You guessed it: Lisa Brown stepped down as director of the Washington state Department of Commerce so she could run for mayor of Spokane. "Together, we can get a city that is stuck in neutral moving again," said Brown, a former state Senate majority leader and WSU-Spokane chancellor. Brown argued that current Mayor Nadine Woodward hadn't truly accomplished her campaign goals. "The mayor ran on two issues: homelessness and crime downtown," Brown said. "But most people would tell you that we have made little genuine progress on these issues. And many would say that things feel worse." But given the chance to argue that downtown had become more dangerous over the last four years, Brown didn't. "It feels about the same honestly," she said. Meanwhile, Woodward accused Brown of using a "radical playbook straight out of Seattle that has only weakened our state laws and policies governing public safety." (DANIEL WALTERS)
MORE HOSPITALITY RELIEF
Washington state recently announced the end of pandemic restrictions, but relief money is still rolling out to help businesses impacted by the shutdowns. The state Department of Commerce announced this week that $100 million in grants from the federal American Rescue Plan will be available to hospitality businesses, with applications opening March 14. A webinar is scheduled for March 13 to explain the process to eligible restaurants, food trucks, hotels, motels, bakeries, brewpubs and more. The grants will be targeted to businesses that make less than $5 million per year and lost more than 25 percent of their income from 2019 to 2020 due to pandemic restrictions. "The hospitality and lodging industry is an essential part of our economy, and these grants will help affected businesses across the state recover from public health concerns that disrupted their operations for the last three years," says Chris Green, assistant director of Commerce's Office of Economic Development and Competitiveness. For more info, visit wahospitalitygrants.com. (SAMANTHA WOHLFEIL)
NEW OVERDOSE APPROACH
When someone overdoses on opioids, the Spokane Fire Department gives them Narcan, an emergency drug that rapidly reverses the overdose. The drug saves lives, but it can also send the recipient into a nasty withdrawal. It's not uncommon for the fire department to get called back to the scene a few hours later because the person took more opioids and is overdosing again. Spokane Fire Chief Brian Schaeffer estimates that happens two to three times a day in Spokane streets. "It's the argument that you can do the same thing over and over and expect a different result," Schaeffer said Monday at a City Council meeting. To solve the problem, the Spokane Fire Department is exploring a pilot program with Washington State University's medical school embedding emergency responders with a behavioral health unit with the power to prescribe Buprenorphine. The drug, used to alleviate withdrawal, was tightly controlled, but recent changes in federal drug policy have made it more accessible, and the fire department hopes that prescribing the drug immediately after an overdose will help prevent relapses. (NATE SANFORD)
