Briggs leaves Spokane Valley Partners
![Ken Briggs (Colin Mulvany / The Spokesman-Review)](https://thumb.spokesman.com/uO6q6eDqVn9RLDznlEJuDvMVKgE=/600x0/media.spokesman.com/graphics/2018/07/sr-loader.png)
Ken Briggs left his job as director of Spokane Valley Partners on Oct. 11. The board of the Spokane Valley-based nonprofit social services organization promoted longtime development director Jennifer Schlenske to executive director, and she began working in her new position immediately.
Briggs had worked part time for about a month while Schlenske and other staff transitioned into new roles.
Briggs began his tenure with Valley Partners in 2006 and was instrumental in developing the organization from a food and clothing bank to the full service agency it is today.
During his term, he oversaw $1.3 million of capital improvements to the building, including last year’s new boiler, new roof and construction of a teaching kitchen in connection with the food bank. He also pitched in and built shelves in the basement when that was needed.
Briggs was so involved in so many different projects, the staff nicknamed him the Jumping Bean. He said he couldn’t have asked for better colleagues.
“It’s been a great place to work,” Briggs said. “It was hard to leave. But the staff is exceptional and the organization is in very good hands.”
Valley Partners is funded by grants, private donations and the city of Spokane Valley.
Valley Partners received a little less than $20,000 from Spokane Valley last year, and Briggs said he always worried that any bit of funding would disappear, because the number of clients goes up every year.
Since about a year ago, Briggs donated $1,000 back to Valley Partners out of his salary each month.
“That was my own decision, but I felt like my salary was an expense the organization didn’t need,” Briggs said, adding that the organization is absolutely solvent.
Valley Partners is the only comprehensive social service organization in Spokane Valley. It runs a food bank, a clothing bank and a community garden, and it serves as a hub for many social services organizations and programs in Spokane Valley.
Briggs, who’s married to Spokane Councilwoman Lori Kinnear, said he filed for unemployment and is looking for a job in the Spokane area while continuing to teach part time at Whitworth University.
He said the bulk of donations usually comes in right before Christmas and that making the leadership transition now makes the most sense in terms of providing steady leadership of the organization.
“I told the original board that it would take me 10 years to get the organization to where it is today,” Briggs said. “I guess I was pretty much right.”
His decision to leave now was spurred by a heart attack he suffered during a marathon in 2015. A fellow runner saved his life, and he’s recovered well. He said he feels like he got a second chance.
“Only one in 10 or 11 survive what I went through,” Briggs said. “It does make you think a bit.”