Inlander 07/20/2023

EDITOR’S NOTE

We hear it every election: This is the most important election ever. Well, I’ve got news for you. This is a primary election, mainly focused on local races, so it’s not the most important election ever. That title is still probably held by the U.S. presidential race of 1860. (Though the ones in 1964, 1980, 2008 and the diptych of 2016 and 2020 all were clearly consequential.)

That said, I’m here to make the argument that this Aug. 1 primary election is more important than the general election in November. Because look at all those names on your ballot. Five people running for mayor in Spokane, and another 15 running for the city council. An actual mayoral race in Pullman, which hasn’t seen more than one person seek the office since the last century.

By the time November rolls around, we’ll have winnowed all those people down to the top two vote-getters in this election. That election will be important, yes, but simply the sequel to what we’re doing now.

So read all about these many local races this week, leading off with our look at how the political parties have infiltrated Spokane elections in NONPARTISAN? by Nate Sanford. Then head to inlander.com/election2023 and read all of our coverage before you make your decisions during this pretty important election.

— NICHOLAS DESHAIS, editor

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IF YOU COULD DESIGN A BARBIE, WHAT WOULD SHE BE LIKE?

AURORA KERR

I’m pregnant right now… I love Barbies, but the whole “Oh, Barbie has this certain body type,” I think it would be important to maybe have a pregnant Barbie. Because that shows that we’re bringing life into the world and women are still beautiful.

MAGGIE PHILLIPS

She would probably be a Native American because I’m Native American. When I was growing up, it was all the white blonde girls, so I never had a Barbie that looked like me.

MALLORY HAYES

I would design my own Barbie to have more realistic portions — to be more in proportion with our bodies.

What would you tell Mattel about Barbie? I would just ask that they make them more realistic for the girls so that the girls don’t have an unreal expectation of what they should look like, what they should grow up looking like.

JENNIFER EILEEN BOZARTH

For the dress, at the top, there are ruffles and a little strap. At the bottom, the same thing and it’s dropped down to ankle length. And she would have on country boots, and a cute hat… a horse, a dog and two friends to ride the horse.

JENNA HARDMAN

The dress would only be pink and really glittery. The hair would be blonde with a ton of pink streaks in it. And there’d be a lot of makeup and she would look like a total material girl with long pink nails and really tall platform shoes.

Do you plan on seeing the Barbie movie?

Yes! Because it’s so fun and we’re all gonna wear pink when we go!

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Bridge Lessons

The plan to pave over a public asset offers lessons in governance that still ring true today

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PUBLISHER’S NOTE: Back in 1997, a big controversy erupted as plans to build a new bridge over the Spokane Falls became closer to reality. Our columnist Robert Herold first flagged the issue in February 1997, asking, “Have the members of the City Council who brought this bridge to life lost their marbles?” The Inlander dug into the issue, and Herold continued to ask questions until they officially — finally — gave up. Herold died in November last year; here, published on March 2, 2000, are his thoughts on how to prevent a “damnable eyesore” like this from ever happening again.

It died without so much as a whimper. At the City Council meeting of Feb. 7, City Attorney Jim Sloane introduced the item and observed that all the various parties to the dispute needed to do was come to some agreement on the wording of the obituary for the Lincoln Street Bridge. Attorney Doug Siddoway, who along with his wife and legal partner, Laurel, successfully argued the case against the bridge on behalf of the Friends of the Falls, made a brief presentation, clarified a point or two, and then “took the liberty” of introducing his own version of the obituary.

Then, with a 7-0 vote, the City Council ended more than six years of public dispute. Just like that. The ship sank quietly beneath the waves. No dire predictions about traffic flow problems. No wringing of hands over the prospect of paying back all that money. The death was silent. The ripples hardly noticeable.

So what might we learn from this governmental misadventure? Here are some thoughts on the subject:

AVOID GROUPTHINK All groups tend to develop an internal dynamic that propels group members to anticipate the will of the group rather than focus their attention on the task at hand. We call this “groupthink.” Members easily succumb to groupthink for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is in seeking approval of other members. The civic manifestation of groupthink is boosterism.

Indeed, boosterism may be groupthink in its most virulent form, if for no other reason than its scope and impact on public debate and discussion, for it can have the effect of driving out all public dialogue when it is most needed. Groupthink leads to a kind of “go along, get along” mentality and most certainly set the parameters for the early

discussions and debates concerning the bridge.

BEWARE THE GARRISON MENTALITY

At some stage in the bridge debate, most members of the City Council and key staff members decided that they were under siege. Naysayers, that’s what they said of the opposition. This attitude tended to close down inquiry, and prevent alternative perspectives from entering the discussion. Eastern Washington University brought nationally recognized traffic engineer Walter Kulash to Spokane in 1997 and ’98. Kulash participated in two symposia, both of which dealt with the bridge issue. His argument, succinctly stated, was that our traffic engineers were way behind the times. They were mired in the old one-way street, couplet mentality of the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s. Since that time, argued Kulash, his profession had come to generally accept that one-way streets actually led to more pollution because cars were forced to travel as much as a third more downtown miles than they would have to without them. He also maintained that downtown Spokane failed to meet the criteria for one-way streets.

And what became of Kulash’s critique? Not only was it ignored, but he was immediately viewed as an enemy, so much so that a consulting firm in the running for the Downtown Plan contract was forced to take Kulash’s name off the list of consultants. One member of the City Council was quoted as having said, “The only reason Eastern brought Mr. Kulash to town was to make our staff look bad.” The wagons were circled, and inside the circle was both staff and council. The lesson: Don’t kill the messenger.

THE CITY COUNCIL’S PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITY IS DUE DILIGENCE Spokane operates with a part-time council (which, by the way, won’t change with the coming of the strong mayor system). Part-time councils tend to respond to initiatives that bubble up from the permanent government, aka the staff. Jim Sloane has been criticized by some for urging that members of the council regard themselves as so many board members; in fact, he is right. To expect more of them, we would have to adopt a full-time council and provide that council with all the necessary staff.

In 1997, plans were firming up to put a bridge over the top of the Spokane River Falls. YOUNG KWAK PHOTO

But this doesn’t mean that the council should succumb to groupthink, nor does it mean that the council should seek refuge inside the garrison. Throughout the Lincoln Street Bridge fight, most members of the council did both. Instead, they should have been focusing on their responsibility to provide due diligence (a lesson that apparently can also be gleaned from the River Park Square parking garage). Council members should have been probing and asking critical questions.

KNOW THE PROPER ROLE OF CITIZEN REVIEW Doug Siddoway recommends that the city, in the future, not toss off difficult decisions to groups of uninformed citizens, however well meaning they may be. If, after all the staff work is done, we want to run options by such a committee, perhaps that’s OK. But to expect a citizen’s group to decide whether to build the Lincoln Street Bridge puts one in mind of the story about the board of directors that was being asked by staff to commit to building a nuclear reactor at a cost of billions. We note that only three of the 20 members knew anything at all about nuclear reactors, and of the three who knew something, only one knew enough to ask an intelligent question.

The result of the above story was the greenlighting of WPPSS, one of the biggest financial debacles in the nation’s history. The lesson? Don’t ask citizen groups to decide questions about nuclear reactors — or bridges.

ASK ONE MORE QUESTION Suppose someone with influence, back in the early ’90s had done nothing more than ask: “Has staff thought to rethink the assumptions being made the last time this issue came up?” Or, perhaps: “What happens to all these assumptions about air quality given more than a decade of cleaner fuel?” Or, here’s an easy one: “We no longer have a toll on the Maple Street Bridge, so what’s the impact on the need for another bridge?” None of these questions was asked. They should have been.

BE WARY OF THE COZY RELATIONSHIP WITH YOUR FAVORITE CONTRACTOR When we talk about public-private partnerships, we tend to limit the application to the River Park Square garage deal. But, in fact, we enter into a public-private partnership every time the government contracts for goods, services or construction. And in the case of the Lincoln Street Bridge, it wasn’t long before the hired help became the city’s designated drumbeater for the bridge. The most benign interpretation of what followed would hold that the city became co-opted by the contractor. Instead of seeing its role as that of steward of the public trust, it began to view the contractor as a partner, and once that happened, the partner’s self-interest came to be viewed as identical with the public trust. The lesson: Avoid being co-opted.

Just because a project has been around for years doesn’t make it a “good project.” How many times did we hear the line: “This project has been on the books for 20 years, maybe more,” as if that proved anything about the merit of the plan.

DON’T FIGHT A LOSING BATTLE The unintended consequences of fighting so desperately for the Lincoln Street Bridge multiplied as bridge supporters dug in their heels. Not only were jobs lost over the bridge, especially among elected officials who misunderstood the public’s deep resentment over the project, but we also got a grassroots political spasm in the form of an initiative that will force future bridge projects to be put to a vote of the people — hardly a victory for representative government.

Had the city responded to the reasoned argument that in the end was found persuasive by the state (and most everyone else), such results could have been avoided. Instead of engaging the arguments against the bridge with an open mind, city officials were content to stonewall in the hopes that the citizen opposition would just go away. Now everyone knows that just the opposite happened, and the bridge consumed a lot more than money; it consumed political careers, the credibility of individuals and the public’s trust.

As a still-fresh historical case study of how not to run a city, the only question left is whether anyone will learn anything from the mistakes that were made. n

Last month, with neighbors complaining about the sheer quantity of dust coming from Spokane’s city Water Department complex on North Foothills Drive, the City Council unanimously passed a resolution calling for the department to relocate some of its work.

“One of the things that we know is the amount of dust in the air causes a significant amount of health problems,” City Council member Jonathan Bingle said at the council meeting.

And nobody knows that like those who worked for the Water Department.

According to public records recently obtained by the Inlander, Water Department employees worried that the air inside the department’s main building near Gonzaga Prep had become poisonous. And not just from the dust.

It was Jan. 12, 2021, the deadliest month of the COVID pandemic.

Like the canaries carried into coal mines, the department’s clerks were the first to know. They could feel the air scratching their throats and coating their mouths. It burned their eyes and chests. It was hard to breathe.

It got so bad that the whole building was temporarily evacuated a week later — under suspicion that there may have been a gas leak.

The city brought in experts, who discovered the building didn’t just have a dust problem — it had excess carbon dioxide and radon, too.

“Any one of these can cause minor to serious acute and chronic health effects and in combination create an

WATER’S BAD AIR

In 2021, a Spokane city water department building was brimming with dust, radon and COVID

BY DANIEL WALTERS

unhealthy work environment,” a report from Spring Environmental, a third-party consultant concluded in April 2021, saying the issue stemmed from a “direct result of inadequate fresh air flow throughout the facility.”

To Marlene Feist, Spokane’s director of public works, the city’s response to the complaints was proof of how much they care about employee safety. The clerks were allowed to work from home and eventually moved to another building on the site. The city spent tens of thousands of dollars diagnosing the problem, and eventually installed a slew of upgrades to the building’s air handling system.

“We got recommendations to improve that outside airflow into the building,” Feist says. “We’ve done that.”

But it wasn’t just the clerks who had complaints. Half of the employees in the basement of the main building had been complaining of headaches. Ryan Egger, a 6-foot-3-inch bearded former Water Department foreman, was one of them. As the clerks were transferred out, he says he and at least five others were stuck crammed into a tiny “sardine can” of an office in the basement.

Today, he accuses the department of not only failing to quickly fix the toxic air — but of being the reason he contracted a nasty case of COVID.

“I had some trust in you as you talked to the water department management about family, family, family,” Egger wrote in a January 2022 email to then-City Administrator Johnnie Perkins. “My family has suffered at the expense of poor leadership and pure conscious negligence.”

WIND AND FIRE

As soon as the Spring Environmental technician walked into the department’s basement office two years ago, Egger says, his face said something was wrong.

“The guy comes in with his handheld thing, his eyes [bug out], and his jaw drops,” Egger says.

Carbon dioxide levels were elevated, but not so high as to be dangerous. All the headaches and nausea? That was likely caused by “particulate matter” — unidentified stuff floating in the air, setting off the air filters in the building. At its worst, the effect was like experiencing a moderate to severe wildfire smoke day inside the office.

Egger wasn’t surprised. At that time, he says, all four sides of the buildings were surrounded by construction, demolition or big dusty dirt piles bound for the state’s North Spokane Corridor project, also known as the north-south freeway.

Once upon a time, the department’s basement was supposed to be one of the safest places you could possibly be in the event of a nuclear attack. The site had been one of Spokane’s 176 designated fallout shelters.

But there were issues with airflow a half-century ago too. During a packed 29-hour fallout shelter simulation, a Spokane Daily Chronicle article from 1967 detailed a comic mishap involving a nun’s veil and the “big blower used to push fresh air into the stuffy shelter.”

Flash forward a half-century, and that stuffiness had ironically helped turn the former shelter into a sink for radioactivity.

...continued on page 10

After employees at Spokane’s water department complained about air quality, experts discovered excess carbon dioxide and radon. YOUNG KWAK PHOTO

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“WATER’S BAD AIR,” CONTINUED...

Spring Environmental tested for radon — a radioactive substance naturally occurring in the soil in places like Spokane, that is measured in “picocuries.” (A measurement named after Marie Curie, the scientist famously killed due to her radiation exposure, who remains the only person to win a Nobel Prize in two scientific fields; in her case, physics and chemistry.)

If you find just 4 picocuries per liter of radon in your home, the Environmental Protection Agency says you need to take action to address it. In April 2021 the Water Department’s basement was popping with 62 picocuries per liter.

Though it was shy of the controversially loose federal radon limit for workplaces, at the “relatively high level” in the Water Department’s basement, action was clearly needed, says Jim McAuley, a radon specialist with the EPA.

“The higher the level the more chance you have of getting lung cancer,” McAuley says. The EPA says radon-caused lung cancer kills roughly 21,000 Americans a year.

Granted, McAuley says that fixing the radon problem didn’t have to be immediate. Just like getting one X-ray or a single night of secondhand smoke, it’s not one day that’s the concern. It’s the buildup over months and years.

But Egger says it took nearly five months after the first radon test for even the most basic intervention — portable industrial fans to improve the airflow — to be added to the basement offices.

And by then, Egger says, he was at the hospital in the wake of the department’s big COVID outbreak.

WATER AND EARTH

Even before COVID, recently retired Water Department employee Tim LaForce says the department’s building — the “dungeon” as he calls it — long had a reputation as a petri dish.

“I got the flu and cold several times, just from being down there,” LaForce says. “You could hear people coughing and hacking and everything.”

Some guys at the water department, like LaForce, had good reasons to be concerned about the virus. Part of his leg is missing. Long story short: On the job injury. Botched surgery. Infection. Amputation.

“Because of the medications that I’m on, my immune system is compromised as it is,” LaForce says. “I’ve got a 40-year-old special needs daughter. I was terrified I’d bring home something to her and she’d die.”

But there are also people like supervisor Loren Searl. In interviews for this article, three former city employees said that the “mask” Searl wore during COVID was mesh without any liner — essentially like wearing fishnet stockings over his mouth.

Egger took it as a “middle finger at people who had health concerns.”

He knows there’s plenty of debate about how effective masks were against COVID. But the rules were the rules — and he says the Water Department has long had a reputation of playing fast and loose with safety rules.

And in this job, he worries, that can be deadly. Fail to properly “shore” up the trench that you’re digging, for example, and you could end up hospitalized like the employee who in 2018 was buried under a ditch after a dig collapsed at 57th Avenue and the Palouse Highway. An investigation by the Washington state Department of Labor and Industries resulted in a $4,800 fine against the city for not following safety procedures.

And yet by 2021, at least 90 employees were out of date on their “shoring/trenching” training to avoid those kinds of accidents, Egger says. (Feist argues that COVID was partly to blame for the delay.)

Finally, in May 2021, the city took action. Safety training was held for three straight days, roughly 30 employees at a time, to try to get staff in compliance with state rules — but inside the exact same fallout-shelter basement where the city knew the ventilation was toxically inadequate.

It was exactly the kind of low-ventilation environment that could turn into a COVID hot zone. The safety training turned into a superspreader event.

Even though COVID cases nationwide were low, even though the Delta variant wave hadn’t hit yet, even though Egger said he’d been vaccinated, Egger got COVID. And he wasn’t alone.

“I’ve confirmed face-to-face with at least 16

Ryan Egger told his city supervisors that his office was unsafe — he got COVID anyway. YOUNG KWAK PHOTO

guys when I returned to work that ‘Yes, I tested positive,’” Egger says.

Though LaForce dodged the virus, he submitted a complaint to the state in June 2021, estimating that 20 to 30 water employees were out sick following the training.

Though the city sent out a wear-your-mask-reminder to employees, the Water Department’s safety coordinator and manager claimed that the Labor and Industries instructor teaching the class didn’t indicate he observed any COVID regulation violations.

But at least three employees at the training confirmed for this article that a slew of their co-workers at the training weren’t masked up — and that it wasn’t a surprise that the trainer didn’t raise an objection. LaForce says the trainer took his own mask off halfway through his session.

Egger places the blame squarely on the city: They knew the room was dangerous.

“Why didn’t they vacate it months ago and figure out what’s going on?” Egger says. “Instead we all ended up with COVID.”

HEART

Over a decade ago, Egger’s heart had stopped on the operating table. The doctors put in a pacemaker to save his life, and for 15 years, he was fine. COVID, he says, changed that.

“Initially, it was a lot of cardiac complications. Heart beating out of my chest, really a lot of dizziness,” Egger says.

Long COVID is an amorphous thing — hard to diagnose, hard to pin down.

“I tell everybody it’s like having an eggbeater taken to your brain,” Egger says.

Records show that Egger did meet with Feist and Perkins to share his concerns — but as his emails grew increasingly outraged, Perkins shifted to a more defensive talk-to-HR stance.

It’s only now, two years after having COVID, that he says he’s starting to feel better. Just last month, he says, the city finally settled his claim with Labor and Industries.

Feist stresses that even medical facilities, with all their precautions, had outbreaks.

“COVID was one concern. So was making sure we were delivering safe drinking water,” Feist says. “We tried to do absolutely everything we could to do all of these things at the same time.”

The city has continued to upgrade the facility — with new air handling systems and better exterior doors to limit outside pollution. The better ventilation worked: A followup test in September 2021 showed that radon and particulate matter levels had fallen significantly.

Yet in late 2021, Water Department Director Stephen Burns was fired. Feist won’t say whether the air quality issue played into his termination, only that the city made a decision to go in a “different direction.”

But that different direction ultimately meant Searl — the supervisor who reportedly wore the mesh-mask — was the new head of the Water Department. For all of Egger’s criticism of Burns’ tenure, he says Searl was a much bigger problem.

Ultimately, the Water Department is the only Spokane city department to get a COVID-related violation from Labor and Industries.

In February 2022 — nearly two years into the pandemic, and just after the milder but more contagious Omicron variant had resulted in skyrocketing infections — Labor and Industries responded to an anonymous employee complaint about masking in the department. The state fined the city $2,100, concluding that the department wasn’t enforcing all the state’s policies around facial covering and COVID barriers. It hadn’t provided “a workplace free from recognized hazards... likely to cause serious injury or death.”

In an email, city spokeswoman Kirstin Davis argues that that’s the product of exhaustion after two years of complying with pandemic mandates.

But Egger takes it as more evidence of the kind of behavior that can lead to ditch collapses and disease outbreaks.

“That proves my point that Water does what they want,” Egger says “They had my situation in 2021 and still didn’t clean up their act.” n

1997 - 1998

The 1990s were a different, some say glorious, time. Or were they? On April 23, 1997, we had a cover story about trouble brewing on Moran Prairie, aka south Spokane, with its growing congestion and flooded basements. We used the word NIMBY, a term that nowadays has become common here and, well, everywhere. A few months later, on Sept. 24, 1997, we published another cover story titled, “Why SUVs Suck,” all about how bigger and bigger cars are making our streets more and more dangerous. That’s a topic we just wrote about again this year — 26 years later — because, I guess, the ’90s are cool again?

