News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
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Well, it lasted longer than 8 seconds, but after just four years of being named Shane Proctor Park, that park is going back to its old name. The park on SR-174, in Grand Coulee between a gas station and La Presa restaurant is called Grand Coulee City Park. In 2017, the city council approved renaming the park after professional bull-riding champion and Grand Coulee native Shane Proctor. Now, after just four years as Shane Proctor Park, it's being changed back to Grand Coulee City Park. On August...
The mental health of students should be addressed more regularly by Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, according to a letter school superintendents sent to him and to the state Department of Health. Grand Coulee Dam School District Superintendent Paul Turner is one of 40 superintendents in Washington that signed an Aug. 18 letter to Inslee in response to a July 28 DOH update requiring masks for all K-12 students and staff. “OUR STUDENTS NEED HOPE,” the letter starts. “Coming off an unmasked summer of Washington State being ‘fully open’, our students...
Nespelem School students will go to work like many of their parents do — four days a week — after the school board voted Monday night to approve the new schedule that ends the week on Thursday instead of Friday. Principal/Superintendent Effie Dean told the Nespelem School Board that, in applying for a variance from the state to allow the schedule change, she explained that the proposed schedule would actually give students 20% more time in school using longer days. The change is good for the community, too, she said she told the state, because...
Students at Lake Roosevelt Schools may start saying “TGIF” for two more reasons this school year: early release, and a different educational approach. On Fridays, students at LR, from kindergarten age to seniors in high school, will be participating on “STEAM” focused projects, or projects that revolve around Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math. “Activities and experiences will look different depending on grade level and topic,” Lake Roosevelt Junior/Senior High Principal Sara Kennedy explained to The Star in an email Tuesday...
Here is a small example of some of the history of the climate change theosophy. “It is already too late for the world to avoid a long period of famine. Paul Ehrlich said the time of famines is upon us and will be its worst and most disastrous by 1975. He said population of the United States is already too big, that birth control may have to be accomplished by making it involuntary; by putting sterilizing agents into staple food and drinking water and the Roman Catholic Church should pressure into going along.” — The Salt Lake Tribune, 11/17...
Life is full of changes, and they hit at an early age. I was born on a farm outside Palouse, and we didn’t have indoor plumbing. Our facility was located about 25 yards from the house and alongside our parking area. It was a two-hole outdoor toilet. I could never figure out why we had a two-hole toilet? I guess I never felt like I knew anyone well enough to sit there with another person beside me. We didn’t have toilet paper, only a Sears Roebuck catalog. You get the picture? One of my greatest fears is that I would fall in. Now nighttime and...
When thinking of England’s fabled Sherwood Forest, the medieval images of Robin Hood and his band of archers and swordsmen hiding in the woods giving the Sheriff of Nottingham a hard time comes to mind. Who would envision a crew of young American oil workers concealed among the giant oaks drilling oil wells? However, the crude production from those wells was essential in helping fuel the D-Day invasion launched from English shores in 1944. Until Guy Woodward and Grace Steele Woodward published “The Secret of Sherwood Forest – Oil production in...
OLYMPIA – The Washington State Department of Health (DOH) warns people should not take ivermectin to prevent or treat COVID-19, following today’s Health Alert Network advisory released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Ivermectin is an antiparasitic drug used commonly in humans and animals. Although it is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of some parasitic worms, external parasites and skin conditions, evidence shows it is ine...
An agreement, new this year, allows state firefighting helicopters to park at the Grand Coulee Dam Airport and that's helping put out local fires sooner than later. The Washington State Department of Natural Resources has an emergency-use agreement with Grant County Port District 7 to pay $1,500 a month to keep two helicopters parked at the airport, plus $750 for each additional one that may go there, based on available space. "It looked like a strategic place for us," said Russ Lane, assistant...
An outdoor music festival in Grant County spread Covid-19 across the state, perhaps underscoring the new realization that the most common variant of the virus that causes it spreads far more easily, even outdoors. The Watershed Musical Festival held outdoors at The Gorge July 30-Aug. 1 is associated with over 230 new cases of COVID-19, Grant County Health District reported Friday. Those cases were spread across the state, identified among Washington residents of King, Grant, Pierce, Skagit, Kitsap, Whatcom, Kittitas, Okanogan, San Juan,...
A new semi-truck to haul the trailers of trash that come out of the Delano Regional Transfer Station to a landfill in Ephrata will cost a pretty penny in the ballpark of $180,000-$200,000. The Regional Board of Mayors, which includes mayors from Electric City, Grand Coulee, Coulee Dam, and Elmer City, discussed with transfer station manager Randy Gumm Aug. 9 the need for a new truck. City Clerk Peggy Nevsimal of Electric City said possible funding options for the truck included a grant/loan package from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and Am...
The lack of animal control locally has been an ongoing issue since time immemorial, but gears are turning in Electric City minds to find a solution for all the local towns. It’s an issue that rears its head at least a couple times a decade, but at the Regional Board of Mayors meeting Aug. 9, Electric City employee Mike Shear and City Clerk Peggy Nevsimal spoke to the board concerning details on how to set up an animal control program. Shear, who currently does code enforcement work for the city and works for the Delano Regional Transfer S...
