News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
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A school bus accident Oct. 4, in Elmer City, ended up with some students getting shook up, but with only minor damage to the bus, school officials said this week. A number of middle school-age students from both Grand Coulee and Nespelem were checked out at Coulee Medical Center and released. The accident occurred shortly after 5 p.m., with an after-school bus near the old Tillman Store. The bus was struck by a vehicle driven by Daniel Parks Conant. School officials said that bus driver Stephanie Anderson saw that Conant’s vehicle was going t...
Tribal natural resource officers shot two black bears last week that have been repeated uninvited guests in Coulee Dam. The town has been bothered by black bears visiting both the commercial and residential areas recently. One bear was shot on Fir Street early in the morning about the time that children were going to school, and the other was shot on Tilmus about 10:30 at night. A resident near Tilmus said it sounded like a shooting war. Both bears were 2-year-olds. “Please do not feed the bears,” states an informational poster sent out fro...
Timing is the key to progress on any building site, Rotarians learned at their meeting last Wednesday. Speaking was Jim Crowley, Walker Construction superintendent on the K-12 school project in Coulee Dam. Crowley explained the importance of getting materials delivered on time and how it relates to subcontractors and their efficiency. The construction of the Grand Coulee Dam School District’s K-12 building project is back on schedule after a delay that occurred several months ago when the o...
Grand Coulee’s city council declared surplus a number of items from the police department at last Tuesday night’s meeting. Included were two bullet proof vests from the 1970s, a breath analyzer device referred to as “dial a drunk” by Police Chief Mel Hunt, a Polaroid camera with case, boxes of electronic items, some phone parts, and an outdated fax machine and typewriter. But the items that caught the fancy of members of the council were two horsehide leather coats about 40 years old. Several members of the council tried the coats on. The hea...
Grand Coulee passed an ordinance last Tuesday night declaring a moratorium on any type of marijuana operations in the city. The moratorium came after a public hearing where three residents of the city spoke supporting the issue. Speaking against any marijuana activity in the city were Cheryl Piturachsatit, Linda Black and Al Jordan. All were for the moratorium and against marijuana operations in the city. The moratorium is for six months, effective from Tuesday’s meeting, to April 1, 2014. Residents of Washington State voted approval of I...
Coulee Dam has a new licensed day care. The day care center, at 1111 Central Drive, is run by Clarissa Cawston and is designed to take care of 12 children, from 6 months to 12 years of age. She has named it “Coulee Kids Day Care.” Cawston has designed the daycare center to be somewhat like a preschool, with educational materials including lesson plans and learning opportunities. It’s an opportunity for her to exercise her education degree from Washington State University and still be home with...
Some people have a tough time getting to work on Monday mornings. That was the case for Jason Mucciaccio this past Monday when he fell asleep and his pickup truck left the roadway and knocked down a power pole on SR-174, near Knute Street at North Dam Park. Mucciaccio was driving to work at the new school building project, where he is employed by a subcontractor, when he fell asleep, he told police. His vehicle and trailer left the roadway, jumped a curb and severed the light pole. Police said damage estimate was $5,000 to the pickup, $3,000...
A special dinner to benefit the Coulee Pioneer Museum will be held Friday, Oct. 25, at the Senior Center. Tickets are $10 per person or $20 for a family and are available from museum members or at the Senior Center. Museum coordinator Birdie Hensley said the spaghetti dinner proceeds will help the museum move along in its efforts to define itself. “It’s all you can eat,” Hensley stated. The dinner is sponsored by Flo’s Restaurant. As part of the fund raiser, a quilt raffle will be held at $1 per ticket or six tickets for $5, Hensley stated....
Coulee Dam area school children will put on “Blackbeard the Pirate” when they perform as part of the Missoula Children’s Theater on Nov. 9, according to Crystal Jones, vice president of the PTA here. School children from kindergarten through sixth grade will be the actors. Auditions start Monday, Nov. 4, at the Center Elementary School gym. Jones said that 50-60 kids will be involved in the play. Representatives from the Missoula Children’s Theater operation will be in the area directing the youngsters for performances on Saturday, Nov. 9....
That’s one big pumpkin! Bill Niendam of Elmer City shows off what he calls his “300 pound pumpkin.” He and his wife Dusty raised a single pumpkin in their garden on Front Street. He said the pumpkin vine had a number of blooms but only one pumpkin. “We used a giant pumpkin seed for this one,” he said. It doesn’t look like he will move the pumpkin. “We would need a lift truck to get it out of here,” he stated. (Roger S, Lucas photo)...
