News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
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Coulee Dam's wastewater customers will shoulder an additional $2 a month on their sewer bills after the city council solved two big problems with one vote last Wednesday. The council voted 3-1 to accept an additional $1.2 million in loan and grant money to pay for two new lift stations for pumping sewage to the new wastewater treatment facility. The additional $304,000 in a 40-year loan and $909,000 in grant money, with an additional $39,000 from the town budget, brings the total project cost to...
Grant Coulee turned down the idea of turning over a stretch of B Street to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation near where USBR’s new fire station is being built. The idea came up in May at the city’s council meeting with possible benefits including not having to maintain the road and putting the dollar savings towards other streets. B Street is currently closed from where it intersects Division Street to SR-155 because of construction on the USBR fire station being built along SR-155. The street is also used as an alternative route through and aro...
Lake Roosevelt Schools' SHARP Kids program, which includes academic as well as hands-on activities, will continue for another five years after receiving a grant that will fund the program with approximately $270,000 a year via the 21st Century grant. "Through the efforts of a substantial number of people in our school and community, and outside of our community (including grant writer Joyce Garrett out of Wenatchee), we were awarded the 21st Century Community Learning Center grant," said Nancy...
It's not easy swimming to the ocean and back. The Grand Coulee Library hosted a presentation titled "Swimming with the Salmon: The Epic Survival Game" June 17, in which children learned "about the life cycle of salmon, as well as efforts river partners throughout the region take to help salmon overcome the obstacles they encounter on their epic journey," according to a press release from Grant PUD which presented the program. "Everyone will get a better appreciation of salmon and their...
Working with lavender is some of the most pleasant smelling work a person can do. Mary Jo Monteith, who lives on 38 acres out along SR-174 in the general area of Spring Canyon, grows about 1,400 lavender plants on her property that looks like a big patch of purple from the highway. She's grown lavender there for a dozen years or so, originally to just help suppress the weeds, and has made soap and sold a few lavender plants over the years. This year, a new and different opportunity arrived....
Citizens in Electric City could find their future July 4 plans for explosives thwarted if the city council adopts a new law banning fireworks. The Electric City council discussed adopting such an ordinance at their July 9 council meeting. Councilmember Rich McGuire brought the idea up, citing Coulee Dam’s similar code banning fireworks in that city. Councilmember Lonna Bussert described fireworks debris being left behind in the triangle-shaped parking area outside city hall. A man in the audience added that the fireworks went on for over t...
There's nothing like a relaxing day of golf. Or a week. My uncle John Fox, who works in North Dakota and lives in Baja, Mexico, golfed five rounds of 18 holes, or 90 holes total, at the Banks Lake Golf Course while on vacation in the area recently. I golfed 18 holes with him on June 21 and had a great time, and he was very patient with my, let's say, "sub-par" (over-par?) golf skills. Uncle Johnny, as I know him, was so taken by the course that he wrote down some of his thoughts and...
The Banks Lake Golf Course is in the process of being sold by the port district to Rattlesnake Ridge. At Grant County Port District 7's June 27 meeting, commissioners passed a resolution authorizing commissioners to go through with the sale, then signed a purchase and sale agreement on the terms of selling the golf course and some surrounding land for $1.8 million. Scott Garrits, president, and Dennis Lohrman, secretary/treasurer of Rattlesnake Ridge were present at the meeting. Garrits is also...
The Grand Coulee Volunteer Fire Department this week stressed the importance of fire safety on the Fourth of July and reiterated that fireworks won’t be allowed at North Dam this year, but a federal agency doesn’t consider the ban temporary. “Fireworks will not be legal to use anywhere in the city limits of Grand Coulee in July 2019 per ordinance 1036,” a press release states. “When the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and Bureau of Land Management declared fireworks banned on their property, including the North Dam Area, because of extreme d...
From small town Washington to Music City, Lila Rose is an outlaw in song only, and performing on the Fourth of July at the Festival of America at the Grand Coulee Dam. Lila Rose Bowden is the daughter of Coulee Dam Police Chief Paul Bowden and Coulee Dam City Clerk Stefani Bowden. She performs under the name Lila Rose. "I'm sure this confuses some people around here that have known me my whole life," she said, "but I like to keep my last name out of my music so that someday when I get married, a...
Locals can expect new options for television, internet, and phone services soon with a new service provider investing in area infrastructure. Spectrum, the brand name that Charter Communications uses to sell cable television, internet, and phone services, is almost done with upgrades to their system here in the Coulee area that will make those offerings possible. Charter/Spectrum expects to set up "pop-up shops" to answer questions and take orders at Coulee Dam City Hall in August, said Senior...
Them Dam Writers, a local group that has existed in one form or another for decades, has been putting their stories on the internet, helping preserve both-well known and lesser-known local history, and sharing photos both old and new. The group was started in 1985 and helped focus the efforts of locals who had been helping record local history for decades before that, eventually publishing a book titled "Coulee Collection" in 1998. Most recently, Jay Kemble has helped revive the group, bring it...
Citing a dry landscape, federal officials this week put a halt to what has become something of a tradition in recent years at North Dam, where local families have set off fireworks on Independence Day. The Bureau of Land Management and the Bureau of Reclamation issued a fire restrictions order on public lands where BLM fights wildfires, which includes North Dam, according to a June 19 press release from BLM. A release from Reclamation Monday afternoon clarified that that includes the top of North Dam. “Dry, fire-prone vegetative conditions i...
