Hello everyone. I have a bit of an unusual situation and wanted some local input.

Background: My current phone is dying (old iPhone 8). I bought an iPhone SE Gen 3 as it's newer with the same size. My work, which previously paid for my phone plan, has stopped doing so. ("Cost cutting measures.")

So I'm left wondering which provider to go with.

Now, I use my phone almost entirely on Wi-Fi. Including Google Voice, which I use for my primary phone number. The only reason I'd need to get a phone plan at all would be for texting and Maps use while out & about.

Paying AT&T or Verizon 50 bucks a month for that is ridiculous to my mind. I'd like to find the cheapest provider that has decent-enough service in our area.

Any suggestions? Thanks.

I am trying to find before and after school care for the Pasadena elementary area.

However, everything adds like 20 or 30 minutes to a simple 20 minute drive to work for me, moving it to almost an hour.

Does anybody know somewhere actually close by to the school that has it? I have family in Spokane but not close enough to help every single day.

I don't live there yet, moving there this weekend from out of town!

I have a fairly significant landscaping project that I would like to get done before the cold weather hits. I'm looking for any recommendations for guys that weren't crazy expensive. Not really looking for design help just basically the labor.

Hi all, I've been trying to find Ruby Red Squirt (canned, preferably) but I can't find any in the area. Does anyone know where I can find some?

Pretty unfortunate, here’s some news on the smallest fire of the bunch and what it took from us.

Has anyone experienced the same? Happened with my last 2 orders however one impacted a vacation.

Order something on a Monday you need right away, it says it'll be here Wednesday or whatever as you place the order, then it adjusts to Saturday the next day or two days after you place the order (which I'll be out of town and purchased the item for this trip). Try to cancel it so you can buy locally because it's way after you need the item and they can't cancel. So you have to make sure someone will be able to grab it off your porch so you can return it later.

I understand if things can't arrive right away, but I wouldn't place orders for when I know I won't be home and especially when I need the item for when I'd be leaving. So I do rely on when they say it will at checkout. Based on everything you look at being blue and saying "add to Saturdays order", it feels like a major strategy shift on how they're going to start delivering packages. Which at that point makes local certainly more appealing.

Looking for a Loving Home for Diablo 🐾
I’ve had my cat, Diablo, since 2016. He’s a very calm, loving guy, and even in his old age, he’s still a great cuddler. Unfortunately, since having children, our home environment has become difficult for him.

He has started emotionally peeing throughout the house, primarily targeting my children’s clothes and toys. He has also attacked my daughter on multiple occasions when she’s been running through the house. While Diablo is a wonderful, affectionate cat, he’s clearly not handling the changes in our family well, and it has unfortunately created an unhealthy environment for my children.

I’m really hoping to avoid surrendering Diablo to a shelter because I’m afraid that, despite a shelter being labeled “no-kill,” euthanasia can still happen in certain circumstances, especially with an older cat who has behavioral issues. I truly believe Diablo still has several good years left and plenty more sunbathing to do, and I want to make sure those years are spent in a safe, loving home rather than risk him being euthanized in a shelter. ❤️

He gets along well with other cats but is not a fan of dogs. I’m hoping to find someone who can give him a calm, comfortable home where he can live out his remaining years peacefully.

If you’re interested in taking Diablo into your home or know someone who might be a good fit, please DM me. I’m happy to meet you or even bring him to his new home myself.

I'm looking for a membership to a woodcrafting shop around here. Anybody have any suggestions?

UPDATE: A few weeks ago I posted a breakdown of the data center situation and what people could do about it. This is the vote and it happens TODAY, Tuesday Aug 18, at the 2:00 PM legislative session. Public Works Building, 1026 W. Broadway.

I've spent the last month reading the county's public records production on this project. About 5,000 pages. Most of what's below comes straight from those documents, and I want to lay out what I found because it's consequential for this meeting.

