The Star - News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area

by Roger S. Lucas A runaway truck early Monday morning almost made Jack’s 4-Corners Union 76 & Mini Mart a drive-in as it crashed its way through the southwest corner of the building. The driver,...

Center School could get a little crowded next fall. The district will have three first grades and three kindergarten classes as well as providing preschool for 3- to 5-year-olds, according to Superintendent Dennis Carlson. The district received word...

Candidates for upcoming elections are filing for positions on school boards, city councils, hospital boards and some junior taxing districts this week. In early filings, three have filed for positions in Hospital District 6. These include two...

A request from the town of Elmer City to get out of its wastewater plant joint operating agreement with Coulee Dam was turned down by that town council last Wednesday night. In a letter to Coulee Dam officials, Elmer City Mayor Mary Jo Carey...

Two Colville Business Council incumbents lost out in their bids for another term in the primary election certified last week. Losing in the primary were Brian Nissen, in position 1 in the Nespelem District and Darlene Zacherlie in the position 1...

Lake Roosevelt High School counselor Sue Hayes is one of this year’s senior class’s biggest boosters. Hayes spent 20-30 minutes with each senior available for an exit interview and was so impressed she made a report to the school board about this...

The Village Cinema in Coulee Dam is history. Its fate was settled last Wednesday night by mutual consent of the town council and the cinema operator, Lynette Zierden and her family. She asked for relief from her lease with the town and explained...

We were quite surprised and frankly disappointed that Coulee Dam residents are not permitted to speak at future council meetings. In recent months this input has been very positive and certainly reflective of the desires of most residents. We hope...

The town of Coulee Dam is facing a lot of issues with the sewer plant, huge increases in utility rates, the impacts of a new school, needed improvements to our parks, sidewalks, and roads. We need a better and growing relationship with our local...

About one year ago, I noticed something was going to happen with the Sewer Treatment Plant. I became curious. I attended meetings and began looking into Elmer City’s expenditures for sewer. I kept reading and researching and asking for further...

The Queen of Hearts Pageant Float was minus “One Queen of Hearts” who has been ignored or overlooked twice now and never asked to participate after the original pageant was over. Seems like this Queen of Hearts pageant is not following the...

A couple girls ride the Octopus at the Colorama carnival Friday night. More photos of the Colorama weekend are available to view online. Follow the slideshow below and just click through to see it in...

[Editor’s note: Frankie will be reporting weekly on findings at local sales and culture right here. Let us know what you think, and don’t believe everything you read.] Detective Frankie D. here with what some shoppers might consider extremely...

A drive to raise $95,000 to replace Village Cinema’s projection equipment with new digital technology has failed, and the theater’s owners hope to end their lease early, unable to continue with a broken, obsolete projector. A report on...

Three seniors at Lake Roosevelt High School have been selected as Gates Millennium Scholars, the district announced recently. Selected were Kendall Piccolo, Johnny Medina-McCraigie and Charli Knight....

It’s a big week in the coulee. Local residents and visitors will be treated to the 56th Annual Colorama Festival celebration, beginning Thursday with the opening of the carnival and ending Saturday...

Thieves broke into Banks Lake Golf Course office sometime Sunday night and took the safe from the premises. It was the second time this year that the course’s safe has been taken. The first time...

A public art hunt is on for the new K-12 school project. Public buildings are required to set aside one-half of one percent of the cost of construction for art. The school board decided Monday night to seek art produced by local artists, that is...

A comment from a resident of Coulee Dam who asked why something isn’t being done to get people to clean up their properties, got a quick response from the police department. This past week police went on a real campaign to notify property owners...

The results of Saturday’s Colville Business Council primary election, minus absentee ballots, show that in two of the races, it appears incumbents are in for serious challenge. The Keller District position 1 incumbent, Darlene Zacherie got 23 votes...

The Grand Coulee/Coulee City meals program will not be affected by any cutbacks due to the sequestering of funds by Congress, Director Myrna Schryvers said Monday. While the Meals on Wheels program might feel some effect from federal cutbacks, the...

Mr. Ward is right about living here in Coulee Dam. We have the Credit Union to save our money, the Variety Store to spend our money, Harvest Foods to purchase maple bars and the waste water treatment plant to piss the rest of our money away. Bruce...

Most voters agree that big corporations and the wealthy should start paying their fair share in taxes. But of course big corporations and the wealthy don’t want to do that. They want to pay less, and they are used to getting their way. So what do...

Somewhere along the way, most of us have had a teacher who influenced our lives in a big way. Perhaps a teacher encouraged us to pursue a particular interest or skill, challenged us to push the limits and achieve more, or saw something in us that we...

• Congratulations to Fern Blaylock, who was recognized by Gov. Inslee last week for her volunteer service. Often nominated for The Star Volunteer of the Year award, Blaylock’s service is something many people in the local community appreciate....

