News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
Sorted by date Results 1 - 25 of 33
Elmer City received word this week that it has been awarded a “Complete Streets” grant from the state Department of Transportation’s “Transportation Improvement Board.” Elmer City had been nominated by an unidentified agency for the $250,000 award, allowing a three-year window for the use of the funds. Public works Director Jimmer Tillman said he had been hopeful that Elmer City would be selected to receive the grant and that he had already submitted the town’s work plan to TIB and it had been approved. Tillman said that the council wil...
Both Lake Roosevelt Schools and Nespelem School will start two hours late today. Freezing rain is making roads and sidewalks dangerous. The National Weather Service has issued a freezing rain advisory through 10 p.m. tonight....
After losing 58-53 last night in Tonasket against the Lady Tigers, the Lady Raiders will play in the third round of league playoffs today in Bridgeport at 3:30 p.m. Lake Roosevelt will face Liberty Bell, which lost to Brewster last night 58-44, competing for the third- and fourth-place spots in the 2017 CWB League 2B Girls Basketball Tournament. LR beat Liberty Bell in a comeback win 46-40 in mid January. If the Lady Raiders win, they’ll play in the 2017 District 5/6 2B Girls Basketball Tournament at 3:15 p.m., Feb. 14 at Eastmont Junior H...
Nespelem School will start two hours late Friday and will not hold preschool at all....
All athletic events scheduled for today with the Grand Coulee Dam School District are canceled, the district announced at 11:30 this morning, Thursday, Feb. 9. The girls' basketball game in Tonasket tonight has been rescheduled for Friday....
Lake Roosevelt and Nespelem schools canceled after-school programs today and will both start two hours late tomorrow, Thursday, Feb. 9 due to snow....
Alex Yeutushok, from Portland, Oregon, pulls a whitefish from a hole in the ice while fishing on Banks Lake with his friends Thursday afternoon. Using salad shrimp as bait, he used a fishfinder and a very thin line almost invisible in the water, noting that the fish are very skeptical if they see the line. The ice is about a foot thick and sings an eerie song as it shifts on the water. Ice fishermen drill holes in the ice, about six inches in diameter, with a large ice auger. Yeutushok learned...
The Electric City 25-year Pathway and Revitalization plan would change the face of the city by adding a number of visual treats. While the plan suggests a number of changes, it will depend on successful grant applications to become a reality. Its Ice Age Floods theme would take shape through sculptures and signage. A dominant feature suggested in the plan would be a metal life-sized sculpture of a woolly mammoth greeting residents and visitors who access the city from the south. The suggested mammoth is huge and a fitting symbol of the Ice Age...
Elmer City and Coulee Dam are in a stink over less than $1,000 in current sewage treatment bills. Elmer City has recalculated Coulee Dam’s third quarter wastewater treatment bill by $870.74, according to exchanges between the two towns. Elmer City submitted payment of $9,034.11 on Coulee Dam’s bill for $9,904.85 covering the third quarter last year. In dispute is how Coulee Dam allocates the wastewater treatment plant manager Tim Lynch’s time. Elmer City Mayor Gail Morin says the plant operator is called on to do work outside the waste...
People are frustrated with crime and feel powerless to do anything about it. That was evident at Tuesday night's Community Watch meeting held at the Almira/Coulee Dam Community Church. It was the second Community Watch meeting held in Coulee Dam in an effort to try to find a way to curb crime. About 25 people showed up for the meeting. One thing decided on was to determine places to put up neighborhood crime watch signs. The next will be how to finance the cost of the signs. One woman said she...
New chief in Coulee Dam It’s Paul Bowden’s turn to be police chief in Coulee Dam, according to Mayor Greg Wilder, who explained at the Jan. 25 town council meeting that state law does not allow towns to keep the same interim police chief for more than four months at a time. Sgt. Larry Hall had been named interim chief a year ago after then-chief Pat Collins resigned in 2015. The town has recently hired another officer and will send him to the state academy for training this month. Two others have also applied for positions with the police dep...
Will Friedlander and Megan Abel sing "Little Talks," from the group "Of Monsters and Men," during a talent show at Lake Roosevelt Junior/Senior High School Friday night. The duet took the top spot in the contest, earning loud applause. A video of a portion of their performance, posted on The Star's Facebook page, reached nearly 1,900 people and garnered a string of positive comments. - Scott Hunter photo...
One of Grand Coulee Dam School District's buses received damage to its front end last Thursday about 7:15 a.m. when the driver swerved off the road near Nespelem to avoid hitting a vehicle in front of it. There were no injuries, and only one child was on the bus at the time. Damage to the bus was limited to the front bumper and security arm. The Washington State Patrol issued veteran driver David Gates a citation for driving too closely. Gates has been driving bus for the district about 12...
You can access the Grand Coulee Dam District School survey online (http://www.gcdsd.org) and have an opportunity to make comments about the good things happening in the district and things you believe need improving. The district office stated this week that the survey will be open until the end of February. The school board plans to use the information from the surveys in shaping its Strategic Plan. School officials said this week that 83 surveys have been received to date, most returned online. The school district announced the survey after...
