Local Digest
King County budget avoids service cuts

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Council members said steps taken to reduce the number of inmates in the county's two adult jails and one youth jail helped cut the annual growth in spending on criminal justice from 10 percent a year to 3 percent.

Criminal-justice costs are critical because they represent 71 percent of the $539 million general-fund budget where the county has faced the toughest budget-balancing job. Recovering sales-tax revenues also have helped balance the general fund.

The budget includes provisions intended to soften the blow of the recently enacted critical-areas package of ordinances on rural landowners. The budget ordinance consolidates single-family development reviews, assigns more staffers to assist landowners and helps owners qualify for tax breaks if they develop rural stewardship plans.

Edmonds

Police investigate mutilation of dog

Police are investigating the mutilation of an elderly dog found Thursday in the back yard of a home in the 1000 block of Eighth Avenue South.

The owner told police the dog was last seen alive in its back yard, in the 1000 block of C Avenue, Nov. 12. The animal was on heart medication, said Edmonds police spokesman Sgt. Jeff Jones.

Several of the dog's ribs were removed, Jones said. An autopsy is being done to determine whether the dog's death was caused by a human or another animal, he said.

Police are warning local residents to keep watch on small pets.

Tacoma
 
Girl, 15, raped on way to her school bus

A 15-year-old girl was raped yesterday on her way to her school-bus stop near Tacoma Mall.

The girl said a man came up behind her in the 4200 block of South Pine Street. She said the man told her he had a gun as he pulled her behind a large utility box, said Tacoma police Officer Tracy Conaway.

During the rape the man threatened to stab the teen. After the attack, he ran away. The girl was taken to Mary Bridge Children's Hospital & Health Center in Tacoma, Conaway said.

Cheney, Spokane County

Professors at EWU vote to form union

Professors at Eastern Washington University have voted to join a union under a state collective-bargaining law passed in 2002, union officials said yesterday.

The vote was 338 in favor of the union and 46 opposed, meaning the United Faculty of Eastern will represent full- and part-time faculty in collective bargaining with the university administration.

"We are proud that colleagues from every department supported us, and we are proud of the UFE Organizing Committee conducting this vote through collegial, face-to-face conversations," said Anthony Flinn, UFE president.

The United Faculty of Eastern has existed for several years and has negotiated collective bargaining contracts with the EWU administration in the past. However, the previous agreements were voluntary.

A 2002 law granted collective-bargaining rights to faculty members at four-year public colleges and universities in Washington.

Faculty at Central Washington University voted for unionization last June. Professors at Western Washington University are also organizing a faculty union.

Tacoma

New jury to hear case of boss who was slain

Another jury will be asked to convict and sentence Covell Paul Thomas to death for the execution-style killing of his boss more than 6-1/2 years ago, Pierce County prosecutors said.

Thomas' conviction in the death of Richard Geist was upheld in January by the state Supreme Court, but his death sentence was overturned because the trial jury was given faulty instructions.

Geist, 26, Thomas' boss at a janitorial-service company, was robbed of about $5,000 and shot four times in the head on March 27, 1998. Times staff and news services