IN THE NEWS

On Feb. 19, 1997, longtime Inlander columnist Bob Herold took his first aim at plans for a LINCOLN STREET BRIDGE. If you haven’t heard of it, that’s because Herold had particularly good aim. It was a terrible idea. City leaders and some downtown property owners hatched plans to convert the Monroe Street Bridge into a four-lane span for one-way traffic, and paired it with a new bridge — right over the Spokane Falls — of equally/disastrously wide one-way traffic. In a big, newsy cover story on July 23, 1997, we questioned the project, in the story and in our headline, “Bridge over the river, why?” Thanks to Herold’s dogged coverage, and lots of lovers of the Falls, the Lincoln bridge was quietly scuttled.

CULTURE BEAT

In 1998, members of the various Inland Northwest tribes and other Native and Indigenous people came together to hold the first modern JULYAMSH POWWOW. The sharing of Indigenous culture — through dance, music, food, history and more — was the “ultimate summer festival gathering” and better than any “Lollapalooza-fest-o-ramas,” as local author Kris Dinnison wrote in our pages back then. Laura Stensgar, who was marketing director of what was then called the Coeur d’Alene Tribal Bingo-Casino, said it was “the nation’s largest outdoor powwow.” (Today, she’s Laura Penney, CEO of the Coeur d’Alene Casino Resort Hotel.) Powered by the leadership of then-CEO David Matheson, Julyamsh grew and grew, but it hasn’t been held since the pandemic. But the sharing of Native culture has continued. Matheson, who was also a pioneer in bringing tribal gaming to the Inland Northwest, died earlier this year, as his casino celebrated 30 years.

ON THE COVER

Remember when Avista was called Washington Water Power? That was the topic of “HASTA L’AVISTA,” a big story in the Dec. 16, 1998, issue that explored the growing trend of deregulation in the energy industry. Local WWP investors fretted about losing “Washington” in the name, worrying the new moniker was a harbinger of less local control. They had good reason to worry: The deregulation that led to the Avista name also led to Enron, the Texas-based company that was the darling of financiers before it was revealed that the company, valued at $101 billion, was engaged in accounting fraud. That company’s eventual bankruptcy sent shocks through the world economy. In the meantime, Avista is still headquartered in Spokane and sends shocks — I mean electricity — to hundreds of thousands of people in Washington, Idaho and Oregon.

LOCAL FOLKS

Reading a recent edition of the Inlander, you won’t be surprised to see the names NADINE WOODWARD or LISA BROWN. One’s the mayor of Spokane, and the other wants to be, after all. But in 1997? On March 26 of that year, the results of our long running Best Of contest were published. Woodward was there, in the midst of a hot streak as the “best local newscaster.” She’d already won twice, and we noted that “this woman just can’t lose these days.” A page later, over in the “best local public official” category, Brown appears, placing third behind John Roskelley and George Nethercutt. Those two guys are out of politics, but Brown keeps going, though we’d like to update the descriptor we gave her back then: “mom-with-an-attitude-for-social-justice.”

Charley Crockett

July 21

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July 22

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August 3

Don’t miss the biggest name in progressive bluegrass bringing together country, soul, and blues to create an unapologetic hybrid that is old as the hills but fresh as the morning dew.

Rolling in Dough

A new state law lets home ‘cottage’ cooks and bakers make thousands of dollars more every year

BY ELIZA BILLINGHAM

Flour, sugar, milk, butter and eggs — the not-so-secret ingredients for almost anything delicious. But they’re also the pantry staples that faced some of the steepest price spikes since 2021.

“There’s a lot of people that I talk to where it’s just like, ‘Well, it’s just eggs and flour,’” says Jamie Roberts. “[But] it’s my livelihood.”

Roberts is the owner and baker of Three Birdies Bakery, a custom sugar cookie bakery in Spokane. She started her business out of her home in March 2018 after friends saw her Christmas cookie Facebook posts and asked if they could buy some.

She wasn’t sure how big the business would get, so she got a cottage food license that allowed her to keep making and selling cookies from home.

For years, Washington has capped the annual income for cottage food makers at $25,000. But rising food costs are eating into that income and whisking away profits.

In May, Washington legislators passed a new state law increasing the annual income cap for cottage food operations to $35,000 effective July 23. It also requires that the cap be reevaluated and adjusted for inflation based on the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics’ consumer price index every four years. Additionally, cottage food makers will be able to keep their license for two years, instead of reapplying every year.

State Rep. Carolyn Eslick, R-Sultan, who sponsored the bill, says she’s been working for three years to improve conditions for emerging food business owners in order to create a better incubation period for growing businesses. She says many states don’t put any income cap on cottage food operations.

“Give the entrepreneur their due knowledge of what they’re doing and their capacity,” she says. “When they outgrow their kitchen, then they go to a commercial kitchen.”

Eslick and other legislators initially proposed increasing the cap to $50,000. Though the bill passed unanimously in the House, it got some pushback in the Senate. A main concern was food safety.

A cottage food license allows a residential

home to produce foods that are “not potentially hazardous” like baked goods, candies and jams. It requires an inspection from a Washington State Department of Agriculture food safety officer, plus a separate area for retail food preparation, away from personal cooking, kids and pets.

The paperwork and prep is daunting, Roberts the home baker says, but worth it.

“If I’m buying food from somebody that I’m gonna put into my body or my kid’s body, I want that regulated,” she says.

An income cap is an additional way to control the amount of food being made in someone’s home, says state Sen. Kevin Van De Wege, DLake Sutherland, the only senator to vote against the bill. He thinks a cap is more a cost effective food safety protection than paying for more frequent health inspections.

He also wants to keep the cap low in order to limit any unfair advantage a home baker would have over a traditional business owner who has employees and rent to pay.

Van De Wege uses wedding cakes as an example. Tiered and decadent, they can be lucrative, if you’re good at it. A talented baker making cakes at home could earn a lot of money pretty quickly, unfairly competing with a commercial baker who has a lot more bills to pay.

“I think the intent is that somebody does it as a hobby, or somebody that’s home with their kids [is] able to make some money,” he says, but not replace larger businesses.

Negotiators could only raise the cap to $35,000 but made sure to include the permit extension and regular review for inflation.

“Ten grand is a lot of money,” says Roberts. “However, when everything else is a lot of money, it’s like, ‘Well, that doesn’t really make a difference.’”

Regardless of the income cap, Roberts was already planning to move into a wholesale license, which would allow her to sell to coffee shops and grocery stores, plus ship out of state to nearby customers in Idaho. If the cap had been increased to $50,000, she says she may have kept a cottage license for a year or two longer, but ultimately she was always aiming toward a bigger business.

“I mean, everybody needs to make money,” she says. n

Three Birdies’ Jamie Roberts at work. ARI NORDHAGEN PHOTO

Cruel Summer

Washington state is in a drought. Plus, Spokane loses another top official after misconduct allegations; and the city plans to install 20 speed cameras.

Washington issued a statewide drought advisory this month, after many areas entered moderate to severe drought conditions Spokane, Pend Oreille, Whitman, Garfield, Asotin, Columbia and Walla Walla counties are all in drought after the hottest May on record and a warmer, drier start to summer. Some water users are not able to draw water from the Little Spokane, Walla Walla, Wenatchee or Yakima rivers, or several other watersheds. The Spokane River is currently running at less than half the streamflow that is typically seen this time of year. “As we head into the hottest weeks of the summer, we want people to use water wisely and to be aware of our water supply situation,” says Jeff Marti, water resources planner for the state Department of Ecology. (SAMANTHA

WOHLFEIL)

PERKINS OUT

There’s more staff turnover at Spokane City Hall after City Administrator Johnnie Perkins abruptly resigned last week amid allegations that he’d violated the city’s sexual harassment policy On Friday, Mayor Nadine Woodward applauded the “courage of city employees who came forward” to report their concerns with Perkins’ behavior. Woodward said the concerns involved Perkins sharing “intimate details” with city employees about a relationship he was involved in. Perkins was placed on administrative leave in June shortly after employees reported their concerns, and a human resources investigation began. Woodward described his behavior as “unacceptable,” but wouldn’t give further specifics about the allegations. She added that a copy of the report will be released when it’s complete. Garrett Jones, director of Spokane Parks and Recreation, is taking Perkins’ place through the end of the year. Perkins has “categorically denied” the allegations, according to his attorney.

SANFORD)

SLOW DOWN

Speeding in Spokane might get pricier. On Monday, City Council members voted to allow speed enforcement cameras to operate near parks and hospitals Previously, such cameras were limited to school zones. But changes in Washington law last year expanded the places where cities can operate them. Unlike school cameras, which only operatue during school hours, the cameras near parks and hospitals will be on 24/7. Drivers will get flagged if they go more than 8 mph over the speed limit. Council President Lori Kinnear, who cosponsored the ordinance, says the change will likely lead to 20 new cameras throughout the city some time next year. Half the revenue they generate will go to the state, and the other half will go to the city’s traffic calming fund, which is typically used for street projects aimed at slowing motorists down, which is important considering the steep rise in pedestrian deaths. (As we reported in the cover story, “Reclaiming the Streets,” April 27, 2023.) Council members recently voted to allow some of the traffic calming money to go towards overtime for police doing traffic enforcement.

(NATE SANFORD)

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Expect smoke this summer. YOUNG KWAK PHOTO

Some members of the Spokane City Council have sour relations with the mayor, but this year’s election could help reset city governance. ERICK DOXEY PHOTOS

IS

NONPARTISANSHIP DEAD?

BY NATE SANFORD

Everyone agrees. There’s a lot at stake in this year’s election.

The pandemic is fading, but its scars have yet to heal. Spokane’s homeless population grew 36 percent last year. The city budget is in a rough, maybe even dire, situation. The police department is understaffed, and blowing through its overtime budget. Many people say they don’t feel safe. There aren’t enough houses. Rent is rising. Potholes, potholes, potholes.

PRIMARY ELECTION 2023

“Spokane is at a point where it can either be its best, or it can continue to deteriorate,” says Katey Treloar, an educator, business owner and one of 20 people running to be part of elected Spokane city government this year.

This year’s election — which begins with the Aug. 1 primary and ends with the Nov. 7 general election — could mark a major shift in Spokane city governance. Three City Council seats are up for grabs. So is the mayor’s office and the council presidency.

Spokane government has spent recent years divided under a conservative mayor and a veto-proof, five-person progressive majority on the City Council. The relationship between Mayor Nadine Woodward and the council has frayed to the point of near inaction.

“Trust was broken,” says City Council member Betsy Wilkerson, who represents District 2 and is running for council president this year.

Wilkerson and a slate of progressive candidates are

hoping to maintain the council’s progressive majority and usher in a new era of unity with Lisa Brown, the former state commerce director and Democratic state Senate majority leader, as mayor.

In a fundraising letter, Wilkerson told supporters that this year’s election offers a rare chance for Spokane’s “first-ever progressive trifecta” — with Brown as mayor, Wilkerson as council president and a progressive supermajority on the City Council.

This trifecta, Wilkerson wrote, would allow progressives to “enact our values and pass our policies in full force.”

The prospect worries conservatives, who have spent years frustrated by the council majority’s tendency to vote in unison and ability to override the mayor. They accuse the majority of, among other things, failing to support the police department, ignoring the voices of business owners, and turning a blind eye to crime and homelessness.

Current council members deny this. But John Estey, executive director of the Spokane Good Government Alliance, doesn’t buy their denials.

“We need integrity in the office of the City Council and the mayor’s office,” Estey says. “And Lisa Brown, Betsy Wilkerson and the slate of candidates who are running on their side have been on the wrong side of issues from public safety, housing and homelessness.”

Estey’s group, formed in 2019, describes itself as a “bipartisan” political action committee with the aim to “keep Spokane from becoming Seattle, Portland or San Francisco” and prevent the council majority from continuing to push “far left ideas.” The PAC played a major role in the 2019 election, when it spent $350,000 on its preferred candidates. It’s already spent more than $100,000 this election cycle.

Etsey, who also works as campaign manager for U.S.

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a Republican, says he’s confident that a fresh slate of candidates can disrupt the council’s supermajority and bring “good governance” back to Spokane under a second Woodward term.

Kim Plese, who is running against Wilkerson for council president, agrees.

“I’m supporting Woodward because I think our community needs to give her another chance,” Plese says. “From day one, she’s been attacked. … Every single time that she has tried to do something, [the council has] taken power away from her.”

Brown thinks Woodward had her chance — and blew it.

“Mayor Woodward has dug us in a deep hole, and she’s still digging,” Brown said, standing outside City Hall last week next to a poster-board graph showing the city’s unallocated reserves (aka its savings account) tanking under Woodward’s tenure — from a surplus of $28 million in 2020 to negative $9.2 million today.

Brown and the other progressives hoping for change in the mayor’s office characterize Woodward’s first term as beset by chaos, miscommunication and poor management. They accuse her of failing to articulate any sort of plan for homelessness or policing, and instead choosing to deflect blame toward Olympia and the City Council.

Despite the contentious tone of local politics, the people running for city government this year are in broad agreement on the city’s biggest problems, and even the solutions. They mostly agree that Spokane needs more housing and that the police department needs to be fully staffed and given the resources necessary to do its job. They’re all interested in proposals to regionalize homeless services.

Much of the disagreement lies in the details — and the leaders tasked with implementing them.

In this divided political era, the people who want to run Spokane city government have already chosen a team — is it time to let the parties in the door?

Your ballot is due Aug. 1. The top two vote getters will face each other in November’s general election.

This year’s candidates say they’re conscious of the tension in City Hall, and pitch themselves as unifiers and “voices of reason” who can bring Spokane together.

But what does that actually mean? Is it possible to avoid picking sides in today’s hyperpartisan political climate?

‘THE CITY HAS TURNED LIBERAL’

Spokane city races are officially nonpartisan — there’s no “D” or “R” next to candidates’ names on the ballot.

But for years, networks of big donors, consultants and advocacy organizations have shaped a de facto system of progressives and conservatives.

One of the most influential progressive advocacy organizations is Fuse Washington. The Seattle-based group endorsed Brown for mayor and Wilkerson for council president. It recommends voting for Lindsey Shaw in northeast Spokane’s District 1, and Paul Dillon for south Spokane’s District 2. In northwest Spokane’s District 3, they endorsed two progressives: Esteban Herevia and Kitty Klitzke.

Estey’s Good Government Alliance is on the opposite side of that spectrum.

His organization has thrown its support behind Woodward for mayor, Plese for council president, Treloar in District 2 and Earl Moore in District 2. In District 1, it’s endorsed the incumbent Michael Cathcart, who is the only council member running for reelection this year

and part of the council’s two-person conservative minority, along with Jonathan Bingle.

The four council candidates backed by the Estey’s group have all raised more money than their opponents and have financial support from various real estate groups and prominent local conservatives like Mary Kuney, a Republican county commissioner, and former Spokane Mayor David Condon.

This group of council candidates leans to the right of their opponents, but they prefer the word “nonpartisan” on their yard signs and campaign material — with the exception of Cathcart.

“I don’t feel like I need to put nonpartisan on my sign because I feel like I am nonpartisan, I’ve acted nonpartisan,” Cathcart says. “My constituents know that I’m nonpartisan, and they know these are nonpartisan positions.”

Dillon and other progressive candidates have argued that Plese’s, Moore’s and Treloar’s embrace of the “nonpartisan” label is disingenuous — an attempt to hide their conservative affiliations in a city that tends to vote liberal.

“The goal is to misinform voters about their true positions,” Dillon says. “They’re collectively trying to rebrand themselves and make themselves more relatable and hide their real views.”

Spokane County is solidly red, but the city itself tends to vote slightly blue. Woodward, who also describes herself as nonpartisan, acknowledged as much in a recording of a speech that Fuse obtained and released

during her run for mayor in 2019.

“I work extremely hard to keep partisanship and party out of this race. I know full well that someone who is right of center is going to have a hard race in the city election for mayor,” Woodward said, speaking at a Rotary Club event. “Cathy McMorris Rodgers lost the city in her last election by 17 points. She wins the county. She overwhelmingly wins the district. But the city has turned liberal.”

Last year, Plese ran as a Republican for a newly created seat on the Spokane County Board of Commissioners that encompasses the western half of the city of Spokane. She lost to Chris Jordan, a Democrat, by 10 points. (Unlike city races, county commission races are partisan.)

Plese says that race showed her the unsavory side of party politics and that she isn’t interested in running in any more partisan races.

“I’m so tired of the in-fighting between parties,” Plese says.

Moore, a retired respiratory therapist, says she put “nonpartisan” on her yard signs because she’s trying to show voters that she’s “not a Democrat or a Republican.”

But Moore has spent years as a precinct committee officer with the local GOP. Last year she was given the “2022 Republican Hero award.”

Moore acknowledges her Republican roots, but she stresses that she has lots of Democratic friends and that she’s trying to stay away from politics in this election and

“IS NONPARTISANSHIP DEAD?,” CONTINUED...

Kim Plese (left) and Mayor Nadine Woodward have campaigned togther and have similar, conservative political views, but reject the Republican label for their races this year. YOUNG KWAK PHOTOS

solely focus on the issues facing Spokane — mainly keeping the community safe and “supporting the police for being the heroes that they are.”

Moore didn’t seek the local Spokane County Republican Party’s endorsement this year. Instead, the party voted to recommend one of her opponents, Chris Savage, the board chair of Meals on Wheels who has previously run for the District 3 council seat.

“I’m trying to walk a line. I will look at both sides of everything, always,” Moore says. “And then I will vote in the best interest of the constituents.”

The local GOP is also recommending Cathcart for District 1, and nobody in District 2. Treloar says she didn’t seek endorsements from either party because she’s committed to nonpartisanship.

The Spokane County Democrats endorsed Shaw, Wilkerson, Klitzke and Brown. In District 2, they endorsed both Dillon and Cyndi Donahue.

While Plese openly supports Woodward’s reelection campaign, Moore says she’s focused on working with whoever wins, and won’t say which candidate she supports.

“I’m not here to talk politics, I’m just not,” Moore says.

Jim Dawson, a Spokane resident and Fuse’s program director, agrees with Dillon and argues that the “nonpartisan” label can be misleading.

“It’s a question of transparency, especially when you have no record,” Dawson says. “There’s a lack of clear signal to voters, and it makes it harder to figure out who agrees with their politics and ideologies.”

But Dawson also acknowledges that the inverse is often true in conservative areas like Spokane Valley, where left-leaning candidates tend to de-emphasize their progressive connections. It’s ultimately political posturing, he says.

Dawson also insists that even though Fuse proudly describes itself as progressive, it’s a nonpartisan group that doesn’t follow party labels and only endorses people who align with their values. He acknowledges that the group overwhelmingly endorses Democrats but stresses that it’s endorsed Republicans in the past. It’s just getting harder, he says.

A VERY RUDE QUESTION

Dillon’s, Shaw’s and Wilkerson’s campaigns have all hired the same consultant: Rising Tide Consulting. It is led by Sean Gannon, who also works as a digital strategist at a firm that boasts former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other top Democrats as clients.

On the other side of the consultant world is Crimson Consulting, which is run by a former McMorris Rodgers staffer and is working for Treloar’s, Plese’s and Woodward’s campaigns.

Regardless, Treloar is very firm about her commitment to nonpartisanship. She won’t say who she voted for in the 2020 presidential election (it’s a “very rude question”) or who she’s supporting for mayor. She didn’t seek endorsements from either political party, and she describes herself as a “mom, a teacher, small business owner and nonprofit organizer” when asked if she considers herself a conservative.

