After nearly a year of varying restrictions on social gatherings and business operations to stem the spread of COVID-19, business owners-and a growing number of politicians-say they've had enough of what they believe are heavy-handed mandates.

A representative of a west Spokane private school says officials there are confident they can secure funding commitments to complete the finishing touches on a $2.3 million multipurpose building currently under construction.

LunchboxWax salon franchisees Brandi and Mike Chapman plan to open a salon on Spokane's South Hill, its second overall, either in late May or early June. The couple opened their first bikini and facial wax salon last July in 1,500 square feet of space

The old 345-acre Northside Landfill, once the site of the largest garbage disposal operation in Spokane County, reached a milestone late last year as it was declassified as a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Superfund Site and removed from the age

The banking field hasn't lost its luster for Lorilei Bruggink, who has worked in the industry for 35 years and was named president of Spokane Valley-based State Bank Northwest earlier this month.

Despite the economic havoc COVID-19 brought on wide swaths of the economy last year, the pandemic's presence didn't halt the downward trend of bankruptcy filings in Eastern Washington.