Strong winds Sunday night and early Monday pushed the Summit Trail Fire west of Inchelium to the northeast, south and southeast, igniting large spot fires on Brush and Tungsten Mountains. The blaze has torched 40,608 acres and is 35% contained. Along with the 376-acre Upper Lime Creek Fire, 421 personnel were engaged in the fight to quell it. Colville Tribal Police issued more Level 2 and 3 evacuations while fire crews and heavy equipment protected structures in the new areas, along with air support. Priorities Tuesday included protecting...
It’s time to play the blame game. Who exactly is at fault for the rapid collapse of Afghanistan? There are those who can’t see the similarities between this collapse and the one we saw in South Vietnam. I think it is a carbon copy! I know of a local serviceman who was on one of the last helicopters out. The French failed in Vietnam So we went in, and with 55,000 dead later, we barely got our people out before the full collapse. On my three trips to Vietnam I was shocked to see the streets full of fighting-age men and women who were content to...
Each year Americans throw away more than three billion batteries constituting 180,000 tons of hazardous material, and the situation is likely to get much worse as the world shifts to electric vehicles. Everyday-green.com reports more than 86,000 tons of single-use alkaline batteries (AAA, AA, C and D) are thrown away. They power electronic toys and games, portable audio equipment and flashlights and make up 20 percent of the household hazardous materials in our garbage dumps. Unlike composted waste, batteries are hazardous and contaminate our...
What if all school sports were played at the same location? The Grand Coulee Dam School District Board of Directors recently looked at slides of what the Lake Roosevelt Schools campus could look like under different options. The designs, from the school's recently hired NAC Architecture, showed a football/soccer field with a track around it being located near the current one in Coulee Dam, but at a different angle. A separate baseball field and softball field could fit near it. A new gym could b...
Despite strong winds and high heat Thursday, firefighters on the Whitmore Fire south and west of Nespelem managed to limit fire growth to just 18 more acres without the help of aircraft on the 57,478-acre fire, Friday morning’s update says. The wind out of the north and the smoke it brought with it from other fires kept aircraft out of the effort. High heat is expected again today. The National Weather Service issued an excessive heat warning through 8 p.m. Saturday. Air quality was expected t...
With no music teacher at the school, Lake Roosevelt Junior/Senior High students will have a different kind of opportunity to play music. Music teacher Karen Pace retired at the end of the last school year from a position not easily filled, but a club called Raider Rock Band was approved by the Grand Coulee Dam School District Board of Directors during their Aug. 9 meeting. History teacher Justin Thompson will sponsor the club. He says there are eight students he thinks will definitely join it, and at least 25 who expressed interest. The club...
Unofficial results of the Aug. 3 primary election for Grand Coulee City Council position 1 were posted late Monday at results.vote.wa.gov. Ben Hughes garnered 101 votes for 65.16%. He will face Tracy Justice Wright in the November general election. Wright got 17.42% of the votes with 27. Not far behind, Frank Jones garnered 22 votes. Five ballots were cast for write-ins. The next vote count and certification will take place Aug. 18. Voter turnout countywide was 27.75% across 45 precincts and...
The Olympic Games are over. I watched about enough of the competition that I was interested in — mainly track and field, basketball and volleyball. While the games register winners and losers, it is my opinion that there are no losers. It is no small feat to represent your country in the games. It takes thousands of hours of practice, dedication, and sometimes luck to get on the Olympic team. I don’t recall ever personally meeting an Olympic competitor from any country. A shirttail relative of mine was determined that their young daughter wou...
Time is short, but action is necessary! Gov. Jay Inslee and Democrats who control the state legislature need to postpone implementing the sweeping “Long-Term Services and Supports Trust Program” to determine its future financial viability and find better alternatives for coverage. The new law, also known as the Washington Cares Act, is a mandatory, public, state-run, long-term care insurance program. Beginning Jan. 1, 2022, Washington employers must withhold a new payroll tax ($58 per $10,000 of wages) to fund it. Even then, some paying the...
A loud US Army training exercise on a hillside above town drew a different kind of fire at Coulee Dam’s city council meeting July 28, a small-caliber complaint compared to the big guns that alarmed citizens late at night July 22. Bob Hendrickson told the council he was disappointed that people had not been given any notice that a training was about to happen that might sound like a terrorist attack against Grand Coulee Dam. He said that he and many other people he talked to had worried about that as they listened to automatic weapons and w...
The Whitmore Fire is located on the Colville Reservation south of Omak Lake and west of Nespelem, WA. The Incident Command Post at Nespelem Community Center is closed to all but essential personnel to help ensure the health and safety of firefighters and community members. Operations Yesterday, fire fighters took advantage of cooler temperatures, higher moisture levels, and less active fire behavior to secure stretches of fireline. The southwest to southeast borders of the fire along Columbia...
Inchelium, Wa. – The cold front that moved into the area yesterday brought measurable rain to the Summit Trail Fire, Upper Lime Creek Fire, and Chuweah Creek Fire. This moisture gives firefighters the opportunity to build direct fire line, while fire behavior is still moderate. Even though this moisture is helpful, the fire is not yet out. A drying trend will start today and continue with warmer temperatures throughout the week which will increase fire activity. Firefighters will hit the fire hard today with more direct attack in areas where p...
Several new fires have started on the Colville Reservation following a lightning storm Tuesday night, and evacuations are in effect, with the largest of the fires already estimated at 2,000 acres. Residents from Kartar Valley, Goose Flats East to the net pens on the Columbia River Road and everything north of that road have been notified of a Level 3 Evacuation, meaning leave immediately, the Mt. Tolman Fire Center said in a release Thursday afternoon. Kartar Road is closed. Residents south of C...