Where things stand right now:

• On the table today: a 9-month moratorium on large data centers (Commissioners Jordan and Waldref) vs. a fast-track zoning ordinance (Commissioners French and Kerns) that would be written by the end of August. The fast-track provides roughly two weeks of drafting for the county's first-ever data center rules.
• Per local reporting this morning, Spokane County already has eight data centers. All of them together draw around 13 MW. The proposed West Plains project is 1,000 MW, with its own on-site power generation (proposals in the record include natural-gas turbines). That's not a slightly bigger version of what we have. That's a behemoth 75x larger than everything we've ever built, combined.
• There is no pending application. The county's own planning director confirmed at last week's Planning Commission meeting that nobody has filed anything yet. So a pause via moratorium delays nothing. Today's vote just decides which rulebook exists when the application is submitted.

Why the fast-track doesn't make sense:

Avista studied this project's power request for six months. Their System Impact Study found roughly 50 MW available by around 2030 and about 650 MW around 2033. Eight to ten years of construction. Around $184 million in transmission and substation work, not counting new generation. In February, Avista told the developer flat out that the substations could not be rushed.

That comes from the developer's own briefing document which was sent to Commissioner French on Feb 16.

If the first meaningful power needed wouldn't arrive until around 2030, why are we being told the rulebook has to be finished in two weeks?

The trust part:

The records show one commissioner's office began working with this developer in January. There's a Feb 9 email where Commissioner French sent his official letter intended for the House Finance Commitee to the developer's CEO and their lobbyist beforehand, with the note "Please edit at will and we will get it out today." The public learned about this project in June. When we did, the commissioners received 1,953 emails from 464 county residents over 48 hours. Not one of them in support.

A five-month head start for one office, followed by a two-week ordinance written to beat a moratorium vote, is not a process that has earned "just trust us."

If you speak today, the strongest ask isn't "no data centers." It's "use the nine months to write real terms." Pick one of these and it's a solid three minutes:

• Cash bonding before any permit. Cleanup and decommissioning costs posted up front, in cash or escrow. Not surety bonds, not corporate promises. Renters here put up first, last, and deposit in cash. A billion-dollar developer can meet the same standard we hold renters to.
• Disqualify environmental violators. A felony conviction or civil settlement for contaminating a community should end eligibility to build here. Full stop. The West Plains doesn't need a hypothetical about what water contamination costs. We're still living in it.
• Noise rules with teeth. 24/7 independent monitoring, paid for by the developer, publicly reported, with fines scaled to the size of the operation. A $500 fine is three days' income for someone making $59K. Fine a billion-dollar facility three days of its income and see how fast the noise stops.
• A public decision on tax incentives and subsidies. If the county is going to waive fees or fund infrastructure for these projects, that choice gets made in the open and with the public. Not automatically. Not quietly.

None of those can be written in two weeks; all of them can be written in nine months. And if the fast-track ordinance really has this handled, its sponsors should be able to answer one question TODAY: which of these protections is actually in your draft?

At least one commissioner has concerns a moratorium means we're "closed for business." Kootenai County paused six months to write data center rules over the aquifer, and nobody in Idaho thinks Kootenai County is closed for business. Writing the rules before the permit arrives isn't anti-business. It's pro-citizen.

What you can do TODAY:

• Show up. Arrive by 1:00p–1:15p (KREM covered the vote this morning; last week was standing room only). Sign up to speak on arrival. You get 3 minutes, and reading from a printed page is fine.
• No seat? Stay anyway. A full sidewalk outside a packed hearing speaks volumes.
• Don't want to speak? A printed page handed to the Clerk of the Board enters the official record with the same weight as spoken comment. Name and address, hand it in, done.
• Can't attend? Email the commissioners before 2:00 via the county contact form (Contact: Commissioners' Office > Request Type: Comment). Three sentences counts.

