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Reporter
FRIDAY April 06/12
our view | A strong endorsement for the Renton School District bond measure [6]
Learning center| The Secondary Learning Center in the Renton School District will open Reporter Newsline 425.255.3484 this fall [3]
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Eagles rolling | The Lindbergh baseball and softball teams are off to strong starts [12]
City Council looks at public vote on library By TRACEY COMPTON
It’s not so simple
tcompton@rentonreporter.com
Renton residents may get their chance after all to vote on the location of a new downtown library. However, more than $1 million could be lost from previous and current work on the new downtown location if a new course is set, a city spokesman said late Tuesday afternoon. City Council President Rich Zwicker,
OUR VIEW, page 6
Mayor Denis Law, Jay Covington, chief administrative officer, and City Attorney Larry Warren met for much of Tuesday to try and figure out how to give the public its say and still fulfill the city’s obligations to the King County Library System. “The petition is basically dead; the spirit behind it is not,” said Kelley Balcomb-
Bartok, a city spokesman, referring to the citizens’ initiative the council voted 4-3 against adopting Monday night. “The council took action last night to address a citizen petition that is invalid due to a number of legal requirements, and fails to address contractual agreements that we’ve had in place for some time,” said Law in a news release on Tuesday. “Nonetheless, a good number of [ more library page 5 ]
Split council votes not to send library initiative to a vote By TRACEY COMPTON tcompton@rentonreporter.com
Karen Hensley of Renton paraded back and forth with her Save Renton Library sign Monday evening in front of City Hall before the City Council meeting. The council voted 4-3 to decline to place on the ballot an initiative to keep the library over the Cedar River. dean a. radford, Renton Reporter
After much debate among Renton City Council members and public testimony, the council Monday night opted not to put an initiative on the ballot that could have kept the library over the Cedar River. The council’s 4 to 3 vote was made before a packed City Council chambers, with some in the audience spilling into an overflow conference room. The vote followed an earlier recommendation from Mayor Denis Law to decline to place the initiative on the ballot. The initiative required that the library remain over the Cedar River and money spent to make improvements there. If that option was not possible, then voters would decide where to build the new library on a simple majority vote. City Attorney Larry Warren had called the initiative “fatally flawed” in a March 5 memorandum to the mayor, City Council and other administrators. Warren told council members they had four options before them to handle the initiative. They could adopt it as is, put it to a vote of the people, refuse to act on it because of illegality or change the language and adopt it. Richard Stephens, the attorney represent[ more Council page 4 ]
Agency to offer education about sex offenders By TRACEY COMPTON tcompton@rentonreporter.com
There are more than 200 registered sex offenders residing in Renton currently and the King County Sexual Assault Resource Center wants people to be aware of the resources that are available to the public.
Sexual Assault Awareness Month is April this year and the organization has several events planned for the month-long campaign. KCSARC will offer two “Family and Community Safety” presentations with pizza for the public. The presentations are 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.,
April 10 and April 18 at the center. They will offer prevention tips, the three most important things to learn about sexual offenders and offenses and community resource contacts. The talk will also feature an explanation of the coordinated system for managing sex offenders in the community.
There will be a panel of experts from law enforcement, corrections, sex- offender treatment and victim’s advocacy. KCSARC and the King County Sex Offender Management Team created the presentations because they thought they could be more effective at educating the [ more KCSARC page 16 ]
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