News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
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If you’ve received an unexpected hospital bill recently due to your insurance company denying payment, you’re not alone: Coulee Medical Center staff reported an uptick in denials by insurers when the hospital attempts to collect on claims. “They’re hanging up on our billers when they call,” Chief Financial Officer Kelly Hughes told the hospital board last month as part of her monthly financial report. It’s an issue that goes far beyond the Coulee area, and in fact appears to reflect a nationwide trend that started to become evident to hospitals...
Colorama gets its name from the colorful lights the Bureau of Reclamation used to project onto the milelong concrete dam to mark the start of the summer tourism season here in the Coulee, in the years before the laser light show became a summertime staple. Nowadays, a big part of the weekend festival happens at North Dam Park in Grand Coulee: the vendor fair and food purveyors, live music, a beer garden, and this year, a little traveling circus of aerialists, stilt walkers, jugglers, clowns and...
Jericho Desautel was crowned queen of the prom Friday night, with Damon Landeros crowned king. Alice "Wheatie" Desautel said Jericho's classmates had been "nothing but amazing," supporting the girl who has a rare chromosomal disorder that causes developmental delay. "As her family, the people that love her, we find comfort that since day one, her classmates have loved her, cared for her, watch out for her, acknowledge her as their peer, and treat her like she's a part of THEM," Desautel wrote...
What if our president went to the Arlington Cemetery to put a wreath on the unknown soldier and said the soldier who gave his life to protect us was a loser and a sucker? What if our president got out of the service draft about a half dozen times by claiming one ailment after another and then bragged that he had torn up his draft card? What if he said John McCain was no hero after his airplane was shot down and the Vietnamese captured him. John did about five years of torture. Was McClain a loser and sucker also? Don Andrews...
When coming from Coulee Dam through Grand Coulee I understand people like to take a left at The Star newspaper building to save time on the way to Wilbur. If it is a safety hazard, make it a four-way stop! Or tell area police to patrol it. The money was not appropriated for signs on Federal and Main; they were bought for entry into our town from Bridgeport and Wilbur. Is that so hard? I feel like Nicholas Cage in the movie Con Air. (Why can’t you just give me the bunny????) Robert Fields...
I decided to quit my job with Potlatch Forests and move to southern Idaho so I could see my future wife more easily and not have to drive 500 miles on weekends to see her. I guess that’s when I came in contact with Idaho potatoes. If you are in Idaho you wouldn’t be served anything but. Wherever we went and ate out I would ask the waitress if these were Idaho potatoes. I did it as a lark and would get the funniest looks. The answer was usually yes, they were, or I don’t know I will ask the cook. I really didn’t care, I was just having a littl...
Unfortunately, too many pragmatic Democrats and Republicans in Congress are retiring at a time when we need them most. Two are from Washington: Reps. Derek Kilmer (D), Olympic Peninsula; and Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R), Eastern Washington. McMorris Rodgers and Kilmer cut their political teeth in Washington’s Legislature. While they faithfully followed their parties, they found ways to come together on issues vital to our state and nation. McMorris Rodgers was elected to Congress in 2004 and Kilmer in 2012. Recently, problem-solving Democrats a...
One minute, they were heading to another party. The next was chaos, blood and death. That was the scene outside the Nespelem Community Center April 18 as unveiled in an elaborate enactment involving vehicles full of Lake Roosevelt High School students. Most of the student body stood on the other side of the black plastic curtain and a taped off border. Beyond it, many of their classmates lay in a bloody scene depicting the kind of instant carnage that can happen when fragile flesh is forced...
Update: Two students have been arrested by police and taken to jail or juvenile detention, Superintendent Rod Broadnax said about 7:45 Thursday night. The two students at Lake Roosevelt Jr./Sr. High School were expelled on an emergency basis earlier Thursday after an investigation of their emails revealed threats to kill five students at the school. During an authorized investigation into one student's emails, school personnel came across a "hit list" of five students to kill, naming two of them... Full story
The prominent former “MPH” auto shop on Midway Avenue has been sold to the investment firm that owns two contiguous vacant properties to the east. But the multi-million dollar hotel once planned for the block has no immediate future, according to the firm principal. “We don’t have any plans for it at all,” Caleb McNamara of Blackfly LLC said in a phone call with The Star April 12. “It just added to our piece of the pie.” McNamara’s Blackfly LLC owns the neighboring vacant building that once housed Pepper Jack’s Bar & Grille, and the building...
"They're going to put panties on a milk cow," explains Cheryl Pryor of the six teams from local businesses participating in the "Merchants' Panty Pull" at the Cleatis Lacy Memorial Bull Riding event on Thursday, May 9. That marks Day One of the annual Colorama Festival, followed by two days of pro rodeo events, all happening at the Ridge Riders Arena in Delano. Cindy Edwards and Pryor have been Ridge Rider volunteers for years as part of a team of four to eight people. This year, Edwards says,...
Some deep thinking has been going on, and its helping. Last week, many local professionals in law enforcement, emergency medicine, and other first responders, — the folks who have to live with the possible trauma of a car crash to which they only responded to help — took time to show every local high school student just what happens in a crash. Many of them worked for weeks or months in preparation and planning. Teenagers as a group are far more likely to be involved in car crashes, and this area has too often seen the worst side of those sta...