Spokane County Treasurer Michael Baumgartner, a former Republican state senator, describes Treloar as having “pretty centrist” views. He knows her family personally and has also been mentoring her on the nuts and bolts of running for office through a Washington state organization called League of Our Own.

“It’s sort of candidate support and recruitment for female candidates that are on the pro-small business and pro-safe community side of the political spectrum,” Baumgartner says.

League of Our Own — which is led by the former executive director of the state Republican Party and lists McMorris Rodgers as co-chair — is an offshoot of Project 42, a nonprofit which enables “center-right forces in our state to be on the offense.”

Treloar says League of Our Own didn’t recruit her to run. They reached out after she declared, she says, and they have mainly been helping with fundraising, doorbelling and other administrative aspects of campaigning.

Moore says League of Our Own also reached out to her, but she hasn’t had time to work with them.

...continued on next page

“IS NONPARTISANSHIP DEAD?,” CONTINUED...

ALL POLITICS IS NATIONAL

The other candidates running this year have signage and slogans that, like the word “nonpartisan,” are a little vague and don’t offer much insight into their ideology or political affiliation. But when asked, the candidates are mostly open about which way they lean.

“At the very beginning of this, I was called the ‘most Democratic, most left-leaning candidate,’” says Herevia, who was not endorsed by the local Democratic party. “And I think that’s the reality of where I find myself.”

Randy McGlenn, who is also running in District 3, recalls an interaction with a neighbor who asked him which party he was affiliated with and who pushed back when McGlenn told them the race is nonpartisan.

“Well yes, you can say it’s nonpartisan, but people have biases, people have leanings and philosophies,” the neighbor told him. A fair point, McGlenn says.

McGlenn used to run Washington’s Libertarian Party, and he acknowledges an appreciation for small government and personal liberty.

“I think being a libertarian, in this particular setting, really frees me to focus on issues from the very moderate perspective,” McGlenn says.

Donahue, who is running against Dillon and Treloar in District 2, says that she’s prepared to work with people on all sides and seek unity if elected but acknowledges her partisan leaning.

“Quite honestly, I’ve been a lifelong Democrat. And if people ask me personally, I’ll tell them who I want to have for mayor. But I also don’t want to be disrespectful,” Donahue says. “It’s a matter of respect, publicly trying to stay nonpartisan as much as I can.”

Dillon is especially vocal about his political lean-

ings. He’s spent years advocating for abortion rights and other progressive causes through his work with the local Planned Parenthood, and doesn’t shy away from criticizing Woodward.

Some of his opponents see that as a liability.

“One of the biggest issues right now is if you look at Paul’s social media, he’s constantly bashing our current mayor,” Treloar says. “If he does win the position, how is he going to work effectively with someone that he so outright disagrees with?”

Treloar also has concerns about Dillon bringing divisive national issues — namely abortion rights — into the race. She says abortion isn’t relevant to local politics.

“It’s definitely not a priority when I’m doorbelling,” Treloar says.

But even if it doesn’t come up in the day-to-day work of city government, Dillon argues that candidates’ stances on issues like abortion, immigration and the 2020 presidential election are fair game for voters to ask about.

It’s a belief system, Dillon says, and voters deserve to know how candidates think.

A number of the candidates running for office this year say they get lots of questions about party affiliation while doorbelling.

Baumgartner, who has held elected office for more than a decade, says there’s been a clear shift.

“We used to say that all politics is local, and it was really local issues they cared about. I think now all politics is national, ” he says. “There’s just so much more tribal

identification amongst a lot of people with how they vote.”

There’s a famous saying, often attributed to former New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, that there’s “no Democratic or Republican way to pick up the garbage.”

Cathcart thinks it’s an ideal worth striving toward.

“I think everybody has obviously partisan leanings of some kind, but I do think it’s possible to act in a nonpartisan way,” Cathcart says.

Cathcart says there’s a lot of frustration in Spokane, and that this year’s elections may usher in a more centrist era of government. He hasn’t decided yet if he’ll be endorsing people this election cycle.

Baumgartner says the current system of partisan and nonpartisan elections feels a little backwards. It doesn’t make sense that elections for more administrative roles like county clerk, auditor and treasurer come with party labels, while legislative positions that make policy decisions like city council don’t, Baumgartner says.

“If I was waving a wand to change things, you would make the city council races partisan,” he says. “Those party labels would tell you something about how people would vote.” n

nates@inlander.com

“There’s just so much more tribal identification amongst a lot of people with how they vote.”

AIRWAY HEIGHTS VOTERS ARE ASKED TO HAND OFF THEIR LIBRARY TO SAVE THEIR FIRE DEPARTMENT

If you had to choose between funding the fire department or the library, which would you choose?

That’s the question before voters in Airway Heights in this Aug. 1 primary election.

Currently, Airway Heights funds all city services — including the library, police and fire department — with a general property tax levy.

But the cost for all city services exceeds the amount collected in these taxes.

The Airway Heights Fire Department has borne the brunt, says Assistant Fire Chief Nate Whannell. The predominantly volunteer staff is struggling to respond to more emergency calls.

Over the last decade, while the city’s population has grown 35 percent, emergency medical calls have boomed 172 percent.

In an effort to respond, the city hired four full-time firefighters this year, Whannel says. However, these positions are currently funded out of reserves — the city’s savings account — which Whannel says is not sustainable.

In addition, the fire station — built in 1968 — is outdated. Despite 10 renovations over the decades, it’s no longer capable of serving the community or its firefighters.

“The station lacks adequate decontamination areas to wash off carcinogens and medical waste after calls, and station bays are too small to fit modern ladder trucks,” City Manager Albert Tripp said in a statement, adding that much of the time firefighters are working without air conditioning or heat.

To solve the problem, voters are being asked to consider two ballot measures that would, in effect, maintain library services, hire firefighters to respond to higher call volumes and replace the city’s fire station.

The first measure asks voters to approve joining the Spokane County Library District. The library is already unofficially part of the library district. But if voters approve officially joining the system, property taxes would go straight to the library, freeing up city dollars. Currently, the city pays about $370,000 a year to fund its library.

This freed up revenue would be used to maintain funding for the recently hired firefighters, Whannel says.

If approved by voters, the library measure would take effect in 2025 and cost the owner of a $300,000 home about $100 a year, says Patrick Roewe, executive director of the Spokane County District Library.

The second ballot measure asks voters to fund the renovation of a property to accommodate the fire station. Tripp says the city has signed an agreement to buy a building at 1149 S. Garfield Road in Airway Heights. If the bond is successful, the owner of a $300,000 home would pay about $111 a year, and the city will receive $1.3 million in grant money from the state to help pay for the purchase, saving taxpayers 15 percent of the cost, Tripp said.

To reduce impacts to taxpayers, Tripp says the city has staggered these requests. The bond would take effect in 2024 — one year before the library annexation.

Both the City Council and the library district’s board of trustees have unanimously supported the proposal, but the final decision remains with the voters of Airway Heights.

“It seems odd to talk about library and emergency services in the same sentence, but both are critical to the well-being of our growing community,” Tripp said. “One saves minds, and the other saves lives.” —

BEN VANDEHEY

THREE FOR THREE FORKS

In the most competitive Pullman mayoral race in decades, three candidates hope to take the lead and replace the Voice of the Cougs

BY SAMANTHA WOHLFEIL

It’s been a long time since Pullman saw a competitive mayoral race — the last time there was more than one candidate was 1999.

Current Mayor Glenn Johnson, the famous “Voice of the Cougs” who announces the Washington State University football games, has run unopposed for the role since 2003.

But with Johnson declining to run this year, there’s a rare opportunity to change the game in the college town.

In the Aug. 1 primary, three competitors are hoping to become the city’s star player. They include current City Council members Eileen Macoll and Francis Benjamin, and retired teacher Deb McNeil.

EILEEN MACOLL

Like many residents, it was WSU that first brought Macoll to Pullman as a student in 1973, before she got married and decided to stick around.

Over the years she’s worked as a real estate agent, theatrical scene painter, sales associate for Ace Hardware, horse trainer, and volunteer board member for various arts organizations.

Since 2015 she’s served on City Council, and says she’s ready for the next step.

“There’s so many things I can only do from the other chair,” Macoll says. “Although council determines policy, the mayor steers the ship.”

An issue she’d like to tackle is traffic on Grand Avenue, which, aside from Main Street, is the main drag. Traffic regularly backs up in the afternoons, and she wants the city’s engineering staff to try out different solutions such as timing the traffic lights differently.

“What we’ve got going now is not working. People get frustrated and run red lights, it’s scary,” Ma coll says. “Pedestrians perched on the street corner wondering when it’s their turn is not a welcoming way to say, ‘Hey! Come visit our downtown!’ We need to make that more welcoming.”

Macoll says she’s proud that the council recently implemented water con-

servation rules, which restrict automatic summer watering hours to three nights per week.

Water levels in the aquifer that serves Pullman, Moscow, and surrounding communities, are declining by about 0.7 feet per year, and Pullman is the largest water user. Macoll has been on the Palouse Basin Aquifer Committee for six years, working on long-term regional water planning.

She’d like the city to examine its urban growth area and promote low-income housing.

She also says the council could improve communication with residents and staff.

“We need to make our council meetings more inviting,” Macoll says, noting that as mayor she would also “make staff feel more comfortable in reaching out to individual council members.”

The city is currently revitalizing its downtown, and Macoll wants to work with property owners to see if they can fill empty buildings with tenants and businesses.

Macoll recognizes Johnson’s legacy — she saw hundreds gather at a recent Association of Washington Cities conference to hear Johnson speak, after chanting the Cougar fight song — and knows this will be a change for the city.

“That’s how well known his presence is and the love and support he has earned by all of that outreach he’s done,” Macoll says. “We’ve got this amazing base to start with.”

FRANCIS BENJAMIN

For more than three decades, Benjamin has worked at WSU, teaching real estate and designing psychology research.

Outgoing Pullman Mayor Glenn Johnson, aka the Voice of the Cougs.

He attended Moscow’s University of Idaho, and stayed in the area to raise his family with his wife.

He was a city council member from 2003 to 2015, and was elected again in 2021.

During his six-year break from council, Benjamin helped start Pullman 2040 to bring together community groups to create a vision for the future.

He says he realized that the city focused on things like infrastructure, safety and the library, but there was little planning for economic development, home affordability and the potential growing pains to come.

“I realized there really had not been any type of long-range vision planning for what we want our town to look like roughly 20 years from now,” Benjamin says. “What are the things Pullman currently has that we really like and want to be sure to maintain, and what don’t we have that we want to add?”

The group has identified more than 50 projects, ranging from environmental efforts to food security. Benjamin was proud to help with the inaugural Three Forks River and Arts Festival this spring, which nods to the town’s former name.

He hopes to see continued support for the expansion at the Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport, which Johnson helped lead the way on.

Benjamin is also proud of the city’s water conservation efforts, and converted his yard to native plants that don’t require watering.

His experience on the council and with Pullman 2040 has made him ready to lead the city.

“The mayor is the one managing city staff and needs to have connections and relationships in the community,” he says. “The work I’ve done with

Pullman 2040 has really laid that groundwork.”

He’d also like to acquire unused rail properties in town to expand the city’s playing fields and create a community event space supplementing the downtown improvements.

“I have been very active,” Benjamin says. “That really is an asset for me to be able to understand the varying needs of the community.”

DEB McNEIL

After attending WSU, McNeil taught for nearly four decades in the Pullman School District, starting out with elementary and middle school and later teaching at the high school.

During that time, she worked stints as a librarian and the middle school vice principal, and helped with administration.

She and her husband also owned Quilted Heart for 17 years, until cotton supply issues led them to close the shop in 2013.

“Of the three candidates, I’m the only one that had a brick-and-mortar store downtown,” McNeil says. “We certainly experienced everything a small business owner experiences: managing employees, business and occupation tax, insurance, and supply chains — even back then, the supply chains had issues.”

McNeil retired from teaching in 2014, and says she’s spent the last 9 years being a “nanna” to her grandchildren and extended family.

“We got to see how the city responds to children and working families,” McNeil says.

She’s seen great opportunities provided by parks and recreation and the library, but feels the city could better communicate with busy families so they have time to respond to issues they care about.

McNeil says she’s appreciated Johnson’s work on big vision projects, but as mayor she’d focus on building relationships with families and seniors.

“Eighty percent of the mayor’s job is to go out and listen to what people are saying,” McNeil says. “I can go to those places where the parents are. They have concerns, but they don’t have the time. I see myself as that sort of conduit.”

She suggests planning small events like block parties for people to get to know their neighbors.

“I’m very proactive in getting people to rethink: What is community? Getting to know all your neighbors, watching their back, helping somebody on your block,” McNeil says. “I know that’s hard to do sometimes, we’re such a transient community. … We go from 12,500 in the summer to 35,000 within two weeks in August” due to returning WSU students.

She agrees that Grand Avenue traffic needs to be addressed, and knows it contributes to the perception that the area is growing too big.

Water planning is her top priority.

“The number one way to kill your community is not to worry about the water,” McNeil says. “We have to have a managed growth plan.”

While downtown is under construction in coming years, she’d also like to work with landlords to ensure that businesses survive.

“I have absolutely no doubt that what I have done in the last 38 years of teaching is more than enough to prepare me for this mayor’s position,” McNeil says. “I’m a quick study. I could be ready to rock and roll that joint on whatever day in January they want me there.” n samanthaw@inlander.com

EILEEN MACOLL

DEB McNEIL

FRANCIS BENJAMIN

VISUALIZING THE VALLEY OF THE FUTURE

Three challengers for Spokane Valley City Council focus on business, community building and public safety

BY SAMANTHA WOHLFEIL

Three political newcomers hope to replace Spokane Valley City Council member Brandi Peetz, who isn’t seeking re-election, but only two will make it through the Aug. 1 primary election.

The candidates include Adam Smith, a business owner with three mixed martial arts studios in the county; Rachel Briscoe, co-owner of Briscoe Construction and the Ladies Business Community; and Jessica Yaeger, who works as a placement specialist for Angel Senior Care.

ADAM SMITH

After growing up in Spokane Valley, Smith worked various jobs, from plumbing to hotel desks, bootstrapping his way to opening his SMASH Brazilian Jiu Jitsu studios in Spokane Valley, Deer Park and Airway Heights.

Attending a Spokane Valley City Council meeting a few years ago encouraged him to run for office the first time. Black Lives Matter was starting to make ripples around the nation, and Smith says he realized he was one of the only diverse people in the room. (His dad is Black.)

“I dealt with a lot of different problems growing up as a mixed-race person in Spokane Valley,” Smith says. “As I got older I started to realize one of the things you needed to do as an adult is be a part of your community.”

The biggest issue he says got him interested in running for council is a lack of connection for various groups.

“They have poor representation that doesn’t allow us to get a more diverse group of voices heard,” says Smith, who also worked as a volunteer firefighter. “For 12 years as a fireman I saw people die, saw a lot of people on their worst day. I saw what grandma needs for services, what mentally unstable people need.”

He feels not many people on Spokane Valley City Council have that experience, which would inform his choices about homelessness and emergency services.

Above all, he hopes to build relationships.

“I know from starting a business when I was 23 years old, you never get a ‘Welcome,’” Smith says. “Some of that stuff I think I can break through with.”

He thinks that being a single adult, which enables his work running three gyms, will come in handy as he focuses on community leadership.

“I’m excited for that piece,” he says.

RACHEL BRISCOE

The construction company that Briscoe started with her husband focuses on remodeling. She helps with operations, training and logistics.

“We joke that I’m also the CEO of morale,” Briscoe says.

Previously, she ran residence halls on university campuses for about a decade. In 2018, she helped start the Ladies Business Community for women in Spokane and Kootenai counties to network.

Running for office is something she’s considered for years. After moving to the Spokane area about 12 years

ago, leadership training at Whitworth University helped guide her.

“A mentor posed a challenge to our cohort: What’s a leadership opportunity you’ve been saying no to that you need to say yes to?” Briscoe says. “I knew I wanted to get involved.”

So she started attending council meetings in fall 2022, and she quickly learned how much planning goes into things like traffic patterns.

“There are a lot of lights where, if you want to turn left, it’s a red arrow. But if no one’s coming it feels silly to sit there,” she says. “At a council meeting someone was talking about what goes into changing a red arrow to a blinking yellow arrow to yield to oncoming traffic. In my mind, it was, ‘Just change the light bulb.’ That is not how that works. It’s so much more complicated.”

She’d like to focus on improving “public safety and decency.”

“If you feel like you belong to a community and look out for your neighbor, you’re likely not to violate your neighbor,” she says.

Similar to Smith, Briscoe thinks City Council meet-

ings can be intimidating, as the public is allowed to comment, but council members don’t respond.

“There is a way to promote communication and decency in a meeting and still help people feel heard, or at least give people next steps,” Briscoe says.

She also hopes to help make businesses feel more welcome.

Between the three candidates, two are business owners and two are moms. She feels that being both sets her apart.

“I feel like with my life experience and where God’s brought me to this point, I can connect with a lot of different people, even if we have nothing in common,” Briscoe says.

JESSICA YAEGER

For more than two decades, Yaeger has worked in elder care, from ophthalmology (which largely focuses on eye issues that affect older people) to serving as the executive director of multiple memory care and assisted living facilities.

With experience running communities of more than 125 residents and 100 staff members, Yaeger says she feels she has already run a small city. She understands budgeting, staying updated on new laws, disciplining staff and understanding how to be a better leader.

Her family has deep roots in the Valley — Schafer Road was named after a relative — and while she recognizes that everything changes, she doesn’t feel it’s the same place she grew up in.

“Safety has been an issue in the front of my mind,” Yaeger says.

With her education and experience, Yaeger feels she can help address mental health and addiction, particularly as they relate to homelessness.

“Homelessness is a human issue, and we need to help them because they’re struggling,” Yaeger says. “We also need to make sure that their struggles don’t become our crime statistics.”

She doesn’t feel low barrier shelters are the answer, nor is housing people in hotels temporarily.

She wants to explore the pros and cons of forming a city police department, but emphasizes that she’s not advocating one way or the other.

“Is it going to cost us money or save us money?”

Yaeger says she’s a servant leader willing to do the same work as staff, which could set her apart in city leadership.

She’s also the Spokane chapter chair of parental rights group Moms for Liberty, and emphasizes that the group is nonviolent. She fought against mask mandates in schools during the pandemic and actively encourages people to hold conversations with those they disagree with. She believes it is parents’ God-given responsibility to raise children who will do good in the world.

“It is not the government’s responsibility to do that, and it is not their right to do that,” she says. n

ADAM SMITH

JESSICA YAEGER

RACHEL BRISCOE

Earn more on your liquid cash.

Mermaid You Look

The Spokane Merfolk Pod is making waves by bringing mermaid subculture to dry land

BY MADISON PEARSON

Some children want to be firefighters when they grow up. Others want to be doctors or rockstars. But not Cat Kailani.

Instead, she dreamed of becoming a mermaid.

“I’m from California,” Kailani says. “I grew up right by the beach, so becoming a mermaid was always meant to be.”

Today, Kailani’s childhood dream is a reality — she has a tail and a pod full of merfolk, friends and found family.

In 2020, Kailani discovered the mermaid community — people who dress up as merpeople — and sought out local mermaid wannabes to form her own pod in the Inland Northwest.

“I scrolled through #SpokaneMermaid on Instagram and started reaching out,” she says. “A lot of my friends started to move away from the area, so I was mainly looking for friends. We started with like four or five people coming to the meet-ups and swims; now we have about 25 people in the pod.”

The Spokane Merfolk Pod doesn’t just swim around in local lakes and pools, though that’s part of the fun. As of late, the pod has been attending events dressed as their “mersonas,” hosting mermaid storytimes at local bookstores and even making appearances at area renaissance fairs.