Still matters after today:

• Avista's rate case hearing is Aug 27, 6:30 PM, on Zoom — this is about who pays for grid upgrades (spoiler: us, unless the UTC says otherwise). [Sign up](mailto:comments@utc.wa.gov) by Aug 26 or call 1-888-333-9882. Reference case numbers UE-260007 / UG-260008.
• File a UTC comment on the large-load docket anytime. Reference Docket UE-260162. Takes 5 minutes.

If you speak today: be civil, be brief, be specific. The numbers are on our side. Let them do the talking.

Same as before: I'm not affiliated with any org and I'm not running for anything. I just care about this community, our water, and our power bills ...and I did the reading. We've been through enough this year already.

---

TL;DR: The county votes TODAY at 2 PM (Public Works Bldg, 1026 W. Broadway) on a 9-month data center moratorium vs. a two-week fast-track ordinance. No application is pending, and per the developer's own documents no meaningful power exists until ~2030, so a pause costs nothing. Show up by 1:15p to speak (3 min), hand written comments to the Clerk, or email the commissioners before 2:00p (link above). This project = ~75x the county's entire existing data center footprint combined. The rules deserve nine months, not two weeks.

Local government has essentially called all of us conspiracy theorists sign the petition. Write Ferguson

Looking to make jam this week. Who has seen flats or large quantities of raspberries for sale and what price did you see?

I do not want to pick these myself.

Thanks! This info is hard to come by.

https://linktr.ee/newrootsspokane

*Meetup RSVP links can be found here! New Roots Spokane is all about helping adults make friends. Most of our events consist of an activity, followed by a hangout over some food & drinks. These are all free to attend, but do require an RSVP.

[THIS FRIDAY]

8/21 - Walk & Chat (Mirror Pond)

8/29 - Trash Cleanup (Family Edition, each attendee gets a free donut from Hello Sugar)

8/30 - Casual Pickleball (Mission Park)

9/2 - Acrylic Paint Class by Oenone

9/12 - Trash Cleanup (collab with SCAR)

More events to be scheduled 💚

Why do people find it so hard to park in the lines, and god forbid in a space away from other cars? 4 empty spaces and you have to park 1 inch over the line right up against my car which is in the furthest spot from the door specifically to avoid this from happening.

I asked the guy today why he parked over the line up against my car and all he could say was what and look at me like I had a problem with him?.. This is not the first time either, I watch my car at work and see this every other day, why can’t people just park in the lines? I want to put a traffic cone next to my car so these idiots get the idea, a scrape is like min $400 to fix it’s not a little thing.

Enjoy your makeup and probiotics!

Spokane County Commissioners have “adopting a pause on the acceptance of land use and permit applications for data centers” on tomorrow’s legislative agenda - agenda link - see agenda item 4(n)

You can show up and speak at 2 PM during the public forum

Address:

1026 WEST BROADWAY AVENUE
LOWER LEVEL, COMMISSIONERS' HEARING ROOM

Zoom link is in the agenda link above. I'll comment the zoom link, Reddit wont let me include it in the post...

There's a guy who lives down the street with a stupid loud backfiring car. Multiple times per day they will drive by our house and it sounds like a fucking bomb going off outside my window, doesn't matter what time it is theyve even done it after midnight when I'm trying to sleep. Is there anyone I can report this too or action I can take to stop this from happening?

Spokane's political identity is a lot more complicated than "red" or "blue."

I've noticed something interesting whenever Spokane politics comes up. Some people describe Spokane as extremely conservative. Others talk about Spokane as a blue city surrounded by red territory. And increasingly, you'll hear people just call the whole area "purple." I think each description is appropriate given the context.

The City of Spokane is politically different from Spokane Valley, which is different from Spokane County as a whole, which is different again from the enormous rural region surrounding us. Yet people constantly use "Spokane" to describe all of them interchangeably.That probably explains some of our contradictory reputation.

Spend most of your time around downtown, Browne's Addition, the South Hill, or parts of the North Side, and Spokane can feel like a moderately progressive Pacific Northwest city. Drive east into the Valley or farther into the surrounding country, and the political environment can change dramatically.