Communities across Central Washington have been devastated by the epidemic of synthetic opioids like fentanyl, which is the leading cause of death for people ages 18-45 in the United States. Dubbed the “silent killer” of American youth, fentanyl’s lethal potency is alarming; a mere two milligrams, equivalent to 10-15 grains of table salt, constitutes a fatal dose. Bad actors in China have been taking advantage of loopholes in our laws in the United States to push these dangerous substances over our borders, and I have been working tirel...
The Raider tennis team will host the District 6 Tournament on Saturday, May 11, and Wednesday, May 15, Coach Casey Brewster said. The tournament will take advantage of the four courts at the high school, likely the newest in the district, built in 2015, and the two courts at Coulee Dam's Cole Park just across the river, originally built in the 1930s but resurfaced during Coulee Dam's Quincy Snow administration more than 10 years ago. Visiting teams will include those from Liberty Bell High...
From Newman Lake to Lake Stevens, they came to fish Banks Lake last weekend to try to catch three different species of fish on each of two days. Local Brian Walters completed the task, with the greatest combined weights to take the big prize of a tricked-out Jackson kayak. Reel Recreation, a local non-profit led by fishing friends and dedicated to promoting fishing and other outdoor activities for kids, put on the Triple Fish Challenge tournament, which started in 2013 under the local chamber...
Over the next few weeks, you'll be hearing a lot about the 67th Colorama Festival – the kickoff to the Coulee area high tourist season happening May 9-11 this year. Part vendor fair and part pro-rodeo, the early summer community party features live music, beer gardens, bull riding, a parade, two days of pro rodeo events, a raffle drawing, cowboy breakfast, riding entertainment, a Kid Zone with games and activities, a 21+ after party, and even a little variety circus show. For now, Colorama b...
High school students tomorrow may pretend to die or be injured in a mock car crash planned for Thursday morning in an exercise designed to resemble the real tragedy. That will include "toning out" police and ambulance units to respond to the event at the Nespelem Community Center, so don't panic if you hear those genuine-sounding calls. The purpose is to portray to students just what can happen in the seconds and minutes after someone makes a mistake: distracted driving, driving intoxicated,...
Emphasis patrols to discourage speeding will be popping up in Electric City, according to Coulee Dam Police Chief Paul Bowden, whose force provides police services there. The speed limit is 35 mph throughout the main corridor of Electric City, but drivers at times increase their speed before they reach the higher speed zones on either end of town, Bowden said. This can be problematic this time of year, he said, as more traffic goes in and out of the campgrounds during the warmer seasons. The limit becomes 50 mph just after Sunbanks Lake Resort...
“Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day” is on April 25th, and I think we should try something different this year: Let’s take our daughters and sons to grandma’s. The Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day Foundation says that April 25th is designed to be more than just a career day — more than the practice of “shadowing” an adult in the workplace. It’s equally important to show children “the value of their education, helping them discover the power and possibilities of work and family life…” It’s about “providing boys and girls a chance t...
For the people that have not followed political history, I would like to give you my perspective as to where the political parties have gone from the late 1950s and early 1960s. (I voted for JFK.) The Democratic Party today is where the Socialist party was in the 1950s &1960s, and a large part of the DNC is where the communist party was. The Republican Party is where the Democrats were in the late 1950s and early 1960s. To demonstrate my point, John Fitzgerald Kennedy could NEVER be nominated or elected President in the DNC party today. But he...
If a dog is man’s best friend, then why can’t a man be a dog’s best friend? I lost my little dog over a year ago. She had been with me for about 15 years. Now I don’t want to pick a fight with people who feel differently about pets. I bought my little dog when she was just a small puppy. A woman was selling her dog’s puppies out of the trunk of her car on Bureau property near The Star newspaper corner. I paid $50 for the puppy. Upon the advice of my wife, I eventually picked a female puppy, while I liked the color of the male puppy better. My i...
While wind and solar farms generate “greenhouse gas free” electricity, there are ongoing concerns over their impacts on our environment especially as a rapidly growing number of worn-out blades and panels are landing in landfills. Those blades, housed on giant wind towers reaching over 250 feet in the sky, are starting to reach the end of their useful lives (15 to 20 years) and are being taken down, cut up and hauled to burial sites. Even though over 90 percent of the decommissioned wind tow...
Sometimes a Coulee Medical Center patient needs to be transferred to specialists or trauma care at a larger hospital, in a city such as Spokane or Seattle. In critical situations, air transport may be deemed medically necessary to save a life or limb. At that point, emergency room staff start making calls to one or both of the competing EMS programs covering the Coulee area. One program is called Life Flight Network - which most people informally surveyed for this story knew about - and the...
Could be excellent pitching. Could be fast, smart base stealers. Could be good, solid bat-ting skills. It must be all of those. The Lady Raiders are having a season. The 1-A Omak Pioneers managed to get a point on them Saturday in Omak, losing 14-1. LR skunked Oroville last Thursday in Grand Coulee, 15-0. Yesterday, they scored 17 on Tonasket, holding the Tigers to 2 for their 10th win of the sea-son. They've only lost to Okanogan and ACH, once to each. The Raiders meet Manson there Thursday...
Ceremonial gold shovels overturned dirt after prayers, songs and speeches Tuesday, celebrating the coming construction of a new convalescent center north of Elmer City, where the Colville Tribes will build the new facility for elders and other clientele. Praise was high for the project and those who moved obstacles and legislatures to get it underway, but details were scarce. Jarred-Michael Erickson, chairman of the Business Council of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, said...
