title IX “frustrates Title IX’s original purpose by now allowing biological males to unfairly compete with biological females in athletic endeavors,” and asks that both the Washington state legislature and US Congress “amend current laws to allow all students, regardless of biological sex or gender identity, to participate in athletic activities in a safe and equal manner, while ensuring that biological female athletes are not denied their rights under Title IX to fair competition and opportunity.”

The resolution implies this is for transgender kids’ protection, stating “biological males competing in female sports consistent with their gender identity have been subjected to discriminatory and hateful vitriol,” as one of their reasons for asking for Title IX laws to be interpreted differently.

That language is vague in the resolution, but the draft letter makes it more clear: they want all “female sports categories,” to be reserved for those who are “born female.” The letter further goes on to ask the state and/or congress to create new rules that force transgender girls and “nonbinary boys” (we assume this means nonbinary students who were assigned male at birth) to play boys’ sports, while transgender boys and “nonbinary girls,” (again, we assume this means assigned female at birth) will have to play girls’ sports.

They state they’re also open to the creation of a third “open” category for students of all genders to compete in.

According to the 2023-24 WIAA handbook, which governs the state’s high school athletics, “All students have the opportunity to participate in WIAA athletics and/or activities in a manner that is consistent with their gender identity.” If passed tonight, this resolution and letter from CVSD wouldn’t change that policy or limit athletic participation for any transgender athletes that may currently want to compete for or against CVSD schools, but it would be a clear show of disapproval, and would continue to put pressure on WIAA to ban transgender athletes from competing in alignment with their gender.

If you want to provide testimony at this meeting, you can sign up here before 5 pm today. Feedback can also be emailed to the board prior to the meeting at publiccomment@cvsd356.org.

Agenda here
Monday, November 18 at 6 pm
Learning and Teaching Center
2218 N Molter Rd, Liberty Lake WA 99019
The meeting is also live streamed here.

Spokane Valley City Council

🌶🌶🫑/5 peppers

Camping regulations vote

We covered the first read of this ordinance last week, but Spokane Valley City Council will escalate the penalty of being in a city park after hours from an infraction to a misdemeanor crime. It would also change the definition of camping to just be “sleeping overnight on city property,” regardless of if someone actually has any “camping paraphernalia,” (ie tent, sleeping bag, etc) and make that a misdemeanor too. The ordinance would also allow the police in parks at night to patrol and arrest people. The timing of this ordinance highlights the priorities of the elected leaders of Spokane Valley, as the area just had our first snow and Spokane Valley does not have a single overnight homeless shelter for people to access, instead contracting with shelters in Spokane to provide a few beds to Spokane Valley’s unhoused folks.

SREC governance

The City of Spokane is knee-deep in negotiations with Spokane Regional Emergency Communications (SREC) over proportional board representation, and it looks like Spokane Valley is getting in on the fray. This week, Spokane Valley City Council will discuss sending a letter to SREC requesting their own Spokane Valley representative on the board, as well as an official interlocal agreement to be drafted up. Currently, Spokane Valley isn’t a member of SREC, even though it paid about $1.3 million for SREC services in 2023. Instead, Spokane Valley pays through services through an agreement with the Spokane County Sheriff’s Office, which results in them paying the second highest amount to SREC (after Spokane’s $1.8 million) but having no direct representation on the board. The council is scheduled to discuss the letter and potentially make edits, but a vote on whether or not to send it has not been scheduled yet.

Agenda here
Tuesday, November 19 at 6 pm
City Hall 10210 E Sprague Ave
Spokane Valley, Washington 99206
Virtual attendance here.

Liberty Lake City Council

🫑/5 peppers

Agenda here
Tuesday, November 19 at 7 pm
22710 E Country Vista Drive, Liberty Lake, WA 99019
The meeting is also live streamed here.

Spokane Public Library Board of Trustees

🌶️🌶️🫑/5 peppers

The budget and the bees

The Spokane Public Library Board of Trustees keeps their agendas pretty thin, but even with no details, a few items stood out to us: a vote to adopt a 2025 budget and an update on the Indian Trail Bird Garden and Pollinator Meadow. The pollinator meadow is home to nearly two dozen different kinds of wildflowers which were “carefully selected to sustain native bees throughout the growing season.” If you’re curious about library spending for the next year, or how the pollinator meadow is doing, check out this meeting.

Agenda here
Tuesday, November 19 at 4:30 pm
Shadle Park Library
2111 W. Wellesley Ave, Spokane, Washington, 99205
The meeting is also live streamed here.

Bicycle Advisory Board

🫑/5 peppers

Our columnist Lauren Pangborn did a bang-up job breaking down the 27 miles by 2027 urban mobility network plan. This week, the Bicycle Advisory Board (BAB) will receive a presentation on the plan, complete with a draft schematic map of where exactly those 27 miles of routes will go. The BAB will then consider voting on a resolution to show their official support for the project.

Agenda here
Tuesday, November 19 at 6 pm
City Council Briefing Center
808 W. Spokane Falls Blvd. Spokane, WA 99201
The meeting is also live streamed here.

Spokane School District Board of Directors

🌶️🫑/5 peppers

Finance findings

The report isn’t linked in the agenda so we have no preview on the details that might be included, but Spokane School District Board of Directors will be getting their Year End 2024 Financial Report at this week’s meeting.

Agenda here
Wednesday, November 20 at 6 pm
Spokane Public Schools Administration Building
200 N. Bernard, Spokane, WA 99201
The meeting is also live streamed here.

Spokane Transit Authority Board of Directors

🌶️🌶️🌶️/5 peppers

Public hearings

Spokane Transit Authority Board of Directors is scheduled to hold public hearings on two major items:

Their proposed 2025 Budget
A draft of Connect 2035, a ten-year strategic plan for investing one-time money

If you have strong opinions on transit, or want to learn more about either of these things, this might be the meeting for you!

CEO Search

Longtime CEO Susan Meyer announced her retirement for the end of 2024 earlier this year, and the board has been discussing (debating?) how her replacement should be found all summer. At this week’s meeting, we’ll get an update on how the search for the new CEO is going. The board is also planning to adjourn for a short executive session (a private session where no decisions are made) to discuss “succession planning.” We anticipate this could result in an Interim CEO being appointed to fill Meyer’s shoes after the end of the year while the board conducts their full search process for STA’s next leader.

Agenda here
Thursday, November 21 at 1:30 pm
STA Boardroom
1230 W Boone Avenue, Spokane, WA 99201
The meeting is also live streamed here.