Wait, did you say mersona? Yes! Just like every individual has their own personality, each pod member has created a character to play while dressed in mermaid attire.

Kailani goes by Mermaid Izira, often donning a technicolor tail and a matching crown. The other pod members lovingly call her Captain.

Spokane Merfolk co-founder Chandler Dean’s mersona is Mermaid Minnow. She has an Instagram page (@MermaidMinnow) and a YouTube channel where she shows off her mermaid skills while making a splash in a bright green tail.

For Rose Brown, whose mersona is Maelstrom Ship-Breaker, a Russian mermaid known to pick on her podmates, an interest in mermaiding began as part of her health journey.

“I found out that I had a degenerative disorder so water therapy really helped my pain level,” Brown says. “So I said, screw it — if I’m gonna be in the water forever I’m gonna have fun with it. I always wanted to have a tail, anyway.”

Lauren Bolkovatz (Mermaid Karina), right, with Savannah Linjenquist (Mermaid Bubbles) during mermaid storytime at Auntie’s. YOUNG KWAK PHOTO

In less than a year, Brown lost 60 pounds by taking up mermaiding as a hobby.

“I cannot say enough wonderful things about the body positivity in the community,” Brown says. “We don’t care what you look like — I don’t care if you have an incredibly expensive tail or no tail at all. Everyone gets to be just as gorgeous and beautiful. There’s no such thing as the right body; put on a fish butt and have fun!”

In order to become a mermaid, one must first be an extremely strong swimmer.

“We take safety very seriously,” Kailani says. “A lot of people who are just starting out make mistakes that can be lifethreatening.”

One member of the pod, Laurel Radavich (Mermaid Nori), began her mermaiding journey on the wrong fin when she bought a starter tail from Wish.com.

The tail, which was made of non-waterproof fabric, became tangled in her feet and dragged her to the bottom of a lake. Luckily, she was able to kick it off, but she warns others to not make the same mistake that she did.

“I thought I was prepared,” Radavich says. “I practiced swimming with my feet tied together for a month.”

In order to decrease the likelihood of those scary experiences, Kailani is taking a certification course on mermaiding safety from the Professional Association of Diving Instructors.

In the course, she’ll learn about the physical properties of water and how it affects you while swimming as a mermaid along with safety skills that could save the lives of her podmates.

“Safety is really everyone’s first priority,” Kailani says. “I’m pretty lenient on most things — we love to have fun — but if you put yourself or anyone else in danger while swimming with us, you’re out for good. We’re lucky that most pools allow us to use mermaid tails, but other cities have banned tails completely because of people nearly drowning. If you’re not properly trained, you shouldn’t be putting on a tail.”

FOLLOW THE POD

Facebook: fb.com/spokanemerfolkpod

Instagram: @spokanemerfolkpod

Once a Spokane Merfolk Pod mentor deems someone a strong enough swimmer, they earn their tail.

For those who don’t have the financial means to buy their own tail, the pod has a number of loaners that are perfect for those just starting to ditch their sea legs.

“Things can get pretty expensive,” Kailani says. “We want to make it as accessible as possible.”

Silicone mermaid tails can run anywhere from $2,000 to $5,000 depending on the style, but you can snag a just-as-gorgeous scuba knit material tail for a little less than $300 if you’re just starting out.

Once you’re in a tail, borrowed or not, and making waves, the next most important step in mermaid training is to have fun.

When the pod isn’t busy making kids smile at mermaid story times or swimming in Lake Coeur d’Alene, they’re just hanging out as friends.

“As much as we love doing events, the pod is just as much a hobby as it is a social time for us,” Kailani says.

Whether they’re in the water or on dry land, pod members are laughing with one another and bantering back and forth. They joke about creating a mermaid stand-up comedy show as a side gig, and they’re always coming up with new ways to explain their legs to children who see them out of costume. Some even get involved in ocean conservation efforts.

“It’s so multifaceted beyond just, like, dressing up and swimming around,” Brown says. “It’s about making real-life connections and trying to make change, too.” n

THE BARBIE CINEMATIC UNIVERSE

With Barbie poised to be a blockbuster, we help Mattel write other toy movies

We’re all just Barbie girls in a Barbie world. Partly it’s because our blood is polluted with microplastics BUT ALSO because the new Barbie movie is set to be a boxoffice smash. The seemingly self-aware colorful comedy from writer/director Greta Gerwig (who’s yet to make a non-great movie) and featuring a wildly loaded cast (Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, Will Ferrell, Michael Cera, John Cena and tons more stars) should get audiences out in droves (with tons of film nerds doing the inherently amusing Barbie/Oppenheimer double feature).

It’s also totally fair if anyone feels repulsed by the Hollywood franchise machine mining low-hanging nostalgia for mass appeal. And it looks like that trend isn’t ending anytime soon. Because of the buzz Barbie has generated pre-release, Mattel reportedly has 45 movies based on its toys in the works. 45. FORTY-FIVE!

Sure, movies adapted from existing toy franchises are nothing new and occasionally great. The Lego Movie is legit one of the best films of the past decade, Clue is a cult classic, and this year’s Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves was a blast. But for every hit, there are a slew of misses. The G.I. Joe franchise, anyone? Also… THEY MADE A BATTLESHIP MOVIE.

So in order to save us from a cinematic hell of 45 Battleships, here are creative pitches for some of Mattel Cinematic Universe films that have already been announced. And, again, I must emphasize, these are all adaptations actually in the works. For real. These are happening.

BARNEY

The big purple dino’s big-screen adventure is being produced by Get Out star Daniel Kaluuya, so why not lean into a psychological horror aspect? Things go crazy when the greedy corporate execs want to stop paying the actors in the costumes and make a deal with a witch to have real talking dinosaurs. But the witch merely turns the actors into their characters, and Barney, Baby Bop and B.J. must figure out how to get their minds back into their human bodies while nobody treats their problem as real because of their cuteness. “I love you / You trapped me…”

POLLY POCKET

A mix of Fantastic Voyage and Toy Story, the tiny Polly Pockets are actually alive and when their benevolent creator falls ill, the miniature gals must venture into the human body to try to cure the ailment and save Polly Pockets from going the way of the dodo.

BY SETH SOMMERFELD

THE BUZZ BIN

ROCK ’EM SOCK ’EM ROBOTS

Am I crazy or didn’t we already make this movie? Real Steel? The 2011 Hugh Jackman fighting robots movie? Anybody? Anybody? (Just rerelease it and see if anyone notices.)

UNO

The Muppets : Muppet Babies :: Rounders : Uno

MAGIC 8 BALL

Another obvious horror film. A group of ragtag teens stumble across a cursed Magic 8 Ball at a thrift store that actually works. Anytime they ask it a yes-or-no question and give it a shake, its response will happen… but with monkey paw-like results. Will my crush ask me to prom… “Without a doubt”... where the scaffolding will fall and crush you both. Will my parents ever get off my back… “Signs point to yes”... as they are framed for a gruesome murder committed by a crazed man trying to get the 8 ball back. “Outlook not so good” indeed.

AMERICAN GIRL

When rowdy boys in the neighborhood overrun the treehouse of two BFFs, the young ladies must do a Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure-esque journey through time to recruit an elite team of American girls to help take back their clubhouse.

VIEW-MASTER

A single photographer shot every picture for all the View-Master slide wheels, and we follow him on his oddball adventures. Obviously, Wes Anderson directs.

BETSY WETSY

Just a straight-up adaptation of comedian Sarah Silverman’s memoir, The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee. (Because I am terrified of other potential directions a movie about a pissing doll could take.)

THOMAS THE TANK ENGINE

All I know is this should be written incharacter by Lemon, Brian Tyree Henry’s Thomas-obsessed assassin from Bullet Train

MATCHBOX

Turn the tiny toy cars into the Fast and Furious franchise but for kids (i.e., you have to make it more intelligent and less cartoonish). n

Barbie opens in theaters on July 21.

VOTE RIGHT MEOW!

Exercise your democratic right and make sure your voice is heard, not only in the upcoming local primary election, but for another important matter: the Inlander’s COVER PET PHOTO CONTEST! Voting is live through midnight on Sunday, July 23, at pets.inlander. com. After receiving hundreds of adorable and heartwarming submissions from community members last month, our judges were put to the very tough task of picking just five finalists in each of 15 categories. From Sweet Seniors to Rescue Rascals, and the coveted Best in Show — the winner of which will be on the cover! — finalists’ photos and stories are sure to soften even the hardest of hearts. Then, pick up our Aug. 10 Pet Issue. (CHEY SCOTT)

BOOTS IS BACK

After a slightly dramatic exit from its longtime home on West Main Avenue late last year, vegan cafe BOOTS BAKERY & LOUNGE’S future was unknown. While finalizing plans for a new permanent location inside the Saranac Commons — just across the street from Boots’ old digs — owner Alison Collins moved food production to a commercial kitchen inside the Thrive Center, a former hotel now used for transitional refugee housing. Although it took a little longer than envisioned to restart Boots’ daily operations inside the Commons, the bakery at last reopened to the public last week, and is reported to have sold out of food well before closing time for several days, thanks to an outpouring of support. Boots is open Mon-Sat from 7 am-7 pm, Sun from 7 am-5 pm. (CHEY SCOTT)

THIS WEEK’S PLAYLIST

Noteworthy new music arriving in stores and online on July 21.

BARBIE: THE ALBUM. Fittingly the new summer blockbuster features a stacked fem soundtrack which includes Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, Charli XCX, Nicki Minaj, Ice Spice and more.

BLUR, THE BALLAD OF DARREN. Damon Albarn takes a break from playing cartoons with Gorillaz to reunite his standout Britpop group for its first LP in eight years. (SETH SOMMERFELD)

GRETA VAN FLEET, STARCATCHER. The young Michigander rock titans take on a raw, psychedelic tone for Starcatcher, straying away from the classic rock sound that defined the band’s early albums. (MADISON PEARSON)

Beneath the Surface

Sarah Conover’s Set Adrift documents a tragic accident at sea and the grief that followed for those left ashore

BY SUMMER SANDSTROM

Unforeseen and tumultuous, 70mph winds and 40-foot-tall waves brought the newly built, agile sailing yacht Revonoc down to the bottom of the Bermuda Triangle in 1958, where it has remained undiscovered ever since.

Harvey Conover Sr. was at the helm, cruising through the tropical waters on a New Year’s escapade with a friend, his wife, their son Larry and daughter-in-law Lori on board. Their families were left shattered after their disappearance.

“When a ship goes down, it’s only the hull and the bodies that vanish, and everyone ends up circling the absence,” says Sarah Conover, Spokane-based author of Set Adrift: A Mystery and a Memoir – My Family’s Disappearance in the Bermuda Triangle, which documents the known details of the infamous accident and its impact on Conover and her family.

Conover was only 18 months old when the Revonoc — Conover spelled backwards — fell victim to the whirlwind storm. She and her sister Aileen subsequently lived with her father’s sister Fran, her husband Dick, and their children Rick and Carolyn.

Growing up, Conover’s family never spoke of the tragic accident or held a memorial for their vanished relatives, yet

curiosity prompted her to spend a decade investigating the accident and interviewing family members about her parents and grandparents.

“The funny thing about early childhood loss is you can’t mourn what you don’t know,” she says. “You have to spiral back in to find out what some part of you knows.”

Conover didn’t originally plan to write a memoir, but as she uncovered more stories about her family, the book began to write itself.

“When I wrote the first paragraph, and really the first line, it was like, oh, there was a lot of energy behind this, this story wants to be written,” she says. “It pulled me along for the most part.”

While a tragedy of that magnitude may bring some families together, Conover says it blew hers apart, and it took talking about the past and her writing the memoir to bring them together.

“It was a gradual opening to see that it was more of a ‘we-moir’ than ‘a me-moir,’ and that tragedy at that level affects a lot of people,” she says. “You see that yours was only one small part of it.”

As she wrote Set Adrift, Conover realized how dangerous tragedy can be, and how the grief her relatives experienced im-

pacted their perceptions of different events and relationships.

“Story is how we give our lives meaning, but here are all these people telling stories about each other, giving their lives meaning in a way that might not have been very kind to the other people,” Conover says. “But it was the only way they sort of knew what to do with their suffering.”

It was eye opening to Conover and her family to hear each other’s stories from perspectives outside of their own, she says, and while writing she wanted to weave together a universal narrative that wasn’t solely about herself so that readers could relate to the overlying theme of Set Adrift.

“That’s kind of one of the themes of the book, that everybodys got a story, and maybe none of them are totally true,” she says.

Conover organized Set Adrift into short chapters with brief excerpts from interviews, news clippings documenting the accident and succinct definitions of words such as “orphan,” which became another theme interwoven throughout Set Adrift

“I could see the patterns that were established,” she says. “I say orphan is not just a noun, it’s a verb. That’s how we survive. We orphan other people — that’s how we stay safe.”

To Conover, it was also important to create something beautiful with Set Adrift She also teaches writing workshops, such as a recent session titled “Bitterness: On Finding the Language for Loss and Love,” in which she guided participants through writing about grief.

While the Revonoc has never been found, an upcoming episode of the History Channel series The Bermuda Triangle: Into Cursed Waters documents a monthslong search for the wreckage and includes films, photos, and interviews with Conover and her sister about their family.

Conover says she didn’t have a desire to find the wreckage until recently, when she learned the Revonoc model that never returned was made by a different builder, raising questions about possible construction errors causing the yacht not to be able to escape the violent waters.

“To me, it’s not a mystery,” Conover says of the accident. “But I am curious now whether or not it was a mechanical failure.”

While Conover notes that Set Adrift may not be the easiest or most enjoyable read, she hopes it reminds readers that tragedy and grief should bring us together, not separate us.

“I think if you’ve been exposed to trauma and you’re willing to kind of stick with that, there’s kind of a beautiful redemption at the end,” she says. n

Writing to Wisdom, Writing to Wonder: A Weekend Memoir Workshop • Sat, July 29 and Sun, July 30 from 10 am-4 pm

Retreat Center

Conover’s parents were lost at sea in 1958.

SLICE OF LIFE

Three local chefs dish on their relationship with cookbooks, snapshots of our ever-changing relationship with food and culture

Cookbooks contribute to an overall narrative about humans, but also to the individual story of the person who bought or was gifted the book.

Forty years ago, recalls chef Laurent Zirotti, he was asked if he was familiar with James Beard, whose legacy includes 20-plus cookbooks, the earliest televised cooking shows and a posthumous foundation that has redefined culinary industry standards through its namesake awards program. He was 19 years old and a recent arrival to San Francisco from France.

“I was like, ‘James Beard? I don’t know that guy,’” says Zirotti, who, in 2017, was a James Beard Award semifinalist for the Best Chef: Northwest category. He smiles at the irony.

But Zirotti was curious and aspirational, so he bought James Beard’s American Cookery, a hefty tome with 1,500 recipes but no pictures. Zirotti was underwhelmed, he says, and shelved the book.

Short, funny story. Now for the twist.

Since closing his popular Fleur de Sel restaurant in Post Falls, which Zirotti and his wife, Patricia, ran from 2008 to 2021, he’s been an instructor for Community

BY CARRIE SCOZZARO

Colleges of Spokane’s culinary program.

“I had a student this quarter that is very engaged in food, is very passionate about it, and asked [a lot of] questions,” explains Zirotti. So he gave that student American Cookery and told him, “You are James Beard material.”

Cookbooks make good gifts that way, reflecting who we are or could be in relation to food.

When one of my high school art students became pregnant her senior year, I gave her the Betty Crocker cookbook I’d inherited from my mother. The book was dog-eared and stained with evidence of two generations of women — soon to be three generations — navigating the path to adulthood from cookies to casseroles. I treasured it, but I’d moved on to different relationships with food and cooking.

Now Betty Crocker’s recipes and a zillion other howtos can be found online, yet cookbooks endure, amounting to a roughly $20 million industry. Is it the pretty pictures? The immediacy of pages you can quickly flip to? Or that they’re bona fide in a way that online content might not be?

All of those things are important, says Michelle Ho, whose culinary experience includes a stint as pastry chef with the Davenport Hotels, as well as Rind and Wheat. She was included in Ari Nordhagen’s The Spokane Cookbook with a recipe Ho sometimes serves at Feast World Kitchen.

Ho is in her late 20s and has never not known smartphones or the internet, even in her native Hong Kong, which has been less restricted on the web than the rest of China. And although she watches a lot of cooking videos, like those from YouTube chef SingSingKitchen, she prefers the chef’s physical cookbook, which is easier to follow and more detailed.

“I still like cookbooks more than the phone,” Ho says, pulling several of them out of her bag during our interview. Each offers a snapshot of her personal and professional evolution.

Inspired by a visit to Paris, Ho bought Christopher Felder’s bright pink hardcover, Patisserie: Mastering the Fundamentals of French Pastry and cooked her way through COVID.

Kenmizaki Satomi’s Oishisa No Kotsu Ga Hitome De

Michelle Ho finds physical cookbooks an ideal format for culinary inspiration. ERICK DOXEY PHOTO

Wakaru Kihon No Ryoì Ri is from Ho’s brief time attending language school in Japan. Translating the title to mean “something like Japanese basic home cooking,” Ho says it helped her understand both Japanese writing and customs.

Cookbooks are “a really good tool to connect to different cultures, even if you don’t know the language,” Ho says.

When her husband and fellow CCS graduate, Sebastian Zowal, wanted to cook authentic Chinese food, Ho suggested All Under Heaven by food scholar Carolyn Phillips. It’s a deep dive into 35 of China’s distinct culinary traditions, which is not typical for cookbooks by Chinese authors, Ho says.

“Sometimes I feel in China people really don’t really want to share a recipe to people, especially industry people,” says Ho, who learned to cook by watching her mother and grandmother, neither of whom wrote anything down or used conventional measurements.

Ho is hoping to add one more book to her library: the recipes written by her grandfather, also a pastry chef. For now, they exist in digital images on her cell phone, but Ho hopes to make the information more permanent, maybe even share them with others as a way of preserving her culture.

“I don’t want any good recipes to get lost,” she says.

Maren Scoggins feels the same way about recipes for ice cream and other sweet treats she created in 2016 as chef-owner of Abi’s Ice Cream. Even before she closed the downtown Coeur d’Alene venue in 2022, Scoggins was at work on Abi’s Ice Cream: The Cookbook.

“I wanted people to be able to do this at home,” Scoggins says. “Ice cream is easy to make, but it seems like it’s really magical.” And when you make ice cream, she says, it becomes part of a good memory.

Scoggins’ memories from 10 to 15 years ago when she discovered Food & Wine magazine recipes have shaped how she approached making ice cream and the recipes she still favors.

They focused on fewer but elevated ingredients, says Scoggins, who also really likes The French Laundry Cookbook by celebrated chef Thomas Keller featuring recipes from his eponymous — and consistently Michelin-starred — restaurant. Keller’s Ad Hoc at Home, she says, is a little more accessible to the average cook.

“The food was just phenomenal,” Scoggins says. “It was so simple and so that’s really kind of where it got me on this track of simple, quality ingredients that really get the best tasting food.”

Scoggins emulated that approach when making ice cream for Abi’s.

“Every ice cream has the base of just five ingredients [of] cream, milk, egg, sugar, and kosher salt,” she explains. After that, Scoggins gets creative with flavor profiles. A vegetarian Indian cookbook in her collection, for example, inspired both a curry and a chai ice cream for Abi’s.

Inspiration is also what motivates Zirotti to pick up a cookbook, and that can be from images but also the serendipity of flipping through the book’s pages.

Although he still has a typewritten, mimeographed collection of French classic recipes he acquired as a 15-yearold aspiring chef — the proportions are spot on, he says — Zirotti is always on the lookout for new cookbooks.