The marina that serves the north end of Lake Roosevelt will close in the spring, the National Park Service announced Monday in a press release. The Kettle Falls Marina will close April 30 when the NPS contract with Lake Roosevelt Vacations, Inc. expires. An “effort to select a contractor to continue operations was cancelled to give park officials more time to evaluate visitor services in the northern portion of Lake Roosevelt,” the NPS said. “The National Park Service will take a fresh look at public needs and wants with regard to servi...
This letter is written to Congressman Dan Newhouse in response to his letter to concerned constituents about the planned repeal of the Affordable Care Act: Dear Congressman Newhouse, As you know, many Americans are concerned about their access to health care if the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is repealed without a meaningful replacement. One of the key provisions of the ACA, which you supported in your recent letter to me, is that insurers are not permitted to discriminate against individuals with pre-existing conditions. In other words, someone...
Another grant application for your spending enjoyment has been written by Councilmember Gayle Swagerty and submitted to the Community Forestry Assistance Grant Program, a part of the Washington State Department of Natural Resources. The Project Name for the Town of Coulee Dam is the “Urban Forest Management and Maintenance Plan.” In my letter of Jan. 25, I stated that the next grant application would cost the citizens of Coulee Dam $10,000. Well, I was wrong. The actual cost to the Town of Coulee Dam will be $11,108.45. The total cost of thi...
In 1993, President Bill Clinton was pictured holding a Washington state apple while promoting the virtues of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). That photo only underscored the importance of the agreement and our trade with Mexico and Canada. Washington is the most trade-dependent state in the nation. The Puget Sound Business Journal (PSBJ) reported last November that Washington state exported at least $134.5 billion worth of goods to Canada and Mexico since the agreement was signed. The dust-up over NAFTA focuses on Mexico from...
The Super Bowl was Sunday, and if you missed it you missed a little bit of NFL history. Tom Brady and Coach Bill Belichick solidified their spots in the annals of Best QB and Best Coach of all time. Granted, I do not care for either of them, but the results of Sunday’s game made it perfectly clear. Tom Brady must be mentioned with the likes of Montana, Manning, Favre and Elway as the greatest of all time; and, yes, I must admit, as much as it hurts to say this, he may be on top of that list. T...
The O'Donnell brothers, Colin and "Spud," emerge from the waters of the Columbia River, below the downstream face of Grand Coulee Dam. These professional divers were engaged by the Bureau of Reclamation to assist in the river channel improvement operations. – Feb. 20, 1945 photo...
On Tuesday, January 31, 2017, Cheryl N. Chapman passed away peacefully while surrounded by loved ones at Coulee Medical Center in Grand Coulee, Washington. Her death marked the end of a courageous three-year battle with triple negative breast cancer. She was 56 years old. Born in Coulee Dam, Washington, on February 3, 1960, Cheryl was the fourth child and third daughter of the late Irene and Kenneth Ehlers. She lived most of her life in the Grand Coulee area; her adolescent years spent on the...
For eight weeks in November and December, this group of six girls earned a NASA diploma by working on special science curriculum designed by NASA around the International Space Station program. They learned about different types of sciences involved in the ISS. Each week the students were assigned a different mission. A special thank you to Cathy LaPlace for making this program happen for our students. From left, back row: Jenna Cleveland, Carly Neddo, and Sawyer Steffens; front row: Celeste...
Chamber This Week The Grand Coulee Dam Area Chamber of Commerce will meet at noon, this Thursday, February 9, at La Presa Mexican Restaurant, Grand Coulee. On the agenda is general business. Okanogan County Demos to Meet Okanogan County Democrats will be holding a potluck followed by a meeting on Saturday, February 11, at Bob Thomsons, 41 Pleasant Glade Road. Go to Tonasket, turn on Haville Road, go two-and-one-half blocks, it’s on the left side, the one with the barrel roof. Okanogan County School Retirees’ Association The Okanogan County Sch...
Joining the Arbor Day Foundation is an ideal way to get in the mood for spring planting. Anyone who joins the Foundation in February 2017 will receive 10 free Colorado blue spruce trees or 10 free redbud trees to plant when the weather turns warm. The free trees are part of the nonprofit Foundation’s Trees for America campaign. The Tree City USA program has supported community forestry throughout the country for the past 40 years. The trees will be shipped postpaid at the right time for planting, between March 1 and May 31, with enclosed p...
Whitney and Robert Phillips, of Nespelem, Washington, are proud to announce the birth of their daughter, River Arlyce Phillips, born Wednesday, January 25, 2017, at Coulee Medical Center in Grand Coulee, Washington. She weighed 6 lbs., 13 oz., and was 19.5 inches in length at birth. Siblings include Jojo Cavasos Jr., age 8, and Alexavier Phillips, age 4. Maternal grandmother is Wendy Clark and paternal grandparents are Bob and Charlene Phillips, all of Nespelem....