News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
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Kids in the Grand Coulee area can now receive a free book in the mail every month until their 6th birthday, courtesy of a partnership between the Dolly Parton Imagination Library and Friends of the Grand Coulee Area Library. It's one of several ways the local Friends group supports the community and local library branch, according to board President Nancy Carlson, who made a presentation on behalf of the 501(c)3 nonprofit organization at the Grand Coulee City Council meeting Feb. 20. "The...
One way to get people involved might just be to throw a good party. Or as they call it at the Indian Education Program at Lake Roosevelt Schools, a "Family Engagement Night." They had a good one last week, as 230 people showed up to an event they'd planned for 100. "We were blown away by the attendance," program coordinator Ashley Three Irons-Atkins told the school board Monday night. The theme for the Feb. 22 event was a valentine "Be My Huckleberry" relationship-building emphasis. Dinner was...
Renata Rollins joins The Star this week as a part-time reporter. She will cover news related to Grand Coulee City Hall, Electric City, and Coulee Medical Center, as well as occasional features and community stories. Rollins spent early childhood in Colville, and grew up in Spokane in a multigenerational house with her parents, siblings and grandmother. She first visited the Grand Coulee area at age 11, on a family camping trip to Steamboat Rock, and fell in love with the basalt and sage. "We...
It may be next fall, or perhaps in February 2025, but local voters will be asked to decide on forming a new taxing district to support local ambulance service. Fire Chief Ryan Fish told the city council Tuesday night that a lot of work needs to be done between now and then, but demand for services is only growing, and at a rate that can’t be supported long-term doing business the way it has been done for decades. In 2015, Grand Coulee’s ambulance service went on 391 calls. In 2023, the number was 628, including only 240 within the city, accordi...
Things have changed over the last four decades in law enforcement. John Tufts has witnessed the changes. The police chief in Grand Coulee is retiring in March, and agreed to chat about what he's learned along the way. There's less respect for people in general now, a change that started about the time cell phones became popular 25 years or so ago. Tufts isn't talking about respect for police, just for people in general, and it's linked to a lack of communication, linked to age, which has an...
Grant County's Interagency Narcotics Enforcement Team, aka INET, on Feb. 13 arrested two people during a drug trafficking investigation in the Grand Coulee area, the Grant County Sheriff's Office stated in a release last week. Grand Coulee Police, assisted by Coulee Dam Police, pulled over a car containing 42-year-old Tony Gonzalez of Electric City and 36-year-old Latecia Perez of Moses Lake near Grand Coulee Avenue and SR-174. With a search warrant, INET investigators said they found Perez had...
People noticed police activity Tuesday as multiple patrol cars converged on cars parked outside Hometown Pizza in mid-afternoon. Two people were arrested there. An officer who said he was with the Interagency Narcotics Enforcement Team said they were not through. They headed to Fourth Street in Electric City where a house was surrounded by police cars. Three people inside the house were in custody briefly but were released. An expected press release about the event was not available before...
Grand Coulee’s new mayor, Mike Eylar, has proposed a joint meeting with the city councils of four local cities. Eylar brought the idea up at the Regional Board of Mayors meeting Wednesday. He said he and many local elected officials attended a training at Grand Coulee City Hall recently when he was surprised to see many officials from other cities there too. “It was exciting to have a good portion of the various city councils in attendance,” he said. He first broached the idea to Mayor Bob Poch, of Coulee Dam, who said he liked the idea. “Mayb...
A study on a senior housing project is moving forward with a $350,000 grant through the state Department of Commerce, put into the state budget by the Legislature at the request of 7th District Rep. Joel Kretz (R-Wauconda). It gained bipartisan support and was included in the 2023-2025 biennial budget and signed into law by Gov. Jay Inslee. Center Senior Living President Cheryl Hoffman said the “funds provide planning dollars for a study to assess operating costs of an assisted living and memory care facility in Grand Coulee.” The project got...
Two propositions on local ballots passed by nearly the same results Tuesday. Electric City's Proposition 1, to de-annex four large parcels of land the city annexed several years ago, passed by about 81%, 169-40. Nespelem School District 14's Proposition 1, seeking a replacement levy, also passed by a little over 81%, 62-14. Electric City sought to partially undo the annexation it achieved in 2009, shrinking its boundaries to exclude four parcels owned by state or federal governments. They are...
A low cloud pattern happens to catch the sun just right near Crescent Bay for dramatic effect. Winter is apparently back, with lows in the high 20s and highs in the 30s. Check our weather outlook on page 3. - Scott Hunter photo...
The soft light of candles illuminates the Lake Roosevelt gym Monday night as students, staff and community members gather to reflect on the loss of student Ambrose Moore, who died unexpectedly on Friday. The editorial on page two recalls the experience. - Scott Hunter photo...
Voters in the Nespelem School District 14 are being asked to approve a new tax levy to replace one that will expire this year, for taxes to be collected from 2025 to 2028. The ballot question says the amount sought by the district is $40,000 for each of those years. The tax rate is estimated at $2.15 per thousand dollars of assessed valuation on real property, or $215 for a $100,000 property. Proposition 1 was approved last year by the Nespelem School Board of Directors. The levy would pay for educational programs and operational expenses not...
