Jessica Robinson

People living near Fairchild Air Force Base say they’re not worried by news they won’t get a brand new fleet of Boeing-built Air Force refueling tankers. The Air Force made the announcement Wednesday following a process that pitted Spokane against other other communities around the country.

McConnell Air Force Base in Kansas got the nod to be the first to house the new KC-46A refueling tankers. That dismayed Washington Sen. Patty Murray, who said she would press top Pentagon officials for an explanation.

A tragedy in Wenatchee, Wash., is prompting educators there to bring back a high school aquatics program. Starting this fall, high school freshmen in the central Washington city will have to demonstrate they know how to swim.

Formal swimming lessons in Wenatchee had gone by the wayside, as is frequently the case lately in public schools. But the Wenatchee school board is now reversing course.

In November 2011, a freshman named Antonio Reyes drowned in the high school swimming pool.

The FBI is trying to find the person who sent two threatening letters containing deadly ricin in Spokane. One of the letters was addressed to a federal judge.

It's back to work-as-usual at Spokane’s historic Post Office after the two letters made it into the mailstream here. Police say the discovery prompted an evacuation. Authorities don't believe any workers were exposed to the highly toxic substance, but they are remaining tight-lipped about the case.

Representatives from the FBI and local police declined to comment on the ongoing investigation.

Federal agents arrested a man in Idaho Thursday suspected of conspiring to support a terrorist organization in Central Asia. Thirty-year-old Fazliddin Kurbanov is from Uzbekistan and lives in Boise.

Two federal grand juries – one in Idaho and one in Utah – handed down a total of four terrorism-related charges against Kurbanov. Federal authorities say he attempted to help the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan with money and computer software between August 2012 and May 2013. The U.S. government designates that group as a foreign terrorist organization.

In the next couple of months, many employment office workers in the Northwest will join the unemployed. State labor agencies are having to make cutbacks in staffing. It's due to a combination of the economy getting better and federal budget cuts known as the “sequester” setting in.

Staffing at the local employment office usually moves in the exact opposite direction as the rest of the economy. When times are tough, unemployment rolls are booming.

The border between the states of Washington and Idaho is like a petri dish for what the minimum wage does to the economy. That’s where two extremes meet. Idaho has the federal minimum wage: $7.25 an hour. While Washington’s? It’s nearly $2 more -- the highest in the nation.

You might expect that wage gap to send Washington border businesses fleeing over to Idaho. But that's not what's happening.

Efforts to pass more local gay rights laws are moving ahead in Idaho. A city councilor in Coeur d'Alene plans to introduce an ordinance later this month. And in Pocatello, a failed ban on discrimination against gay, lesbian and transgender people is getting a second chance.

An effort to streamline the regulatory process for small hydropower dams is generating a rare moment of bipartisanship in Congress. Two bills sailed through a Senate committee Wednesday. They've already passed the House. Correspondent Jessica Robinson has more.

One of the country's leading suppliers of french fries is asking the federal government to approve genetically modified potatoes. The USDA announced the move Friday by the J.R. Simplot Company of Idaho. It would be the only genetically engineered potato on the market.

Simplot has branded them Innate potatoes. The company figured out how to use existing potato DNA to design a spud that’s less prone to dark spots. It also produces less acrylamide when cooked. Acrylamide is a neurotoxin found in many foods. Studies on animals have indicated it may also cause cancer.

The decreasing price of gold has gotten a lot of attention among investors in recent weeks. The price of silver has received fewer headlines, but it's also dropped. That price has real economic impact in north Idaho, which has one of the richest silver deposits in the country.

There's not much wiggle room when silver drops down to $22 an ounce. That's only a little more than it costs the Galena Mine near Kellogg, Idaho, to get the silver out of the ground. Owner U.S. Silver has placed a hiring freeze on the mine and plans to cut costs by $1 million this year.