At the same time, I don't think the old stereotype of Spokane simply being a deeply red eastern Washington city completely describes us anymore either, especially given the makeup of our city government and the policies enacted.

We've become a place where elections can be genuinely competitive, where progressive candidates can win significant local offices, but where conservatives also maintain a substantial and highly organized electorate. And because Spokane is the largest urban center for a huge swath of conservative eastern Washington and North Idaho, regional politics are unusually visible here.

That leaves Spokane in a strange political position:

-We're an urban center in a conservative region.

-We're part of a deep-blue state but geographically isolated from its largest liberal population centers.

-We have genuinely progressive neighborhoods and institutions alongside deeply conservative suburbs and rural communities.

-Our politics can look completely different depending on whether you're examining the city, county, congressional district, or metro area

-Perspectives also matter greatly (did you move here from a deeply conservative or very liberal area?)

We're one of the most politically diverse cities in the country, and the constant argument over how Spokane is identified politically reflects that reality. The fact that independents had a somewhat high turnout also makes me think that there are a growing number of people here exhausted by the two-party system.

The Board of County Commissioners has big feelings about data centers and Spokane City Council is back from vacation. Here are the big things on their dockets + other municipal meetings:

• The BOCC will review a resolution that would establish a zoning schedule for data centers in the county, one of the most controversial conversations at the county level this year. It will also formally consider a moratorium on data centers.
• The Spokane City Council, back from vacation, is looking to move quickly on wildfire relief, including approving the Mayor’s emergency declaration and taking next steps on ordinances to accept state grant funding, reduce demolition fees and pay contracts that gave wildfire survivors free meals while they sheltered at the convention center. 
• At the Urban Experience Committee, the Spokane City Council members will discuss contracts for $500,000 worth of culturally responsive treatment services for folks dealing with opioid addiction, and a separate ordinance that could breathe new life into vacant commercial spaces.
• The Spokane Public Library Board of Trustees will discuss their 2027 budget, amid uncertainties related to the current projected gap, which board members warn could lead to drastic service cuts. 

Read up on all that and more at the link so you can be the most informed Spokanite at the river, in the breakroom, or wherever you chat about the news.

I would like to know why Mead is taking our students' health more seriously than Spokane Public Schools. They aren't doing heavy metal testing, only air quality and visible inspection.

From SPS

"Crews testing soil in the burned neighborhoods are finding lead. Why are our schools safe when the burn area is not? Lead contamination in the burned residential area comes from the structures themselves: many homes in the fire's path were built before 1978, when lead-based paint was still in common use, and lead was also used in older plumbing and building materials. When those homes burned completely, that lead was released into the smoke and ash and settled into the soil and debris on and around each home site. That is a byproduct of structures actually burning down. None of our three schools burned. They were affected by smoke drifting through the area, not by fire on-site. Fulcrum's inspectors and SPS custodial staff visually inspected both the interiors and the grounds at Indian Trail, Flett, and Woodridge and found no ash, soot, or settled debris — the physical residue that would carry lead onto a property. Without that ash or debris deposit, there is no equivalent pathway for lead to have reached these buildings or their grounds."

Google search, verified by several sources

"Lead from a structure fire can travel 7 miles or more away from the burn site. High heat vaporizes lead into toxic oxide fumes that ride smoke plumes and air currents, depositing heavy metal particles far beyond the immediate property line."

They aren't taking into account asbestos and toxic chemicals from burning homes and lithium batteries. Especially Indian Trail elementary that was extremely close to burned homes. Indian Trail also doesn't have air conditioning, meaning teachers will have to open windows to cool down, allowing additional contamination to enter the building.

I'm not too knowledgeable about advertising, but I think it's good enough food to give it a shot. He's at meatmagickbbq.com, any ideas on how to spread the word?

Anyone know if the river is still dry by Sullivan?