The Coeur d'Alene Press reported on its website May 1 that a firm based there has recently been awarded a contract to build an administration building for the Colville Tribe. Contractors Northwest, Inc. as offices in Coeur d'Alene and Boise, Idaho....

A fire in a service bay at Jack’s Four Corners Union 76 that could have been a disaster was quickly extinguished by a combination of firefighters mid-morning Monday. A vehicle in the service bay at...

A task that many thought would be difficult proved a piece of cake for th e school board Monday night. Grand Coulee Dam School District Superintendent Dennis Carlson had asked the board to allow him to name a committee to come up with three possible...

It was an unlikely night, with community activist Greg Wilder, who has opposed just about everything about Coulee Dam’s proposed wastewater treatment plant, going to work for the town. He isn’t being hired by the town, but he volunteered to...

Elmer City has advised the town of Coulee Dam that their agreement on the wastewater treatment plant is over. A letter dated April 22, states that a 1976, 50-year agreement no longer controls the relationship between the towns, and after Elmer City...

The Coulee Dam branch of Bank of America will close its doors Aug. 23, corporate officials stated in notices distributed recently, Notices to business and regular customers started going out April 19, and customers have been referred to other BofA...

Fern Blaylock, a veteran volunteer at Center School, received an award April 25 from Washington Gov. Jay Inslee. The award, for outstanding volunteer service, was presented to her at the Governor’s...

Lake Roosevelt High School Principal Brad Wilson is taking a position as principal of the middle school in the Chelan School District. The school board accepted his resignation Monday night. Wilson has been in the Grand Coulee Dam School District 11...

About three months ago, the Coulee Dam Town Council was presented with a petition signed by hundreds. Two of the items on that petition were a roll-back of the burdensome sewer rates and a demand for the town to look at alternative solutions for the...

In March, both the House and Senate passed budget plans. Now, President Obama has released his budget. The Congressional Budget Office and Office of Management and Budget will be scrutinizing each proposed new revenue increase, every proposed...

A public art hunt is on for the new K-12 school project. Public buildings are required to set aside one-half of one percent of the cost of construction for art. The school board decided Monday night to seek art produced by local artists, that is...

Grand Coulee Dam School District Athletic Director Rich Black reports the following is an updated sports schedule for Lake Roosevelt High School as of Friday afternoon. May 6-11: *Monday, May 6th: Baseball District Playoffs versus White Swan at...

The first time I met Guillermo Guzman he had just done the butterfly stroke across Crescent Bay and back in September. I had taken his photograph for possible use in the paper and so introduced myself and asked his name. His thick Mexican accent was...

At an arraignment hearing for his brother Monday, Carlos Guzman Romo anxiously showed a reporter a portfolio stuffed full of evidence he thought showed that his brother is a “really good guy” who...

Life changed for Charli Knight after her sister was murdered by her husband in 2009. Charli was a freshman in high school at the time, and her dream was to become a chef, an ambition that lost its...

A California woman arrested last Thursday who allegedly made a bomb threat while on a tour at Grand Coulee Dam, was booked into Okanogan County Jail and released the next day on her personal recognizance. Christina Frisvold, 33, was arrested by...

Science teacher Ralph Rise was presented with a statewide award last week, an example for educators across the state. Sonia Siegel Vexler, co-director of LASER, the Pacific Science Center’s...

Grand Coulee is going to make an effort to get a daycare center in its Central Business District zone. The public interest in a daycare center has attracted the attention of city officials, and the ways and means of making a zoning change was...

The K-12 school project is underway. It started at 9 a.m. Tuesday with a formal groundbreaking, and immediately Grand Coulee Dam School District Superintendent Dennis Carlson met with builder represen...

Grand Coulee officials are trying to get a sidewalk project on Spokane Avenue changed to the same kind of improvement on Federal Avenue. A sidewalk on Spokane Way lost its main focus when city officials realized that Center School would no longer be...

Electric service went down in the town of Coulee Dam just after 7 a.m. Wednesday, morning and would not be restored until late afternoon. Lake Roosevelt High School dismissed for the day, and...

The Chamber of Commerce will host a beer tent during the Colorama Festival celebration at North Dam Park. Chamber Manager Peggy Nevsimal said a 1500 square-foot tent will be located on the tennis court at North Dam Park and staffed by volunteers....

The Lower Crest Drive project in Coulee Dam will begin Monday, public works director Barry Peacock reported. The quarter-mile road project will go from River Drive to the city limits at the bottom of the hill. Granite Construction, from Wenatchee...

If Mark Jenson, the Bureau of Reclamation power manager sees it as a hardship living right here presently, he should have tried it before we got our Variety Store. A lot of us enjoy life in Coulee Dam because each morning, Iris, our town’s mail...

Last summer, news reports broke that the U.S. Department of Labor was effectively holding hostage the crops of blueberry farmers in Oregon until they signed documents agreeing to alleged violations to federal labor laws. Since then, similar cases hav...