Right now, he’s keen to buy J. Kenji López-Alt’s The Food Lab. As he gets older and has transitioned from chef to instructor, Zirotti wants to better understand the science behind the ingredients and dishes he and his students create.

“At 60 years old I’m still learning,” he says. “I mean, this is fantastic. I still am excited about opening a book and reading through it.” n

Cillian Murphy is the Bomb

Reflecting on the unique and fascinating career of the Oppenheimer star

BY JASON BAXTER

In Christopher Nolan’s upcoming biopic Oppenheimer, Irish actor Cillian Murphy has top-billing as the titular nuclear physicist whose atomic bomb innovations with the Manhattan Project have reverberated throughout mankind’s psyche, warfare and politics for seven decades and counting. It’s a rare star turn for Murphy, an excellent actor who has stuck mostly to supporting roles throughout his quarter-century-long career. Will Oppenheimer be his moment of triumph or will the film (and Murphy’s possible awards consideration) detonate on impact?

Murphy first broke through as a leading man in 2002’s apocalyptic thriller 28 Days Later. His performance displayed many of the qualities that would come to define his onscreen persona in the years to follow — a haunted sense that radiates from behind his sky blue eyes and an unusual vulnerability that nonetheless doesn’t preclude convincing outbursts of violence. Murphy bares it all, literally, in his introduction on screen, as exposed to an audience as an actor could possibly be. There’s a transcendent moment of more emotional nakedness in the third act, when Jim, bound, bleeding and emaciated, catches a fleeting glimpse of an overhead jet plane, providing a brief glimmer of hope. In this wordless moment, Murphy’s distinctive eyes do all the work. It’s the crystalline instant where you could tell the man can hold the screen, whether on your smartphone or in an IMAX auditorium.

Murphy has the role of a lifetime in Oppenheimer.

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Sometimes Murphy embodies an unnerving creep, and sometimes he gives off the vibe of a dude in serious need of a hug, but both spring from the same well. Despite his strong efforts, that seminal turn-of-the century horror film didn’t herald Murphy’s anointment as a capital-M Movie Star, and it’s not hard to see why. He’s overwhelmed by the movie’s noise (both figurative and in the form of its confrontationally low-tech visuals), its reinvigoration of the zombie genre (they run now!), and the War on Terror geopolitical real-world horrors that swirled around its release. Speaking of context, the scene where Murphy’s humble bicycle courier Jim wakes up from a coma to a near-empty London ravaged by a deadly contagion might be a little… difficult… to revisit in 2023. Jim is confronted by a world infected by rage. Sound familiar?

After that breakthrough film, the template was set and his modest-but-prolific career was off to the races. In subsequent years he would play second, third or fourth fiddle in films from auteurs like Wes Craven and Anthony Minghella.

He regained his blockbuster footing as a villain in 2005’s Batman Begins, the first of many collaborations with Christopher Nolan that have now culminated in this critical career junction. His Jonathan Crane (aka the Scarecrow) was a true sicko, all spindly frame and vocal tics. But his portrayal would inevitably be overshadowed by the two endlessly quotable and bombastic villain performances of Nolan’s subsequent Dark Knight film series (Heath Ledger’s Oscar-winning tour de force as the Joker and Tom Hardy’s eloquent and distinctively accented terrorist Bane). Nolan clearly saw something in Murphy, initially casting him after the actor failed his audition for the lead role of the Caped Crusader. (You can find clips of his screen test online — he would have made a perfectly tormented Bruce Wayne, but an unconvincing Batman.) The director keenly deployed Murphy’s singular, wounded magnetism in later work together, but the thespian remained relegated to the supporting column: Always the bridesmaid, never the bomb-dropping bride.

One gets the sense that when Murphy really came into his own as a pseudo-household name — the kind that even casual media consumers revere and boomer moms swoon over — was when he starred as Thomas Shelby in the BBC/Netflix period gangster drama Peaky Blinders. The show indulged in Murphy’s capacity for evincing malevolence and “there’s something off about this guy” energy. Blinders ran for six critically acclaimed seasons and — fun fact for your next pub trivia night — the show marked the fourth occasion to date that Murphy has shared the screen with the aforementioned Tom Hardy. (If you can name the other three off the top of your head, the next round’s on me.)

Now, Murphy’s finally being offered his overdue stab at the A-list. He’s almost too perfectly cast in the role of one of history’s most controversial figures, with his shocking resemblance to the scientist himself — he has the thousand-yard stare and gaunt features, and an innate knack for subtly expressing a well of conflict bubbling beneath the surface like so many colliding atoms.

The biggest obstacle standing in his way is a certain platinum blonde Jill of All Trades whose also-eponymous film opens on the same day. It’s the kind of major studio counterprogramming that gets film dork’s tongues wagging and stands as one of the biggest cinematic clashes of titans in recent memory. Maybe there won’t be any Mutually Assured Destruction, as the memes about Oppenheimer/Barbie double-features have been flooding social media for almost a year now. Maybe we can collectively celebrate the possible renewal of theatrical box office success, even if it means a little atomic exposure to naked capitalism and world-ending crucibles. Either way, I’ll be rooting for both Barbie and Murphy, whether he’ll prove to be death, the destroyer of ticket sales or not. n

Oppenheimer opens in theaters on July 21.

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LANTERN THEATER

by Time, by Theater, or Movie

BY CHASE HUTCHINSON

Who is Barbie? Why is Barbie? And Ken? Well, he’s just Ken. But more importantly, what is Barbie?

Yes, it is a movie that has become one of the year’s most anticipated big releases with ubiquitous trailers and marketing giving way to memes galore getting in on the fun. But who is the Barbie behind this Barbiemania? Both a beloved toy and a huge brand, she has become an integral part of growing up with her many contradictions still on full display in stores across America. She is built to be aspirational, having more jobs than most anyone would know what to do with, but also unattainable, a perfect version of what it means to be a woman in the eyes of Mattel.

The latest film from director Greta Gerwig — who previously did great work on 2017’s Lady Bird and 2019’s Little Women (that now seems quaint in comparison to this) — makes this persona her point of entry and draws from many a past film as a means by which to explore this. In a script she co-wrote with partner Noah Baumbach (whose recent absurdist cinematic adaptation White Noise would make for a fascinating double feature with this), the humor all stems from the light deconstructions of the doll and all she has come to represent. The film is playfully humorous and often quite sharp, with many brief asides suddenly cutting deeper into more intriguing thematic territory, though Barbie remains oddly restrained. Its loving visual references just leave you wishing you were watching those other films. It’s at its best in the beginning and the end, but the movie is undone by a middle section where gags give way to convention that constrains any attempts at subversiveness.

return to a standardly shot and constructed comedy.

Much of the trouble with Barbie comes from the way the film has tried to oversell itself. Many of the best jokes and even entire sequences have been revealed before the film was even released. While there are other structural issues, on a pure question of the experience’s entertainment value, there was far too little withheld for the film itself that ought to have been. While watching it, save for a few moments toward the end, you feel like you’ve already seen it. The majority of what you haven’t viewed in ads and trailers feels broadly sketched.

Rated PG-13

Directed by Greta Gerwig

Starring Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, Will Ferrell

Some of this is by design, as the fantasy world of Barbieland gets juxtaposed with our human world, but much of this is rather scattered in a way that lessens the impact of the journey.

Fighting this battle against convention is the so-called “stereotypical” Barbie, perfectly played with a mixture of sincerity crossed with a somberness by Margot Robbie, who begins having an existential crisis and can no longer live amongst the other Barbies. She then sets out with a stowaway Ken, embodied by a fully committed Ryan Gosling, to go to the real world to find out the origin of her discontent and return to her beloved Barbieland restored. The film’s formal interests can be summed up with a brief reference to Jacques Tati’s delightful 1967 film PlayTime that quickly passes as we

Namely, there is some breaking of the fourth wall that attempts to have an earned go at everything from Mattel to the patriarchy itself that Barbie and Ken learn about in the real world. With Will Ferrell doing his predictable shtick as Mattel’s buffoonish CEO, it is hard not to think of The Lego Movie, as he plays a similar character in both self-reflexive films. Each acknowledges how they’re extensions of a brand and bring a healthy animosity to that with key moments in Barbie feeling like they might be pushing us somewhere a bit more challenging. Ken’s story is where this is most in action, but it also sees the film increasingly pull its punches.

This occurs in a manner that was to be expected while also in ways that were not, with a fun vulgarity from an underutilized character that is literally censored by a Mattel logo capturing the film’s general ethos. Does this constitute one more self-aware gag or is it genuinely about protecting the brand so we focus on other superficial references? Forget it, Ken. It’s Barbieland.

While colorful, Barbie never reaches its full satirical potential.

‘I’M NOT A COWBOY, I’M A COWBOY SINGER’

The hard work and hard times of Charley Crockett

BY ELISSA BALL

Crockett has a style all his own.

Charley Crockett is almost always working.

“I play two or three times the amount of shows of any of my contemporaries, year in year out,” the folk country singer tells me over the phone. “I’m not even talking shit. It’s just true.”

He’s not complaining either.

“I’m much more comfortable on the road than I am off the road,” says the Texas-born musician who even has a song titled “I’m Workin’.”

In his earlier days, the self-described “well-traveled man” built up his performance muscles by playing acoustic guitar on street corners in New Orleans and under bridges and in subway cars in New York.

“You know, I walked across America,” Crockett says.

For 10 years he thumbed rides, hopped trains, and worked on cannabis farms in Northern California (before the state declared the plant legal). Crockett’s adventures with guitar weren’t limited to the U.S. either. He strummed his six-string in Spain and Morocco, played coffee houses in Denmark, busked in Paris for a year.

He’s been everywhere, man.

The prolific singer —

with about a dozen albums to his name since 2015 — has been receiving increased attention over the past three-or-so years. Fellow Texan Willie Nelson (!) phoned Crockett in 2022 to deliver words of praise (!!) and an invitation to join Nelson on some of his Outlaw Music Festival Tour dates (!!!). Of course Crockett accepted. The Americana Music Association already named Crockett Emerging Act of the Year in 2021, and this year he’s up for three Americana awards.

Even outside of the outsider country sphere, ears are perking up. This April, Crockett sat at The Daily Show news desk and explained to guest host Jordan Klepper, “I’m not a cowboy, I’m a cowboy singer. And I just wanna keep singin’ my cowboy songs. And they might sound a lil’ different than some of the old boys.”

It’s easy to mistake Crockett for a rope-riding cowboy. He exclusively dresses in vintage Western wear: Pearl-snap shirts and ’70s blazers, fringed leather jackets, requisite cowboy boots and cowboy hat — or the occasional trucker cap. He accessorizes with chunky silver rings, a big rodeo buckle and maybe smoky sunglasses.

...continued on next page

BOBBY COCHRAN PHOTO

GIVE GUIDE

MUSIC | COUNTRY

“‘I’M NOT A COWBOY, I’M A COWBOY SINGER’,” CONTINUED...

Given his vintage wardrobe, cowpoke sound of yesteryear, and straight-out-of-1964 album art, it’s also easy to mistake Crockett’s work as simply plucked from the past. The first time his tunes graced my ears, I had the same shocked response as when I first heard Amy Winehouse on the radio: “Wait, this is a contemporary singer?! No way!”

Though Crockett’s reverence for dusty country and western records is evident in his sonic and visual style, he’s no ultra-nostalgic traditionalist.

“The idea of the good old days, it’s kind of a myth,” Crockett declares. Though he knows he’s “obviously associated with country music,” he’s not cosplaying a cowboy or viewing a bygone era uncritically. Crockett’s a widely traveled man of this time, in creative conversation with the past while expressing his honest feelings and personal experiences.

Far from a country purist, Crockett applauds artists who’ve stirred up the genre. Two aspects of country music appeal to him most: “I like how innovative they really were,” he says. “Waylon [Jennings] was taking the George-Jones-style country, and he was blending it with the R&B and soul music of the time and mashing them together.”

“All of that stuff is considered classic country gold, you know, of the highest order. But at the time, it was not seen that way. It was very controversial,” says Crockett. “It was confusing to… traditional-minded people. Same thing with Hank Williams.”

Crockett’s love of blending styles shines through his own sound: With his agile backing band, border-town brass melds with honky-tonk piano. Tumbleweed-strewn gunslinger ballads mix with Bayou jazz. When it comes to genres and subgenres, Charley sees no fences.

The second thing Crockett likes most about country music is its storytelling custom. Specifically, he’s drawn to the Southern Gothic style, which he says “would be more like something you would see from Bobbie Gentry [“Ode to Billie Joe”] or a lot of those writers like Faulkner… or Flannery O’Connor.”

Crockett’s distinct spin on Southern Gothic storytelling is evident in his narrative-rich albums studded with pain and heavy themes. Three LPs in particular come to mind:

 THE VALLEY (2019)

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Completed just before undergoing two emergency open-heart surgeries, Crockett opens with the expository line, “I’m from San Benito, Texas,” in a title track that paints a Southern landscape with details like “sugarcane and cotton” located “down a dirty, dusty road” while confronting the “darkness” and “trouble” at play, too.

 WELCOME TO HARD TIMES (2020)

Another story-heavy album with Southern Gothic themes, the album’s songs are further enlivened by cinematic, interrelated music videos that depict dream-like desert scenes, cryptic characters, and a symbolic, recurring rotary telephone.

 THE MAN FROM WACO (2022)

The album title alone evokes a legendary tale — and Crockett brings the storytelling to match.

Spokane showgoers have the chance to witness Crockett’s powerful stage presence on July 21 when he plays the Fox Theater. With a playful wink and sparkle-in-his-eye quip, the sharply aware former busker can win over an audience in no time — just ask anyone who caught his high-energy performance at the Knitting Factory in 2022. While Crockett’s having fun on stage and lifting spirits, he also consistently maintains a solemn respect for the depth of sorrow in his songs — both covers and originals — and the very real suffering rooted in the “uniquely American folk” music he loves.

When I ask what instrument sounds saddest to his ear, Crockett contemplates and finally responds, “the human voice.” He tells me that the night before we chatted, a 1971 recording of the gospel song “There’s A Man Going Around Taking Names” brought him to tears as he listened — all alone, on his first Canadian tour — to the voices and claps of the rural Georgia congregation. Crockett uses his own deep voice to create a temporary shelter where people — especially outsiders and hard-working folks — can rest their worries. It’s a role he treats as much as a sacred duty as a mere profession.

Crockett has known hard luck and hard times intimately. His rocky road to bigger spotlights has been pocked by challenges and grief, yet he’s kept up courage to do things his own way. On The Daily Show, he admitted, “I’ve made a habit of telling record executives to, you know, kiss my behind.” But in his heavy-touring lifestyle — which he says is still “so much easier than when I played subway cars” — there’s also softness and bliss.

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On New Year’s Day of this year, Crockett became engaged to Taylor Grace, his “girl” of three years. Grace, a wardrobe stylist (who specializes in vintage!), was the one who turned him on to Flannery O’Connor. She also appeared in his Welcome to Hard Times music videos. “Taylor Grace, I knew I loved you the moment I laid eyes on you darlin’,” Charley wrote in his Instagram engagement announcement. The two now share a home base in Austin, as well as a long-haired chihuahua named Billie.

Though Crockett’s clearly at home on the road, it’s heart-warming to know that this hardworking showman who holds and reflects so much pain for strangers indeed has a love-filled nest under the bright stars of Texas, a private place where — when he’s ready — he can hang his (cowboy) hat, rest his head, and even cuddle a small dog.

As he describes these domestic scenes, his song “Don’t Cry” flashes through my mind. On the tune, Crockett warns his romantic interest, “I can’t stand it, but leaving is my business,” but then immediately assures her, “Because I love you / I’m always coming back home.” n

Charley Crockett, Drayton Farley • Sat, July 21 at 8 pm • $30-$55 • The Fox Theater • 1001 W. Sprague Ave. • foxtheaterspokane.org

An Uneasy Reunion

More than 40 years in, punk powerhouse the Circle Jerks still gets

wild in the streets

BY DAN NAILEN

There’s an old cliche that “everyone will be worldfamous for 15 minutes.” Punk band the Circle Jerks turned that idea on its head. The group took just 15 minutes to deliver 14 songs on its 1980 debut album, making themselves punk legends in the process — legends that are still stirring up mosh pits across the country 43 years later.

That album, Group Sex, sparked the most recent reunion of the Los Angeles band for a tour to celebrate its 40th anniversary in 2020. COVID, of course, delayed the tour a bit, but now singer Keith Morris, guitarist Greg Hetson, bassist Zander Schloss and new drummer Joey Castillo are on the road delivering sets laced with Group Sex songs that still resonate with anti-authority fury: “Deny Everything,” “Back Against the Wall,” “Live Fast Die Young,” “World Up My Ass.” On Saturday, July 22, Circle Jerks will rip through songs from Group Sex and their other albums at the Knitting Factory.

Morris says that while the touring life is a bit rougher than the old days when adrenaline (among other things) kept his engine revving through endless van rides and late

nights, there’s really no other option for a punk-rock lifer.

“There is no retirement plan,” Morris says, joking that the guys in the band are “older, grumpier, grouchier, and whine a lot more.”

“I’m going to be 68 years old in a couple of months, and people want to know what that’s like, and there’s some ups and downs. There are some difficulties. Being diabetic, a lot of times I find myself in situations where I don’t get to make healthy choices when it comes to the food I’m consuming. I find my glucose levels going up and down like a rollercoaster. It gets scary.”

The danger of an inconsistent diet is not exactly the kind of danger Morris is best known for creating. As cofounder of Black Flag and then Circle Jerks, Morris was at the center of the Southern California punk scene in the late 1970s and early ’80s. Shows by those bands and their peers in the Minutemen, the Weirdos, Saccharine Trust and others were often hit-and-run affairs staged in nontraditional venues to stay one step ahead of local police looking to crack down on the scene. And even when the cops didn’t show up to harass them, the punk community was more than capable on its own of turning a show into a chaotic scene of smashed bottles, bruised bodies and destroyed spaces.

Morris recounted the early days of West Coast punk in remarkably vivid and entertaining detail in his 2016 book, My Damage: The Story of a Punk Rock Survivor, including his split from Black Flag and joining forces with Hetson to start the Circle Jerks. It’s a story that shows how insular and incestuous the scene was in the early days. Morris came from Black Flag. Hetson left Redd Kross to join him in Circle Jerks, and also joined Bad Religion during the Circle Jerks’ 1980s run, juggling both bands for several years. Schloss joined Circle Jerks a few years into their run after doing a little acting, including in cult classic Repo Man — a movie the Circle Jerks also appeared in before Schloss joined the band.

The Circle Jerks grew in popularity thanks to the skate and surf communities embracing albums like Wild

in the Streets (1982) and Golden Shower of Hits (1983), but relationships among the band members cracked over divided loyalties with members’ other bands, substance abuse and frustrations with a failed major-label deal that resulted in the band’s 1995 album Oddities, Abnormalities and Curiosities. While Morris is proud of most of the Circle Jerks’ albums, he sees that one as a disaster.

“That record never should have been made,” Morris says. “It was just rushed. We didn’t have any songs. I guess that was our version of [the Sex Pistols’] Great Rock ’n’ Roll Swindle. Just take the money and make a recording. It was really short-sighted. There was no reason for us to make that record. It was, ‘Let’s hurry up and make it, I have a Bad Religion tour to go on. I’ve got a Sweet and Low Orchestra (one of Schloss’s other bands) tour to go on. Let’s hurry up and make this because tax season is coming.’”

The band splintered, seemingly for good, just three weeks into the tour for that album, but they’d occasionally re-form for tours up until 2011, when attempts to make a new Circle Jerks album broke down over the classic “creative differences.” Morris says the other guys didn’t want to work with a young producer he trusted, so he left Circle Jerks behind and started a new band, Off!. Every now and then Circle Jerks would get an offer to reform — including, Morris says, $200,000 for a 45-minute set at Coachella — but he couldn’t stomach the idea of working with Hetson and Schloss again. That started to change as the 40th anniversary for Group Sex approached.

