The Spokane River needs our support
We have a river that flows smoothly and quietly through our county. It is happiest when people come to play with Her, they boat, they paddleboard, they canoe, they swim and they fish. She calls these people Her friends. She is unhappy when the people that come to play create large wakes. She calls these people inconsiderate. These inconsiderate people cause Her friends to have safety issues, environmental damage, and property damage to Her shoreline. Many days Her friends do not come to play because of the inconsiderate people. She is sad.
So, what can She do? Nothing, because she can’t do it by Herself. She needs her Friends.
Four years ago, Her friends said we need to do something to make Her happy. Her friends went to the Fathers of the River (our County Commissioners). After many meetings and public hearings, the Fathers supported the State law and produced a new County ordinance on June 8, 2021, Resolution 2021-63. This made Her and Her friends very happy because it would make it illegal to produce large wakes. The Fathers called these “excessive wakes” and defined under what conditions they were made and thus illegal. The new Resolution will protect Her, allow Her friends to return to safely play and the inconsiderate people will not create excessive wakes otherwise Sheriff Norris will give them a ticket. Unfortunately, that did not happen.
In everything in life there are surprises, some you just do not see coming.
What happened next made Her very sad and Her friends angry. Sheriff Norris made a Media Release that indicated he is not going to enforce the Regulation. To make it worse, Sheriff Norris changed the details of the Regulation via his Media Release and instructed his deputies not to enforce Resolution 2021-63 as it was written.
So how did the non-enforcement work? All the things that made Her and Her friends sad continued, the biggest issue has always been safety. That issue is highlighted by an inconsiderate person running over a grandmother and her granddaughter on their jet skis, causing serious injuries. Her friends believe if Sheriff Norris had been enforcing the Father’s Resolution this could have been avoided.
It turns out no one can “make” Sheriff Norris enforce the law except to recall him or vote him out of office. Until that happens, we must try our best to convince him.
It is now April of 2022 and boating season will start soon.
So, Her friends thought if they could have a meeting with Sheriff Norris, they could better understand his position. After several attempts, Sheriff Norris had one of his staff call and say he can use his discretion to not enforce the law and he had nothing more to discuss. In other words, he will continue to not enforce the law.
We can’t let this happen!
If you care about our River and the people that use it, please help us get our Sheriff to enforce the State and County laws. We pay his salary and all we are asking is that he enforce the law. How unfair to our County citizens and everyone that want to play on the River safely. Why is that so difficult?
If he chooses not to enforce our laws, then it is a clear case of “dereliction of duty.”
Please write to Sheriff Norris and ask him to do his job kcso@kcgov.us.
Thank you for helping,
Spokane River Association Board of Directors.
“Dereliction of duty is deliberate failure to do what you should do as part of your job.”
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The Spokane River Association Board of Directors includes Jim Stafford, President; Ken Stauffer, Vice President; Ray Bradley, Treasurer; Avis Stafford, Secretary; and Bob Stiger, board member.