A buffer zone between the residential neighborhoods of Electric City and Osborne Bay, where the discharge of firearms will not be allowed, was made official at the June 11 Electric City city council meeting. The 500-foot-wide, 7,281-foot-long buffer zone, required the cooperation of various entities to establish: the Bureau of Reclamation, the state’s departments of Natural Resources and Fish and Wildlife, Sunbanks Lake Resort, and the city of Electric City. The zone is being established to create a safety zone for residents who don’t live far...
The Ice Age Park in Electric City may be done as soon as the late summer of 2020. The city council June 11 approved to have SPVV Landscape Architects, who designed the master plan for the park in 2018, move forward with specific designs for the park. The city applied for grant money from the Washington State Recreation & Conservation Office and is ranked 15th out of 91 applicants to get a grant in the amount of $257,649, which the city must match, for a total project cost of $515,298. Jena Jauchius of SPVV said the park will be Electric...
Do fear tactics work as a discipline technique in schools? Not according to a slideshow that the Grand Coulee Dam School District board presented at their meeting in the Raider Hub at Lake Roosevelt High School. Between 30 and 40 people attended the June 10 board meeting for a workshop on discipline within the school system. A video slideshow with a recorded narrative from ChangeLab Solutions focused on things like “Why School Discipline Practices Matter,” and delved into the effects of Adverse Childhood Experiences, or ACEs, on stu...
Did you listen to Smokey the Bear? He wasn’t just talking to children; he was talking to you there, mister, flicking your cigarette ashes out of the car, lighting fireworks to enjoy their exploding lights and sounds, mowing the lawn because it needs mowing. I think many Americans have a bit of fire-related Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from the fires in recent years. Has anyone else been on evacuation notice recently? Has anyone else had a vacation marred by smoke? Decided not to go out on the boat because you couldn’t breath? Felt like lockin...
The Electric City council voted unanimously to not allow short-term rentals anywhere in the city. Short-term rentals are instances in which a home owner who doesn’t live in a residence rents that residence out to someone for less than 30 days. Residents Mark Jenson, Jim Bailey, and Nancy Brown attended the June 11 council meeting to speak against short-term rentals. “I don’t believe they are compatible with residential zones,” Jenson said. Brown said that the primary concerns with short-term rentals were “commercializing and destroyin...
A fire burned a patch of land near the canal near North Dam on Saturday night. A fireworks show put on by the Northwest Pyrotechnics Association went awry when a fire erupted and burned between two and three acres. The permitted event had fire personnel standing by for such an occurrence, with four trucks on standby. A press release from Grand Coulee Volunteer Fire Department Chief Rick Paris said that the fire started at 10:30 p.m. and that Grand Coulee and Electric City Volunteer Fire Departments were called in to assist Bureau of...
Several canoes launched from the Crescent Bay boat launch near the Grand Coulee Dam Friday on an eight-day journey toward Kettle Falls. The Inchelium Language and Culture Association, in association with River Warriors and the Upper Columbia United Tribes (UCUT), organized the event for the third year in a row. A film crew from KSPS was present at the event, which included speakers from these various groups, the singing of a traditional song, and mingling between the paddlers and well-wishers...
The city council approved the creation of the position of “city administrator” and to have current clerk Russ Powers fill the position. The council discussed the need for the position and the justification for the added pay that comes with it for Powers at their June 11 meeting. “So the idea here,” Councilmember Aaron Derr asked, “is we’d have someone at city hall that can make more decisions, given that our mayor will typically have a full-time job and can’t be here on a day-to-day basis?” “Correct,” Mayor John Nordine said. “It makes sen...
Imagine how traveling to another country can change your perspective on life. Local cosmetologist Aly Van Geystel doesn t have to imagine, having returned from a month-long trip to Cambodia, where she taught the trade of cosmetology to former victims of sex trafficking so they can start their own careers. She found out about the Justice and Soul Foundation last year, and decided she wanted to be involved in what they do. A lot of the time," Van Geystel told The Star before leaving, former...
The Electric City council last week obliviated the idea of building a $40,000-plus entrance sign to the city. The city conducted a poll at city hall and online of citizens on the idea. Results showed that out of 81 citizens, 62 (77 percent) didn’t want a sign, and 19 citizens did. Citizens running for council or mayor in the upcoming November election, including Diane Kohout, Brian Buche, Cate Slater, Bob Rupe and Cheryl Hoffman, conducted a survey of their own, collecting signatures and asking Electric City residents if they were for or agains...
A plaque with a bronze Coulee Dam High School Beaver mascot will be installed on the basalt pillar in front of Lake Roosevelt Schools and unveiled July 4 at 11 a.m. in a brief ceremony to which all are invited. Coulee Dam High School was open from 1947 until 1971, when it merged with Grand Coulee High School to form Lake Roosevelt. “Beavers sent their fierce spirit to Lake Roosevelt Raiders,” the plaque reads. A plaque commemorating Grand Coulee High School, featuring their Tiger mascot, was installed on the same pillar in 2017. Bert Smi...
So what's going on with the effort to consolidate local towns into one? A group of local business owners and residents who have that goal met Thursday at the Grand Coulee Dam Area Chamber of Commerce to discuss the logistics of the ambitious task. The Coulee Area Consolidation Committee consists of people from Electric City, Grand Coulee, Coulee Dam and some outlying areas, and those present discussed wanting to bring in someone from Elmer City for the committee as well. The group discussed...