“I had a bunch of free time, and I said to myself, ‘I need to get over this hurt. I need to get over this hatred. They are my friends, no matter how I was treated by them. I’m just going to have to swallow my pride and push my ego aside,’” Morris says. “And here we are, coming up to play, and it will be great.” n

Circle Jerks, Negative Affect, Scowl • Sat, July 22 at 8 pm • $30 • Knitting Factory • 919 W. Sprague Ave. • sp.knittingfactory.com

Old punks are still punks. ATIBA JEFFERSON PHOTO

JAZZ + R&B + REGGAE TROMBONE SHORTY ALT-ROCK INCUBUS

To be blunt: You simply won’t find a more stacked lineup for a single concert in Spokane this year than the four-act bill of Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue, Ziggy Marley, Mavis Staples and Robert Randolph and the Family Band. Trombone Shorty has become one of the most dynamic modern jazz players with his accessible blend of New Orleans sound with funk and rock. Hailing from the first family of reggae, Ziggy Marley has done his old man proud, winning eight Grammys and carving out his own legacy. Mavis Staples is quite simply a soul and gospel legend, whose voice can still bring the house down at age 84. Robert Randloph and Co. being the opener is wild because the band’s energetic live shows are the peak of sacred steel R&B.

— SETH SOMMERFELD

Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue, Ziggy Marley, Mavis Staples, Robert Randolph and the Family Band • Wed, July 26 at 6 pm •  $55-$90 • All ages • Spokane Pavilion • 574 N. Howard St. • spokanepavilion.com

J = ALL AGES SHOW

Thursday, 7/20

ARBOR CREST WINE CELLARS, Robert Vaughn

BOLO’S BAR & GRILL, Inland Empire Blues Society

Monthly Boogie

J BRICK WEST BREWING CO., Kyle Richard and Friends

CHAN’S RED DRAGON ON THIRD, Thursday Night Jam

CHECKERBOARD TAPROOM, Weathered Shepherds

COEUR D’ALENE PARK, Villa Blues ‘N Jazz

J D-MAC’S AT THE LAKE, Nate Ostrander

HISTORIC DAVENPORT HOTEL, Tom Pletscher

THE LODGE AT CARLIN BAY, Keanu

J MCINTIRE FAMILY PARK, JamShack

J THE NEST AT KENDALL YARDS, Zonkey

J NORTHWEST MUSEUM OF ARTS & CULTURE, Matt Mitchell

J PINE STREET PLAZA, Dan Maher

J QQ SUSHI & KITCHEN, Just Plain Darin

J RELIC SMOKEHOUSE & PUB, Pamela Benton: StringzOnFire

J RIVERSTONE PARK, Craig Catlett Big Band, Weddle Twins

SEDLMAYER’S RESORT, Son of Brad

J STELLA’S ON THE HILL, Heather King Duo

J TRUE LEGENDS GRILL, Evan Denlinger

ZOLA, Mister Sister

Friday, 7/21

J AK ASIAN RESTAURANT, Austin Carruthers

BACKWOODS WHISKEY BAR, Son of Brad

BARRISTER WINERY, Sean Owsley & The Rising BERSERK, Mark Farina, DJ Ca$e, Nuno

BIGFOOT PUB & EATERY, Heather King Band

BOLO’S BAR & GRILL, Bruiser

CHAN’S RED DRAGON ON THIRD, Steamboat Rocks

CHINOOK LOUNGE, Keith Wallace

J THE COEUR D’ALENE RESORT, JoJo Dodge

CURLEY’S, Karma’s Circle

J GORGE AMPHITHEATER, Above & Beyond Group Therapy Weekender

J THE GRAIN SHED, Open Mic at The Grain Shed

IRON GOAT BREWING CO., Working Spliffs

IRON HORSE (CDA), Chasing Eos

J KNITTING FACTORY,

It often feels like Incubus gets caught in this strange nexus of early 2000s alt-rock. The band wasn’t as hard as the heavy rock acts or punk-ish bands dominating rock radio, but also certainly wasn’t soft pop rock. The group had a DJ when it was still novel, but they used it as a refreshing trippy accent in the way that the nu metal bands of the time weren’t employing. And while Incubus isn’t often considered one of the biggest modern rock acts, the numbers don’t lie. After breaking onto the scene with 1999’s Make Yourself (and its hit singles “Drive” and “Pardon Me”), the band’s next four albums debuted at No. 1 or No. 2 on the Billboard charts. The group’s soaring sound still resonates and rocks out, managing to seem like a floating spiritual journey of self-reflection one moment (“Wish You Were Here”) and a rock riot (“Megalomaniac”) the next.

— SETH SOMMERFELD

Incubus, Bad Flower, Paris Jackson • Sat, July 22 at 6 pm • $65-$70 • All ages • Spokane Pavilion • 574 N. Howard St. • spokanepavilion.com

Bad Wolves, For the Fallen Dreams, Inimical Drive, The Funeral Portrait

THE LODGE AT CARLIN BAY, Just Plain Darin

LUCKY YOU LOUNGE, Plastic Picnic

MOOSE LOUNGE, The Happiness

J NIGHTFALL LIVE, James Motley

J ONE SHOT CHARLIE’S, LakeTown Sound

J PARK BENCH CAFE, Under the Trees Concert Series

PARK BENCH CAFE, Scott Linklater

PEND D’OREILLE WINERY,

Mike Wagoner, Utah John

J REPUBLIC BREWING CO., Sway Wild

THE RIDLER PIANO BAR, Just Plain Darin

SILVER MOUNTAIN RESORT, Kyle Mont Cunningham

SPOKANE VALLEY EAGLES, Stagecoach West

STORMIN’ NORMAN’S SHIPFACED SALOON, JamShack

J J THE FOX THEATER, Charley Crockett, Drayton Farley

TWISTED SLATE BREWERY, Ducky & Perry

J = THE INLANDER RECOMMENDS THIS SHOW

Saturday, 7/22

BECK’S HARVEST HOUSE, Just Plain Darin

BIGFOOT PUB & EATERY, Heather King Band

BOLO’S BAR & GRILL, Bruiser

BROWNE’S ADDITION, Cannonball

CHAN’S RED DRAGON ON THIRD, Cary Fly Band

CHINOOK LOUNGE, Keith Wallace

CONKLING MARINA & RESORT, Flipside

CURLEY’S, Rusty Nails & The Hammers

J GORGE AMPHITHEATER, Above & Beyond Group Therapy

Weekender

J HISTORIC DAVENPORT HOTEL, Sacha Boutros, Brent Edstrom Quartet

J HUCKLEBERRY’S NATURAL MARKET, Daniel Hall

IRON HORSE (CDA), Chasing Eos

J J KNITTING FACTORY, Circle Jerks, Negative Approach, Scowl

LUCKY YOU LOUNGE, Azariah, Blake Braley

MOOSE LOUNGE, The Happiness

NOAH’S CANTEEN, Son of Brad

J ONE SHOT CHARLIE’S, LakeTown Sound

J J PAVILION AT RIVERFRONT, Incubus, Bad Flower, Paris Jackson

PEND D’OREILLE WINERY, Ian Newbill

J PONDEROSA BAR AND GRILL, Take 2

ROCKET MARKET, Kekoa

J SPOKANE EAGLES LODGE, Slap Shot

J THE FOX THEATER, Morgan Wade

J TRUE LEGENDS GRILL, Nate Ostrander

ZOLA, Blake Braley

Sunday, 7/23

ARBOR CREST WINE CELLARS, |Soul Proprietor

BECK’S HARVEST HOUSE, Rusty Jackson Trio

CURLEY’S, Into the Drift

J GORGE AMPHITHEATER, Above & Beyond Group Therapy

Weekender

J HAMILTON STUDIO, Daniel Champagne

HOGFISH, Open Mic

IRON HORSE (CDA), Hunny Soup

J KNITTING FACTORY, Summer Salt, The Rare Occasions, Addison Grace

LIVE AT ANDRE’S, Eddie 9V

MOOSE LOUNGE, Danno Simpson, Kyle Mont Cunningham

J NORTHERN QUEST CASINO, Volbeat, Halestorm

J ONE SHOT CHARLIE’S, James Motley

J SOUTH HILL GRILL, Just Plain Darin

Monday, 7/24

J EICHARDT’S PUB, Monday Night Blues Jam with John Firshi

J NORTHERN QUEST CASINO, Falling In Reverse, Ice Nine Kills, Spiritbox, Catch Your Breath

RED ROOM LOUNGE, Open Mic Night

J STELLA’S ON THE HILL, Jon Keith Walton

Tuesday, 7/25

J D-MAC’S AT THE LAKE, Jake Rozier

THE DISTRICT BAR, Sanguisugabogg, Kruelty, Vomit Forth, Gates to Hell

J KNITTING FACTORY, Lukas Nelson + POTR

LITZ’S PUB & EATERY, Shuffle Dawgs

OSPREY RESTAURANT & BAR, Sean Kavanaugh

J PRINCE OF PEACE LUTHERAN, Soul Proprietor

SULLIVAN SCOREBOARD, Steve Starkey Duo

J TRUE LEGENDS GRILL, Dallas Kay

J TWIGS BISTRO, Carli Osika

ZOLA, The Night Mayors

Wednesday, 7/26

BECK’S HARVEST HOUSE, Sam Leyde

CHAN’S RED DRAGON ON THIRD, Wednesday Night Jam

J D-MAC’S AT THE LAKE, Chuck Wasileski

THE DRAFT ZONE, The Draft Zone Open Mic

HIGHBALL, Kori Ailene

MCEUEN PARK, Copper Mountain Band

OSPREY RESTAURANT & BAR, Son of Brad

J J PANIDA THEATER, Jeff Tweedy, Le Ren

J J PAVILION AT RIVERFRONT, Trombone Shorty & Orleans

Avenue, Ziggy Marley, Mavis Staples, Robert Randolph & the Family Band

PEND D’OREILLE WINERY, Peter Lucht

J PONDEROSA BAR AND GRILL, Howie King

RED ROOM LOUNGE, The Roomates

J TRUE LEGENDS GRILL, Jake Rozier

ZOLA, Brittany’s House

MUSIC | VENUES

219 LOUNGE • 219 N. First Ave., Sandpoint • 208-263-5673

ARBOR CREST WINE CELLARS • 4705 N. Fruit Hill Rd., Spokane Valley • 509-927-9463

BABY BAR • 827 W. First Ave. • 509-847-1234

BARRISTER WINERY • 1213 W. Railroad Ave. • 509-465-3591

BEE’S KNEES WHISKY BAR • 1324 W. Lancaster Rd.., Hayden • 208-758-0558

BERSERK • 125 S. Stevens St. • 509-315-5101

THE BIG DIPPER • 171 S. Washington St. • 509-863-8098

BIGFOOT PUB • 9115 N. Division St. • 509-467-9638

BING CROSBY THEATER • 901 W. Sprague Ave. • 509-227-7638

BLACK DIAMOND • 9614 E. Sprague Ave. • 509891-8357

BOLO’S BAR & GRILL • 116 S. Best Rd., Spokane Valley • 509-891-8995

BOOMERS CLASSIC ROCK BAR • 18219 E. Appleway Ave., Spokane Valley • 509-368-9847

BUCER’S COFFEEHOUSE PUB • 201 S. Main St., Moscow • 208-596-0887

THE BULL HEAD • 10211 S. Electric St., Four Lakes • 509-838-9717

CHAN’S RED DRAGON • 1406 W. Third Ave. • 509-838-6688

COEUR D’ALENE CASINO • 37914 S. Nukwalqw St., Worley • 800-523-2464

COEUR D’ALENE CELLARS • 3890 N. Schreiber Way, Coeur d’Alene • 208-664-2336

CRUISERS BAR & GRILL • 6105 W Seltice Way, Post Falls • 208-446-7154

CURLEY’S HAUSER JUNCTION • 26433 W. Hwy. 53, Post Falls • 208-773-5816

EICHARDT’S PUB • 212 Cedar St., Sandpoint • 208-263-4005

FIRST INTERSTATE CENTER FOR THE ARTS 334 W. Spokane Falls Blvd. • 509-279-7000

FOX THEATER • 1001 W. Sprague Ave. • 509-624-1200

IRON HORSE • 407 E. Sherman, Coeur d’Alene • 208-667-7314

IRON HORSE BAR & GRILL • 11105 E. Sprague Ave., Spokane Valley • 509-926-8411

JOHN’S ALLEY • 114 E. Sixth St., Moscow • 208-883-7662

KNITTING FACTORY • 911 W. Sprague Ave. • 509-244-3279

LEFTBANK WINE BAR • 108 N. Washington St. • 509-315-8623

LUCKY YOU LOUNGE • 1801 W. Sunset Blvd. • 509-474-0511

MARYHILL WINERY • 1303 W. Summit Pkwy. • 509-443-3832

THE MASON JAR • 101 F St., Cheney • 509-359-8052

MAX AT MIRABEAU • 1100 N. Sullivan Rd., Spokane Valley • 509-922-6252

MILLIE’S • 28441 Hwy 57, Priest Lake • 208-443-0510

MOOSE LOUNGE • 401 E. Sherman Ave., Coeur d’Alene • 208-664-7901

MOOTSY’S • 406 W. Sprague Ave. • 509-838-1570

NASHVILLE NORTH • 6361 W. Seltice Way, Post Falls • 208-457-9128

NORTHERN QUEST RESORT & CASINO • 100 N. Hayford Rd., Airway Heights • 877-871-6772

NYNE BAR & BISTRO • 232 W. Sprague Ave. • 509-474-1621

PEND D’OREILLE WINERY • 301 Cedar St., Sandpoint • 208-265-8545

THE PODIUM • 511 W. Dean Ave. • 509-279-7000

POST FALLS BREWING CO. • 112 N. Spokane St., Post Falls • 208-773-7301

RAZZLE’S BAR & GRILL • 10325 N. Government Way, Hayden • 208-635-5874

RED ROOM LOUNGE •

COMMUNITY STEP BACK IN TIME

Ever wonder about the story behind Spokane’s oldest neighborhood? What kind of people lived there and how did the neighborhood evolve? This Saturday, join Amanda Gardner, a MAC educator, as she leads a journey across time. Learn about the transformation of Browne’s Addition while taking a stroll to Coeur d’Alene Park and back. Observing the grounds both in real life and through old photos allows for visitors to get a feel for what Spokane was like at the dawn of the 20th century. Tour tickets also include access to the Campbell House, where guests can view an exclusive mini exhibit and other areas of the 125-year-old mansion. Join fellow history buffs for an educational day out, and look for other events this summer commemorating the Campbell House’s big milestone on the MAC’s website.

— SYLVIA DAVIDOW

THEATER DANISH DUDES

MUSIC CANNON FODDER

Campbell House 125th Anniversary Tour Series

• Sat, July 22 at 11 am plus additional dates

• $8-$10

• 2316 W. First Ave.

• northwestmuseum.org

• Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture

To see or not to see, that is the question; however, the answer is always yes when it comes to Shakespeare in the Park productions. This year, Spokane Shakespeare Society (S3) is shaking things up a bit and performing two plays in true rep. On the first night of performances, audiences meet the Prince of Denmark in Hamlet penned by Willy Shakes himself. The next night, the story continues with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard which expands on the exploits of the two titular characters after the events of Hamlet take place. Seeing both shows back to back isn’t required, but it’s recommended to get the full late-MiddleAges-in-Denmark experience.

— MADISON PEARSON

Shakespeare in the Park • July 20-Aug. 6, Thu-Sun at 6:30 pm and Aug. 31-Sept. 17, Thu-Sun at 6:30 pm, Sat-Sun at 2 pm • Free or pay what you can • Locations vary, see website for details • spokaneshakespearesociety.org

While big music festivals that bring together headliners in one place for a pretty penny can be a blast, there’s a pureness to the summer music fests that highlight local talent and don’t put a dent in your pocketbook. Browne’s Addition’s annual Cannonball is a great example. Levi Steverding started the summer shindig in his yard in 2018, because Elk Fest was discontinuing and he felt like the neighborhood still needed a music fix. This year’s fifth edition of the free music bash boasts a fun-filled lineup featuring The Night Mayors, Justyn Priest, Aspen Kye, Frisson, Left Over Soul, The RUB, Spilt Milk and DJ Unifest. If you’re gonna lounge in a backyard and drink beer on Saturday anyway, it might as well be live local tuneage.

— SETH SOMMERFELD

Cannonball • Sat, July 22 at 2:30 pm • Free • 21+ • South Cannon St. & West Second Ave. • facebook.com/cannonballbrownesaddition

Submit events online at Inlander.com/getlisted or email relevant details to getlisted@inlander.com. We need the details one week prior to our publication date.

FOOD & DRINK MELE KALIKIMAKA

Don’t think about ice and snow, not while summer is so fleeting. Instead, imagine what it might be like to celebrate the winter holiday season if you’d been transported somewhere that’s sunny and warm year-round. That’s the idea of No-Li’s X-Mas in July Brewfest, which puts a cool twist on summertime brews, offering a lineup that’s a little bit fruity, but also warm and spicy like a soft gingerbread cookie. For $15, get a 20-ounce, event-branded mug and fill. The first 500 inside also get a trucker hat, and additional pours are $8 each. So what’s on tap? No-Li’s Tropicana Crush IPA (6%) boasts “zesty orange” flavors, while the Ginger Snap (5%) dark lager is smooth, with notes of ginger and cinnamon. The third featured brew is dubbed Polar Pineapple (6.2%), an IPA with PNW hops “resulting in a crisp and tropical experience that’ll transport you straight to a Christmas luau.”

— CHEY SCOTT

No-Li X-Mas in July Brewfest • Sat, July 22 from 11 am-3 pm • Free admission • 21+ • No-Li Beer Campus • 1003 E. Trent Ave. • nolibrewhouse.com • 509-242-2739

COMEDY THAT’S WHAT SHE SAID

What’s up, my nerds? Who has two thumbs and loves David Koechner? The infamous Todd Packer, Michael Scott’s raunchiest best friend in The Office, headlines a weekend of stand-up shows at the Spokane Comedy Club, plus hosts a special Office-themed trivia event on Saturday afternoon. This could be your chance to prove that constantly watching reruns of The Office was actually studying. Top teams will need encyclopedic, Threat Level Midnight knowledge and Dwight impersonation skills to be crowned champions by the Pack-man himself. Koechner’s not just for the trivia nerds, but he certainly isn’t for the faint of heart — sex jokes and poop stories are Koechner’s bread and butter. So loosen up, grab some of your dirtiest-minded friends, and watch your step for any surprise “packages” waiting at your seat.

— ELIZA BILLINGHAM

I SAW YOU

THANKS FOR MOVING I honestly didn’t know you lived in my new apartment complex. Yes, I ignored you for three months. Yes, I tried to post a funny ad to send an olive branch. I just decided to do nothing and make no move instead of approach you to avoid drama. I wasn’t trying to intentionally upset you or be mean to you. I never intended to do anything to creep you out or harm you in any way. I’m sorry for annoying you. You were set in your ways to assume whatever about me, and I have other things to focus my time on. Thank you for finally moving. My anxiety is reduced without seeing you around looking mad or paranoid at me. You can think what you want. You decided to severe our friendship years ago, not me, so, I treated you the way you wanted to be treated and I left you alone.

HIT A HOME RUN At the Indians game on June 21, as I was helping my residents get off the bus, I saw you wearing black shorts and a shirt sleeve black top walking behind me through the parking lot. I was wearing a Steelers shirt. Throughout the whole ballgame we would run into each other and say hello to each other. I thought you were gorgeous and wanted to talk to you, but I was working and had to stick to helping my residents. Would love to get to know you more and would love to cheer the Indians on with you sometime.