Elmer City residents met recently to hear about planning efforts for the town's parks and about early results of an ongoing survey on park preferences in the town. City planner Kurt Danison of Highland Associates said the room full of people Jan. 24 was a better turnout than he usually sees for planning meetings in much larger towns, and that interest is what's needed. He said the town so far had 52 people who had responded to a survey on their park preferences, 29 in one day. Nearly 71 percent...
A sea of red, white and blue covered the Capitol steps as hundreds of Washingtonians proudly waved American flags and demanded hearings on six initiatives that would roll back taxes, give parents more rights and police more authority. The initiatives funded by the political action group Let’s Go Washington all received the requisite number of signatures to be approved for consideration but have yet to receive a hearing from the Legislature. In all, 2.6 million citizens signed the petitions. Republicans say the Constitution demands that i...
Coulee Medical Center, along with a couple dozen other public hospitals in Washington state, has been ordered by the state attorney general to provide surgical abortions. The hospital has offered abortion by medicine, but not surgery. That violates the Reproductive Privacy Act, according to Attorney General Bob Ferguson who wrote to CMC in November, stating it was in violation of the law because it fails to offer “substantially equivalent” care to those seeking an abortion, a standard it must meet under the law. Any hospital that can offer to... Full story
Scheduled to start in mid-February, a 10-mile, slope stabilization project near Soap Lake will seek to reduce rockfall onto the highway, the Washington Department of Transportation says. It's unclear if it's part of their New Year's resolution, but the slopes along State Route 17 from mileposts 76 to 85 in Grant County will start to look trimmer this year. To make travel from Soap Lake to Coulee City safer for locals and visitors, a contractor for the Washington State Department of...
In an effort to help high school students prepare for a future full of options, STCU is making an unprecedented effort to help families with completing the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). The credit union is offering FAFSA assistance, after hours at STCU branch locations throughout Eastern Washington and North Idaho. An additional 21 opportunities are being offered, with assistance from trained volunteers who are STCU employees. Completing the FAFSA is a critical step for those who may decide to obtain specialized career...
An immature bald eagle takes off from a treetop at Crescent Bay on Lake Roosevelt looking a little worse for wear with ragged feathers Jan 24. Two of the big birds were in the small tree together near a parking area. - Scott Hunter photo...
Electric City has a lot going on, and the mayor wanted people to have a chance to learn, ask questions and share their thoughts on a several key projects, so the city held a town-hall type meeting at the fire hall Tuesday night. Mayor Diane Kohout spoke with a roomful of citizens about an upcoming vote on de-annexing four parcels of property the city annexed several years ago. Those can't be developed, belong to federal or state agencies, and sometimes require services from the city, such as...
Washingtonians may lose their cherished ultra-late-night sunsets in the summer if Washington state opts for permanent Pacific Standard Time (PST). "If Congress had acted, we would not be here with this bill," remarked Sen. Mike Padden, R-Spokane Valley. The U.S. Senate, in March 2022, passed the Sunshine Protection Act of 2021 that would have made daylight saving permanent, but it has not been approved by the House. The measure now under consideration in the Legislature would have Washington swi...
Until further notice, Keller Ferry users who travel across the Columbia River on State Route 21 should continue to find alternate routes, the state Department of Transportation says. The Keller Ferry (M/V Sanpoil) was removed from service Wednesday, Jan. 10, due to an electrical issue that caused transmission issues during sailing. While troubleshooting the vessel’s electrical systems that week, technicians discovered that an additional electrical breaker system had failed. Coupled with the recent arctic air this past weekend, the vessel e...
A police officer couldn't wait for the fire department to evacuate a woman inside a home that was burning in Coulee Dam last week. Officer Josh Watkins went back to the home he'd visited a few minutes before for an unrelated matter after the dispatch center in Moses Lake told him a bedroom in the house at 1107 River Drive was now on fire. It was 5:23 p.m. Watkins arrived and saw large flames coming out of the bedroom at the northeast corner of the house. Young people he'd just spoken with were...
A citizen initiative aimed at giving police wider discretion on when they engage in high-speed pursuits was forwarded to the Legislature on Jan. 11. Secretary of State Steve Hobbs notified the Legislature petitions for Initiative 2113 meet all legal requirements. Initiative 2113 backers want to amend a law on police pursuit that passed in 2021, which requires officers to have “probable cause” instead of “reasonable suspicion” to engage in pursuits. Critics say that measure hinders law enforcement officers who want to pursue possible lawbrea...
Grant PUD staff have recommended transitioning the utility’s current “Active-E” ethernet technology for to-the-home fiber-optic service with industry standard “passive optical network” or PON technology for a more cost effective and scalable service with greater longevity. IT Manager David Parkhurst told commissioners last week the PON technology would use a lot of the same infrastructure as the existing network, the PUD said in a release, but it would mean lower maintenance and operation costs, faster upload and download speeds, better cy...