BREAKFAST THX We stood next to each other in the waiting area of the Cottage on the morning of July 4. You are the attractive, petite gal with two younger kids.

After you left the servers told me that you had paid for my breakfast. Thank you! Hope to see you again so I can return the gesture and thank you in person

CRAVE BAR 7/7 You saw me, and came back inside to ask my name. I should have given you my number, but chickened out. You had a yellow vans hoodie.

EUROPEAN GRASS-FED BOVINE You: Shopping with your dad (?) in Winco, Sunday, July 9, about 11 am, in a beige ball cap and shorts. Me: camo T-shirt, ponytail, and shopping with my sister. That brief visit with you in the dairy aisle was interesting and a great respite from the madding crowds. On the off chance you see this, I would welcome the opportunity to further flesh out the heightened quality of ice cream and butter in England and France, perchance something more.

MORE RIVERSIDE BOLLARDS, PLEASE You put up a few plastic bollards to protect the city’s only “protected” bike lane, and now most of them are gone. Just this morning, a brown delivery van parked in the lane. It couldn’t have if the bollards were still there. Every time I ride in the lane, at least one car is in the lane, blocking clear passage. Let’s meet up and put more bollards in. This time, make them metal and substantial. Give these bike lanes protectoin and time to work.

CHEERS

SISSY I MISS YOU. Stephanie, I miss you. I am thinking of you and wish you would come back to see us. I am so sorry I was so harsh the last time I saw you. I feel so helpless not being able to contact you. Please come back to see us. Your little brother.

TO THOSE WHO VALUE YOUR DIVORCED FRIENDS/FRIENDSHIPS Cheers to those who value your divorced friends, enough to continue to see them as the individuals they are throughout their traumatic experience. Divorce is terrible and devastating. Every married couple hopes that it never happens to them, but sometimes it happens to people. And sometimes people actually come out happier from years of stressful pretending and doing everything they could to save it. Friends of divorced people… Please do not drop them. They need you. If you ever unfriended them because you think it somehow will affect your own marriage, then your thinking is shallow.

UV INDEX GOODWILL Thank you to the kind fellas working the donation drive-thru on Fourth of July at the Northside Goodwill. You brightened an already very sunny day! One of the gentlemen informed me that the UV Index can be looked up online before heading out for the day. Just as you may check for rain, you can also check for just how much sunblock you may need. Thank you, kind sir. You are an ally to pale people everywhere!

KILLING IT SPOKANE This city continues to amaze me! After the Lilac Festival, ArtFest and Pride, I am thankful to call Spokane home! The city organizers and volunteers

has the highest price for gasoline in the nation, the highest driver’s license fee in the nation, second highest total sales and excise tax burden in the nation, the second highest minimum wage (right after Washington D.C.), and the second highest property crime rate, and now Washington is the only state in the nation to have even more taken from our paychecks for a mandated long term care insurance program. We need new competent leadership here in Washington. There are at least two things you can do to make a difference. First, call our state representatives, and the second is to VOTE!

OUTRAGED AT YOUR OUTRAGE

Why do I

making it up.

YOUR DOG IS HOT TOO! Really? It’s 99-plus degrees out, and your dog has a coat on! Maybe you should try walking barefoot across that hot pavement all day with a coat on. It’s not “cute,” it’s cruel.

SPEEDING FOOLS Dear Spokane Fools: Many backroads that aren’t paved have speed limits of 25 mph or less. When people are walking or running down the same said roads with no sidewalks, it’s courteous to slow down so as to avoid spreading gravel dust all over them. To the a--hole who sped

deserve huge recognition for putting on these awesome events. We really live in a great city.

HAMMOCK SAVED THE DAY To the couple who shared their hammock (used it like an umbrella) while walking to see Aladdin, your kindness is much appreciated. Although my shoes got drenched, the rest of me was dry. Courtesy lives in Spokane — and you are ambassadors!

JEERS

RUDE WORKER AT MANITO PARK Had a wonderful experience at the Japanese garden. Except for the young guy that works for the park when he said no dogs allowed and I said, yeah, but it says service dogs allowed. And he just rudely says, “yeah, that’s not a service dog, clearly it has no vest and all service dogs need vests.” This is a registered service dog. How about you see the paperwork and tell me it needs a vest, it was a hot day. Please educate yourself on the ADA requirements before you try to put someone down, you were so rude out of the blue.

BAD STATE GOVERNMENT Jeers to our Washington state government, especially Gov. Jay Inslee who has spent $15 million taxpayer dollars on funding abortion, and $1.25 million on a stockpile of 30,000 abortion pills. Meanwhile, Washington state

have to follow the rules and you don’t? Take a few steps back… Pay your damn parking tickets and get your damn tabs…it’s the law…go to the legislators and change the bill and quit your whining and your lame excuses.

RESPECT THE SPACE Jeers to the teens and/or young adults holding a loud and obnoxious photoshoot at Manito’s Japanese gardens. People go there seeking a quiet refuge while you scream and yell, trample the foliage, and climb painstakingly maintained trees for a selfie. You’re there for the scenery... why not respect it?

SELECTIVE MEMORY CATHY MC MORRIS

RODGERS The story in the Sunday paper was sad. You stated that Fauci and other health officials served unlawfully, and that federal grants and the accountability of the agency and the trust of the American people were lost during COVID. If the president in 2020 would’ve taken responsibility and taken action sooner, instead of denying that the virus was a threat, and blaming China. Trump was wrong, I thank God for Fauci. Without him and the other health officials, we wouldn’t have the vaccine, which saved many lives. In 2021, when Biden took office, there was no vaccine supply left by the former president, as promised. How many lives could have been saved? Hopefully in 2024 we get a congress member who can actually remember history, instead of

up the other day while I was running and then stuck his puny looking middle finger in the air. Get a real car. Yours is a real POS.

NEAR NATURE, NEAR THE FIRING SQUAD Actions have consequences (karma). Enjoy your geese-free and tourist-free beaches and city. A cheap and unsustainable solution, uncivilized and without compassion. Oh well, they are just stupid animals (the City Council members that is). Geese facts: They mate for life and will stay with an injured partner until they heal or die. Animals have souls, too, despite whatever dogmatic beliefs you choose to justify your actions by. Destroying healthy life merely for your convenience is a crime against nature. n

NOTE: I Saw You/Cheers & Jeers is for adults 18 or older. The Inlander reserves the right to edit or reject any posting at any time at its sole discretion and assumes no responsibility for the content.

EVENTS | CALENDAR BENEFIT

EMPIRE AIRLINES RUMMAGE & TREASURE SALE Includes furniture, vintage items, books, vinyl, clothing by the bag and more. Benefits St. Jude Children’s Hospital. July 22, 8 am-2 pm. Free. 11559 N. Atlas Rd., Hayden. empireairlines.com

WIG FUN MOTORCYCLE RUN Participants wear wigs and donate to local charities at each stop. July 22, 10 am-4 pm. $20-$25. Cruisers, 6105 W. Seltice Way. (208-287-9436)

LIGHT A LAMP LIGHT UP THE NIGHT

FUNDRAISER Silent/live auctions, light appetizers and music by The Rising. Benefits Light A Lamp a nonprofit suicide prevention program. July 28, 6-10 pm. $45. Barrister Winery, 1213 W. Railroad Ave. lightalamp.org (509-465-3591)

COMEDY

FRANCIS ELLIS Ellis is a podcast personality and regularly appears on Barstool Sports. July 20, 7:30 pm. $20-$28. Spokane Comedy Club, 315 W. Sprague. spokanecomedyclub.com (509-318-9998)

DAVID KOECHNER Koechner is best known for his roles as Champ Kind in the Anchorman films and Todd Packer on The Office. July 21, 7:30 & 10:15 pm, July 22, 7 & 9:45 pm and July 23, 7 pm. $25-$35. Spokane Comedy Club, 315 W. Sprague. spokanecomedyclub.com

INK BLOT The Blue Door Players analyze each night’s audience, Rorschach style. Fridays in July at 7:30 pm. $9. Blue Door Theatre, 815 W. Garland Ave. bluedoortheatre.com (747-7045)

MATT RIFE Rife is known for his viral comedy TikTok videos and for his 2021 comedy special, Only Fans. July 23, 5 & 8 pm. SOLD OUT. The Fox Theater, 1001 W. Sprague Ave. foxtheaterspokane.org

IMPROV JAMS Each jam is led by a different Blue Door Theatre Player. Mon at 7 pm through Aug. 28. Free. Blue Door Theatre, 815 W. Garland Ave. bluedoortheatre.com (509-747-7045)

CHRIS PORTER Porter was a finalist on season four of Last Comic Standing. July 27, 7:30 pm, July 28, 7:30 & 10:15 pm and July 29, 7 & 9:45 pm. $18-$30. Spokane Comedy Club, 315 W. Sprague. spokanecomedyclub.com (509-318-9998)

JEFF FOXWORTHY Foxworthy is most well-known for his self-titled TV show, his “you might be a redneck” one-liners and for touring with Larry the Cable Guy. July 27, 7-10 pm. $70. Coeur d’Alene Casino, 37914 S. Nukwalqw. cdacasino.com

COMMUNITY

CAMPBELL HOUSE DARK HISTORY: SOCIETY SECRETS An after-hours tour that sheds light on strange details and unconventional stories from turn-of-thecentury Spokane. Thu, July 20 at 6 pm. $3.50-$6. The MAC, 2316 W. First Ave. northwestmuseum.org (509-456-3931)

HISTORIC SEVENTH AVENUE TOUR

Walk along Spokane’s historic Seventh Avenue and learn about the influential families who lived here and their impact on the region. July 20, 6:30-7:30 pm, Free. Corbin Art Center, 507 W. Seventh Ave. spokanerec.org (509-625-6677)

VEDA LUX’S 13TH ANNIVERSARY

PARTY This Barbie-themed, after-hours party features a photo booth, cake and a chance to win a shopping spree at Veda. Come dressed in Barbie attire. July 20, 4-8 pm. Free. Veda Lux, 1106 S. Perry St. vedalux.com (509-475-1674)

FEED THE BUFFALO This tour includes the farm history, a brief talk on bison and a question and answer session. Meet, greet and hand-feed the bison. Fri-Sat from 12:30-1:30 pm through Sep. 2. $6$7. Win-Tur Bison Farm, 4742 W. Highway 231. winturbisonfarm.com

ROLE-PLAYING GAME DROP IN Improve your RPG skills by watching and participating in games. Fridays from 4-8 pm and Saturdays from 1-5 pm. Free. RPG Community Center, 101 N. Stone Street. rpgcenter.org (509-608-7630)

TWEEN LIBRARY CARNIVAL Tweens are invited to test their skills at classic and unique carnival games and earn prize tickets. Ages 8-12. July 21, 2-3 pm. Free. Moran Prairie Library, 6004 S. Regal St. scld.org (893-8340)

WHEATLAND BANK HORSE & CARRIAGE RIDES Enjoy an 8-minute loop through the Riverfront Park and downtown. Fridays from 5-9 pm through July 28. Free. Downtown Spokane. downtownspokane.org

HISTORIC WALKING TOURS Join local historian Chet Caskey for a walking tour of Riverfront Park. Learn the history of the Spokane Falls, Expo ‘74 Pavilion, the Clock Tower and more. Sat at 10 am and noon through Aug. 26. Free. Riverfront Park, 507 N. Howard St. riverfrontspokane.com (509-625-6600)

MARIO KART TIME TRIAL Competitors have the opportunity to drive four different courses during the event. July 22, 5-8 pm. Free. Natural 20 Brewing Co. 1303 N. Washington St. natural20brewing.com

BIRDS OF PREY See five species of live

falcons and learn about these fascinating birds. Because live creatures require calm behavior to be comfortable, this program is recommended for ages six and up. July 23, 1-2 & 3-4 pm. Free. Coeur d’Alene Public Library, 702 E. Front Ave. cdalibrary.org (208-769-2315)

FEEDING FRENZY: A SAVAGE CELEBRATION OF GLUTTONY’S ALLURE

This Dungeons & Dragons one shot is led by Game Master Mitch. July 23, 3-6 pm. $25. Natural 20 Brewing Company, 13216 E. Sprague Ave. natural20brewing.com

RIVERSIDE FLEA MARKET Shop 20+ booths for clothes, home goods and more. July 23, Aug. 6, Aug. 20, and Sept. 10, 10 am-3 pm. Free. Grocery Outlet, 1617 W. Third. riverside.spokaneneighborhoods.org

DISCOVERING DNA Participants go through six steps of the scientific method and learn how to extract DNA from a strawberry. July 24, 5:30-6:30 pm. Free. Shadle Library, 2111 W. Wellesley Ave. spokanelibrary.org (509-444-5300)

SPY CHALLENGE ESCAPE ROOM Solve all of the clues to complete the super secret spy challenge. Ages 10-12. Registration required. July 25, 2-2:45 & 3:30-4:15 pm. Free. Medical Lake Library, 3212 Herb St. scld.org (509-893-8330)

WORLD TRAVELER TEEN ESCAPE

ROOM Practice teamwork by solving puzzles, riddles and conundrums to escape the room. Ages 13-18. Registration required. July 25, 11 am-noon, 2-3 & 3:304:30 pm. Free. Moran Prairie Library, 6004 S. Regal St. scld.org (893-8340)

COFFEE & CONVERSATION This event aims to help people feel seen and heard within the community. The conversation is free form and the event includes lowkey activities like coloring, puzzles and more. Wednesdays from 10:30 am-noon. Free. Central Library, 906 W. Main Ave. spokanelibrary.org

CREDIT SCORES & REPORTS A class from First Interstate Bank about what a credit score is, its importance and how to read a credit report. July 26, 6-7 pm. Free. Shadle Library, 2111 W. Wellesley Ave. spokanelibrary.org (509-444-5300)

KERNEL Come to Spark Central during the Kendall Yards Night Market to earn a voucher to purchase fresh fruits and vegetables by completing activities related to nutrition, gardening and exercise. For youth under 18. Wed from 5-8 pm through Aug. 23. Free. Spark Central, 1214 W. Summit Pkwy. spark-central.org

LEGO BUILD WITH EXPERTS Learn more about the world of Lego while creating your own masterpieces. This program is

intended for kids ages 9-18, and 5-8 with an adult. July 26, 3-4:30 pm. Free. Shadle Library, 2111 W. Wellesley Ave. spokanelibrary.org (509-444-5300)

TWEEN LIBRARY CARNIVAL Tweens are invited to test their skills at classic and unique carnival games and earn prize tickets. Ages 8-12. July 26, 2-3 pm. Free. Otis Orchards Library, 22324 E. Wellesley Ave. scld.org (893-8390)

COFFEE IN THE GARDEN Gather in the garden for refreshments, demonstrations, and conversation with Carl Kostoff discussing edible garden plants. July 27, 10 am-noon. Free. Create Arts Center, 900 Fourth St., Newport. createarts.org

US SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

70TH ANNIVERSARY Members from the small business atmosphere are invited to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the US Small Business Association. July 27, 11:30 am. Free. Central Library, 906 W. Main Ave. sba.gov (509-444-5336)

COLVILLE 4TH FRIDAYS This monthly program features a community art walk, free concerts, vendors and more. July 28, 4-8 pm. Free. Colville, Wash. colvilletogether.org

FILM

FREE KIDS MOVIES: SING 2 Can-do koala Buster Moon and his all-star cast of animal performers prepare to launch a stage extravaganza in the entertainment capital of the world. July 17-21, daily at 9:30 am. Free. Garland Theater, 924 W. Garland Ave. garlandtheater.com

THIRD THURSDAY MATINEE: THE ENDLESS SUMMER This Bruce Brown documentary follows two surfers as they travel the world in search of “the perfect wave.” July 20, 1-3 pm. $7. The MAC, 2316 W. First Ave. northwestmuseum.org

MOVIES IN THE PARK A series of familyfriendly movies shown outside in Sally’s Park. Bring blankets and/or lawn chairs. Snacks and drinks available for purchase. Fridays at 7:30 pm through Aug. 4. Free. The Salvation Army Spokane, 222 E. Indiana Ave. spokane.salvationarmy.org

PAST LIVES Nora and Hae Sung, two deeply connected childhood friends, are wrest apart after Nora’s family emigrates from South Korea. 20 years later, they’re reunited for one fateful week. July 21, 2 pm, July 22, 4 & 7 pm and July 23, 4 pm. $7. The Kenworthy, 508 S. Main St. kenworthy.org (208-882-4127)

CARTOONS AT THE FARMERS MARKET A selection of kid-friendly animated shorts that run during the farmers market.

Sat 9 am-noon through Oct. 28. Free. The Kenworthy, 508 S. Main St. kenworthy.org

FREE KIDS MOVIES: TROLLS WORLD

TOUR Poppy and Branch discover that there are six troll tribes scattered over six different lands. July 24-28, daily at 9:30 am. Free. Garland Theater, 924 W. Garland Ave. garlandtheater.com

ZIGGY STARDUST & THE SPIDERS

FROM MARS In celebration of the 50th anniversary of this event, the original, uncut version of the film has been restored in 4K and with a 5.1 theatrical mix and features never-before-seen performances by guitar player Jeff Beck. July 25, 7-9 pm. $7. The Kenworthy, 508 S. Main St. kenworthy.org (208-882-4127)

BUT I’M A CHEERLEADER A naive teenager is sent to rehab camp when her straitlaced parents and friends suspect her of being a lesbian. July 26, 7-9 pm. $7. The Kenworthy, 508 S. Main St. kenworthy.org (208-882-4127)

FOOD

CUPCAKE DECORATING BASICS Learn basic techniques for cupcake decorating and discuss supplies, terms and more. Ages 13-18. Registration required. July 20, 2-3 pm. Free. Airway Heights Library, 1213 S. Lundstrom St. scld.org (893-8250)

RIDE & DINE Enjoy a scenic gondola ride, live music and a barbecue on the mountaintop. Fridays from 3-8 pm. $8-$51. Silver Mountain, 610 Bunker. silvermt.com

PILSNER PICNIC This second annual event features 11 regional breweries. Tickets include 5-oz pours of each and a specialty glass. Benefits Volunteers of America. July 22, 12-7 pm. $20. Brick West Brewing Co., 1318 W. First Ave. westendbeerfest.com (509-279-2982)

DEMYSTIFYING FATS This nutrition class examines the role of fats in diets. Presented by Katherine MacNair, Nutritional Health Coach. July 22, 1-2 pm. Free. Natural Grocers: South Hill, 2512 E. 29th Ave. naturalgrocers.com

X-MAS IN JULY BREWFEST Celebrate the holidays in July with a small-batch beer tasting. The first 500 people to purchase a 20-oz mug receive a trucker hat. July 22, 11 am-3 pm. $15. No-Li Brewhouse, 1003 E. Trent. nolibrewhouse.com

AGAVE FEST Spokane bartenders battle it out to win the title of best refreshment. Tickets include tastings of all featured drinks and one raffle ticket. July 23, 12-4 pm. $30. The Wonder Building, 835 N. Post St. wonderspokane.com

...continued on page 46

Pests from the Past

The state of Washington takes on a problem with residual pesticides

BY WILL MAUPIN

This April, the Washington state Liquor and Cannabis Board effectively shut down numerous cannabis producers in north-central Washington after test results showed unhealthy levels of the chemical DDE in their products. Earlier this month, the LCB ended that hold placed on those growers, allowing them to return to producing cannabis.

DDE is a chemical that does not occur naturally, but rather shows up in the environment as a by-product of the long-banned pesticide DDT. The Centers for Disease Control says DDE has no commercial use and DDT, its precursor chemical, has been banned in the U.S. since 1972.

The growers in the Okanagan area who were impacted by this action from the LCB were not specifically applying either chemical to their crops, but rather growing in areas where DDE already existed.

State law sets the limit for DDE at 0.1 parts per million. Of 108 products tested from the 18 producers in the Okanagan area flagged by the LCB, 61 tested above the state’s legal limit. Five of the 18 producers in that region were also shown to be above that limit.

According to reporting by the Associated Press, many of the cannabis products that tested above the state’s limit for DDE were still below the federal government’s limit for DDE concentration in tobacco, another agricultural product often consumed by smoking.

That may not provide comfort to consumers, however, as it highlights the residual nature of pesticides in the environment. Clearly, pesticide-free products can be contaminated with long-lasting by-products of previous pesticide use on the land from which they are produced.

Since releasing its findings in April, the LCB, along with the Washington State Department of Agriculture and Washington State Department of Ecology, have worked with the affected growers on solutions to bring the concentrations of DDE in their growing areas below the legal limit.

As of early July, the LCB is confident enough in those remediation efforts to remove the hold on products grown or produced in the affected area. As a result, the products will once again be available on store shelves going forward. According to the AP, the state is working with growers to continue remediation efforts in the affected area and also statewide, in order to avoid any similar issues in the future. n

Okanagan cannabis growers got hit by the area’s use of pesticides.

EVENTS | CALENDAR

BREWERY BRUNCH Enjoy breakfast, drink specials and a lively atmosphere. July 23, 10 am-1 pm. $15. Natural 20 Brewing Company, 13216 E. Sprague Ave. natural20brewing.com (509-413-3663)

WINE TASTING Taste various regional wines. Buy two bottles and receive your tasting free. Sun from 2-4 pm through Sep. 3. $10. The Culinary Stone, 2129 N. Main St. culinarystone.com

RIVERFRONT EATS A food truck series on the orange Howard St. Bridge featuring live music. Tuesdays from 11 am-2 pm through Aug. 22. Riverfront Park, 507 N. Howard St. riverfrontspokane.com

HEADSHOT HAPPY HOUR Enjoy light bites and refreshing cocktails as photographer Ari Nordhagen captures professional headshots for all attendees. July 26, 4-7 pm. $25. Tavolata, 221 N. Wall St. esrhospitality.com (509-606-5600)

TEEN CUPCAKE DECORATING BASICS

Learn basic techniques for cupcake decorating and more. Ages 13-18. Registration required. July 26, 2-3 pm. Free. North Spokane Library, 44 E. Hawthorne Rd. scld.org (893-8350)

WINE DOWN WEDNESDAYS Sommelier

Justine Recor offers tastings of wine from around the globe as well as knowledge and conversations about their origins. Wed from 4-9 pm. Free. Beverly’s, 115 S. Second St. beverlyscda.org

BBQ & BANDS: ZORAMENA A pulled pork meal with live music by Zoramena. July 27 and Aug. 24, 5-7 pm. $15-$20. The Culinary Stone, 2129 N. Main St. culinarystone.com (208-277-4116)

KENTUCKY TRAIL BOURBON DIN -

NER Immerse yourself in the heritage of Kentucky’s finest bourbons. Beverly’s food and beverage team guides guests through a curated selection of rare bourbon. July 28, 6-9 pm. $125. Beverly’s, 115 S. Second St. beverlyscda.com

MUSIC

NORTHWEST BACH FEST: AFTER-

GLOW! The Attacca Quartet perform along with Zuill Bailey. The program includes Shubert’s String Quartet in C Major. July 20, 7 pm. $15-$25. Barrister Winery, 1213 W. Railroad Ave. nwbachfest.com (509-465-3591)

NORTHWEST BACH FEST: S3 & Z Crossover string trio Simply 3 is joined by cellist Zuill Bailey for a special concert after the trio’s appearance at Music in Manito. July 22. $10-$25. Barrister Winery, 1213 W. Railroad Ave. nwbachfest.com

SUMMER SERENADE This annual fundraiser highlights the talents of conservatory faculty in an intimate classical music setting. July 23, 7 pm. $10-$25. Music Conservatory of Sandpoint, 110 Main St. sandpointconservatory.org

MUSIC ON MONDAYS: KATHY COLTON AND THE RELUCTANTS Singer/songwriters Kathy Colton, Carla Grant and Denise Bartlett perform upbeat folk rock. July 24, 6-7:30 pm. Free. Coeur d’Alene Public Library, 702 E. Front Ave. cdalibrary.org (208-769-2315)

RED YARN MUSIC & PUPPET SHOW Red Yarn (aka Andy Furgeson) weaves music and puppetry into high-energy, interactive shows. Ages 3–5 and their families. July 24 from 10:30-11 am and 3-3:30 pm.. Free. Argonne Library, 4322 N. Argonne Rd. scld.org (893-8200)

POP SUMMER CONCERT: SOUL PROPRIETOR The band performs funky tunes and covers. July 25, 6:30-8:30 pm. Free.

Prince of Peace Lutheran, 8441 N. Indian Trail Rd. popspokane.com

RED YARN MUSIC & PUPPET SHOW: Red Yarn (aka Andy Furgeson) weaves music and puppetry into high-energy, interactive shows. Ages 3–5 and their families. July 25, 10:30-11 am and 3-3:30 pm. Free. North Spokane Library, 44 E. Hawthorne Rd. scld.org (893-8350)

BEST OF BLUEGRASS: DAVE ADKINS

The singer-songwriter performs with a live band. July 26, 7 pm. $25. The Jacklin Arts & Cultural Center, 405 N. William St. thejacklincenter.org (208-457-8950)

SPORTS & OUTDOORS

GREATER SPOKANE PARKS CHALLENGE Complete challenges, using the Outerspacial app related to parks in the Spokane area to win prizes and enter raffles. Through Oct. 31. spokanecounty.org

CHERRY PICKER’S TROT & PIT SPIT A 4-mile run through Green Bluff’s orchard country on paved roads and a pit spit contest. July 20, 5-7 pm. $10-$20. Green Bluff Growers. grange.org

RIVERFRONT MOVES: BARRE ON THE BRIDGE This one-hour, low-impact, high-intensity class targets the whole body with small and large-range movement sequences. July 20, 7 pm. Free. Riverfront Park, 507 N. Howard St. riverfrontspokane.com (509-625-6600)

SPOKANE INDIANS VS. VANCOUVER

CANADIANS Promos include Christmas in July Night (July 20), Star Wars and Fireworks Night (July 21), Storybook Princess Night and Fireworks Night (July 22) and Native Culture Day Game (July 23). July 20, 6:35 pm, July 21-22, 7:05 pm and July 23, 1:05 pm. $8-$22. Avista Stadium, 602 N. Havana St. spokaneindians.com

WILDERNESS EXPLORERS Adventure outdoors through books, activities and guest experts that highlight fun, exercise, creativity and discovery. Ages 6-12. Thu at 11 am through Aug. 17. Free. Coeur d’Alene Public Library, 702 E. Front Ave. cdalibrary.org (208-769-2315)

HISTORIC BROWNE’S ADDITION

WALKING TOURS Take a walk through the western part of Browne’s Addition, Spokane’s oldest neighborhood. July 21, 9:30-11:30 am. $20. Coeur d’Alene Park, 300 S. Chestnut St. friendsofcoerdalenepark.org (509-850-0056)

SCENIC CHAIRLIFT RIDES Ride the chairlift up and down the mountain with options to hike back down. Fri-Sun from 10 am-3:30 pm through Sep. 30. $9-$13. Lookout Pass Ski & Recreation Area, I-90 Exit 0. skilookout.com (208-744-1301)

SPOKANE TO SANDPOINT RELAY An overnight relay adventure where teams of 12 complete 36 legs over 200 miles from Green Bluff to Sandpoint. July 21 and July 22. $600-$1575. nxnwrelays. com/s2s (509-238-2489)

HIKE IN DISHMAN HILLS: ILLER CREEK

This hike includes uneven terrain and some steep inclines. Wear sturdy closetoed shoes and bring water. Registration required. July 22, 9:30-11:30 am. Free. Iller Creek Conservation Area, East Holman Rd. and Rockcrest Lane. scld.org

NATIVE & XERIC PLANT MASTERY SERIES This class teaches gardeners how to replace their lawns with native and low moisture plants. Sat from 2-3 pm through July 29. $10-$30. Ritters Garden & Gift, 10120 N. Division St. 4ritter.com

SPOKENYA A 7k run/walk benefitting Spring of Hope, which provides clean water and spiritual growth in Kenya. July 22, 9 am. $30. LifeCenter Church, 1202 N. Government Way. runsignup.com/Race/ WA/Spokane/SpoKenyaRun (327-4422)

WSU SPOKANE COUNTY MASTER GARDENER PLANT CLINIC Ask experts about your plant issues and get advice. Sat from 11 am-3 pm through Sep. 30. Free. Shadle Library, 2111 W. Wellesley Ave. spokanelibrary.org (509-444-5300)

MOORE-TURNER HERITAGE GARDENS

TOUR Experience this unique garden as it looked in 1915. Learn about its discovery and restoration of the tea house, pond and pergola and heritage plants. JJuly 23 and July 30, 11 am-noon. Free. MooreTurner Heritage Gardens, 507 W. Seventh Ave. heritagegardens.org

YOGA FOR YOU! This adult yoga class is a blend of stretching, strengthening and balance work. BYO mat. Mon from 9:3010:30 am through July 31. Free. Coeur d’Alene Public Library, 702 E. Front Ave. cdalibrary.org (208-769-2315)

BLACK LODGE BREWING RUNNING CLUB All fitness levels welcome. Each week the club chooses from a 3k or 5k route. Wednesdays from 6-8 pm. Free. Black Lodge Brewing, 206 N. Third St. blacklodgebrewingco.com

PRACTICAL CENTERING YOGA Experience the benefits of yoga and pilates movements through these weekly exercise sessions. Wed from 1:30-2:30 pm. $18-$20. The MAC, 2316 W. First Ave. northwestmuseum.org (509-456-3931)

THE SHOWCASE A three-day celebrity golf tournament benefitting Community Cancer Fund, a nonprofit providing resources and funds to cancer patients and their families. July 27-29. The Coeur d’Alene Resort, 115 S. Second. showcasegolf.com (208-765-4000)

RIVERFRONT MOVES: SHALA KUNDALINI FLOW & SOUND HEALING Experience kundalini yoga with Shala instructors and learn about using kriya. This is an all-levels class. July 29, 10 am. Free. Pavilion at Riverfront, 574 N. Howard St. riverfrontspokane.com (509-625-6000)

RUN FOR YOUTH FUN FEST A familyfriendly event aimed at raising funds to raise up lifelong leaders in Spokane’s poorest neighborhoods with options for a 1-mile run, a 5k or a fun run. July 29, 8:30 am-1:30 pm. $17.50-$35. Manito Park, 1800 S. Grand Blvd. runsignup. com/Race/WA/Spokane/RunForYouth

PLANTING FOR BIRDS & POLLINATORS

Learn about bringing more birds and beneficial insects into your yard. July 30, 2-3 pm. $10. Ritters Garden & Gift, 10120 N. Division St. 4ritter.com

SPOKANE VALLEY CYCLE CELEBRATION This event features three rides for participants to choose from: the 50-mile Hills Around the Valley; the 25-mile Adventure Ride; and the 10-mile FamilyFriendly Ride. July 30, 8 am. $15-$29. Mirabeau Point Park, 2426 N. Discovery Place. cyclecelebration.com

THEATER

ALICE BY HEART In the rubble of the London Blitz of World War II, Alice Spencer’s budding teen life is turned upside down. Wed-Sat at 7:30 pm, Sun at 2 pm through July 23. $15-$35. Spokane Civic Theatre, 1020 N. Howard St. spokanecivictheatre.com (325-2507)

SHAKESPEARE IN THE PARK Performances of Hamlet and Rosencrantz and

Guildenstern are Dead in rep. July 20Aug. 6, Thu-Sun at 6:30 pm and Aug. 31Sept. 17, Thu-Sun at 6:30 pm, Sat-Sun at 2 pm. Performances are in Manito Park, Riverfront Park and Sky-Praire Park on a rotating schedule, see website for location information. Donations accepted. spokaneshakespearesociety.org

STEVE MARTIN’S BRIGHT STAR A sweeping tale of love and redemption set against the rich backdrop of the American South in the 1920s and ’40s. Wed-Sat at 7:30 pm, Sun at 2 pm through July 23. $25-$42. University High School, 12320 E. 32nd Ave. svsummertheatre.com

CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG A tale of a dilapidated racecar who gets a new lease on life. July 21, 7 pm and July 22, 2 & 7 pm. Free. Kroc Center, 1765 W. Golf Course Rd. kroccda.org (208-667-1865)

CONSTELLATIONS This romantic drama explores how even the smallest change in our lives can dramatically alter the course we take. July 21-30; Fri-Sat at 7:30 pm, Sat-Sun at 2 pm. $5-$25. The Forge Theater, 404 Sweet Ave. uidaho.edu/theatre

FOOTLOOSE When Ren and his mother move from Chicago to a small farming town, he’s prepared for the inevitable adjustment to his new high school; but not for the rigorous local edicts, including a ban on dancing. July 21-30; Thu-Sat at 7:30 pm, Sun at 2 pm. $50-$65. Schuler Performing Arts Center, 880 W. Garden Ave. cdasummertheatre.com

TREASURE ISLAND Jim Hawkins’ adventure begins when Billy Bones, the old sea-dog captain, appears one morning in the Admiral Benbow Inn. July 21-29; Wed-Sat at 7:30 pm, Sun at 2 pm. $15$25. Spokane Civic Theatre, 1020 N. Howard St. spokanecivictheatre.com

CRAFTING A MONOLOGUE A workshop for area actors interested in theater arts. Actors work directly with local writers to bring a monologue to life. For theatre artists of all levels. Register online. July 22, 1-3 pm. Free. Central Library, 906 W. Main Ave. spokanelibrary.org

CRAFTING A MONOLOGUE (WRITERS

EDITION) Learn to craft dynamic and engaging monologues with the Spokane Playwrights Laboratory. Register online. July 22, 1-3 pm. Free. Central Library, 906 W. Main Ave. spokanelibrary.org

MERMAIDS REVENGE: THE CURSE OF MAELSTROM This continuation of the Black Onyx mystery takes Captain Jack Black Sparrow’s crew to dangerous new waters. July 22, 6-9 pm. $39. Crime Scene Entertainment, 2775 N. Howard St. crimesceneentertainment.com

VISUAL ARTS

MINIATURE MAKE & TAKE Create a miniature garden crate with the Spokane Miniature Society. Registration required via phone. Ages 16+. July 20, 1-4 pm. Free. North Spokane Library, 44 E. Hawthorne Rd. (509-326-4316)

PAINTING: KINDNESS ROCKS Paint rocks with creative designs and uplifting messages and learn about the Kindness Rocks Project. Bring your own clean rock. July 20, 2-3:30 pm. Free. Fairfield Library, 305 E. Main St. scld.org (893-8320)

POAC SANDPOINT ART WALK Local artisans, galleries, and business owners throughout downtown showcase local art throughout downtown Sandpoint. Through Sep. 5. artsinsandpoint.org

SHANNON NOEL: JOON + 30 YEARS

Shannon Noel spent hours training Mary Stuart Masterson to paint for the film

Benny and Joon when it was filmed in Spokane. For this exhibition, she revisits Joon and uses the film as inspiration for her paintings. By appointment through July 31. Free. Hamilton Studio, 1427 W. Dean Ave. hamiltonstudio.com

THE WYETHS: THREE GENERATIONS A collection of works by N.C. Wyeth, one of America’s finest illustrators, along with his son, grandson and other family members. Tue-Sun from 10 am-5 pm through Aug. 20. $7-$12. The MAC, 2316 W. First Ave. northwestmuseum.org

ARTY AFTERNOONS Get to know your local artist community during this collaboration with The CdA Arts & Culture Alliance. July 21, 2-3 pm. Free. Coeur d’Alene Public Library, 702 E. Front Ave. cdalibrary.org (208-769-2315)

SIP N’ SCULPT CLAY JEWELRY WORKSHOP Create a pair of clay earrings. All supplies provided; beer, wine and soft drinks available for purchase. July 21, 7-10 pm. $30. J Bones Musicland, 2204 E. Mallon Ave. fb.me/e/HMtIHcq1

SKETCHBOOK CLUB FOR QUEER TEENS

Local artist Nanette Cloud helps queer teens develop their creative skillsets. Friday from 6:30-8 pm. Ages 13-18. Free. Odyssey Youth Movement, 1121 S. Perry St. odysseyyouth.org (509-325-3637)

CHAT & DRAW WITH BRIAN LAMBERT Lambert, illustrator of the new book Plants to the Rescue, chats about his creative inspirations, process and leads a directed draw. July 22, 11 am. Free. Wishing Tree Books, 1410 E. 11th Ave. wishingtreebookstore.com (509-315-9875)

MINDFUL DOODLING Drop in to the Community Room to make some art inspired by the ZenTangle Method. July 22, 10-11 am. Free. Coeur d’Alene Public Library, 702 E. Front Ave. cdalibrary.org

SUMMER ADULT COLORING: Relieve stress and practice mindfulness with this adult coloring program. Supplies provided. July 11-25, Tue from 10-11 am. Tues., 10-11 am through July 25. Free. Coeur d’Alene Public Library, 702 E. Front Ave. cdalibrary.org (208-769-2315)

ART IN THE PARK Local artists guide participants in paintings inspired by the Riverfront Park scenery. July 26 and Aug. 2, 10-11:30 am. $25. Riverfront Park, 507 N. Howard St. riverfrontspokane.com

WORDS

PANEL: HOW TO PUBLISH YOUR WORK

Five local authors attempt to demystify the vast world of book publishing. July 20, 5:30-6:30 pm. Free. Liberty Park Library, 402 S. Pittsburgh. spokanelibrary.org

SARAH CONOVER & PAUL LINDHOLDT: TAKEN BY THE SEA Join authors Sarah Conover and Paul Lindholdt for a paired reading and Q&A. July 20, 5:30-6:30 pm. Free. Coeur d’Alene Public Library, 702 E. Front Ave. cdalibrary.org (208-769-2315)

RICHARD GOODRICH: COMET MADNESS A discussion of Goodrich’s book Comet Madness in which he examines the 1910 appearance of Halley’s Comet and the ensuing frenzy. RSVP on website. July 21, 7-8 pm. Free. Auntie’s, 402 W. Main Ave. auntiesbooks.com

AUNTIE’S BOOK CLUB: QUEER & WEIRD

A discussion of Tamsyn Muir’s novel, Harrow the Ninth. July 22, 6-7 pm. Free. Auntie’s, 402 W. Main. auntiesbooks.com

BROKEN MIC Spokane Poetry Slam’s weekly open mic. Wednesdays at 6:30 pm. Free. Neato Burrito, 827 W. First Ave. bit.ly/2ZAbugD (509-847-1234) n

1. Year in Augustus Caesar’s reign

2. “Three’s Company” landlord

3. With 32-Down, British duo with the 1994 hit “Missing” (and how to solve 18-, 25-, 51- and 63-Across)

4. Aloe ____

5. How World Cup Final matches never end

6. “Kinda sorta”

7. “Ay, dios ____!”

8. Country album?

9. “Nomadland” Oscar winner Zhao

10. Minor untruth

11. Fork locale

12. Formerly

13. Produce

19. Actor who read a scene of “M*A*S*H” in 2023 that was

written by ChatGPT

21. Anita of “La Dolce Vita”

26. “When will ____ learn?”

27. Item of winter gear with multiple straps

28. General assemblies?

30. Go over again,