The latest failure of Congress to compromise has shuttered two local branches of federal agencies but not affected operations at Grand Coulee Dam. The federal government went into shutdown mode Tuesday as the U. S. Senate and the House of Representatives failed to compromise on a continuing resolution that would allow the government to pay the bills already spent and approved by Congress. Locally, barricades and recorded messages greeted many who tried to contact federal agencies or receive...
Police Chief Pat Collins made a little headway in his efforts to retain at least one of his patrolmen after the town of Coulee Dam was axed from its contract for law enforcement coverage with the Bureau of Reclamation. The contract, which affords the town four additional patrol officers, their patrol cars, training and equipment, was up Oct. 1. The town was already short two officers, and the contract’s end means the loss of two more. “I don’t know how I can provide coverage with only three officers,” Collins told the council last Wednesd...
A plan to match kids and horses as part of a school program got stalled when the school district stated that its insurance carrier wasn’t too high on the idea. The idea was hatched by Chris Holman, president of “The Nourishing Hand” group, an equine rescue organization. His idea was to match kids from the school with mistreated horses and create a bond between school-age children and the animals. The idea was met with enthusiasm at the time, but got stalled by the school’s insurance carrier, Canfield & Associates. Superintendent Dennis Carlson...
The Missoula Children’s Theater is coming to town. Sponsored by the Grand Coulee Dam PTA, the popular theater group will be here to train a host of children from local schools, then put on performances Nov. 9. Representatives from MCT will come here to begin after-school rehearsals Monday, Nov. 4. A request by the PTA to Coulee Dam’s town council for use of the Village Cinema venue was approved last Wednesday night. The council agreed on a $25-a-day charge for use of the theater, an amount that council members said would take care of ele...
Grand Coulee Dam School District Superintendent Dennis Carlson told his board Monday night that the K-12 school construction venture is back on schedule. “The elementary side of the project will be enclosed by the end of October, allowing workers to be indoors during the winter,” he said. Time had been lost early on when excavation survey mistakes were made, placing the schedule at a risk. The ground floor of the secondary wing was scheduled to be poured Wednesday. Carlson stated that the 1,100-foot-long retaining wall is essentially complete....
Port District 7 approved its preliminary budget for 2014 last Thursday and has scheduled a public hearing for Oct. 24 for review and public input. The meeting is at 5 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 24, at the airport office, the port’s normal meeting place. The public hearing will precede the port’s regular monthly meeting. The port’s preliminary budget shows revenue of $458,000 and expenses of $440,200. A large portion of both revenue and expenses is some $254,500 of anticipated grant monies from the Federal Aviation Administration. The port’s major o...
Coulee Dam rejected a bid of $21,000 to clean up a burned-out house at 611 Holly Street last Wednesday night. The lone bid had been submitted by Deckwa Construction, a Grand Coulee firm. The council did so because they weren’t sure where the money would come from. At issue also is how the town would recover the cost of cleaning up the property. One council member suggested that Okanogan County would probably end up owning the property because of unpaid taxes. The county wouldn’t pay off any lien the city would have on the cleanup effort. Cou...
A $5,700 grant is helping Lake Roosevelt lady basketball players mentor young students from the 3-6 grades. The Lady Raiders are holding three basketball clinics teaching the younger students, about 25 of them, the basics of the game. Two clinics have already been held and the third is scheduled Oct. 2. A mini-basketball tournament is planned for Saturday, Oct. 5, at the high school gym. The grant is from the Charlotte Martin Foundation and was written by Mary Schilling, grant writer for the...
Owners of two business firms appeared before the Grand Coulee council last Tuesday to complain about a person doing mechanical work at his residence without a business license. Mike Horne, of MPH, and Jack Madsen of Jack’s Service, both in the vehicle repair business, stated that Donovan Picard, who lives at 431 Grand Coulee Avenue, is doing mechanical work at his home garage without a business license and in a residential zone that doesn’t allow businesses. Horne and Madsen explained to the council that the city isn’t getting tax reven...
Police are investigating a burglary at Center Lodge Motel where an unknown party took about $2,000 from a drop box and cash register sometime during the early morning hours of Sept. 20. The report stated that someone used a key to gain entrance to the motel office where $756.91 cash and a $1,000 check was taken from a drop box and $351.45 taken from a cash register. The cash register was also taken, The loss was noticed by an employee who found the a key in the door which was unlocked when she came to work in the morning. Owner Dale Baty let of...
Grand Coulee’s mayor and council got a tongue-lashing last Tuesday night for what Becky Billups said was “not doing anything,” She repeatedly has appeared before the council asking that the city enforce its ordinances in regard to keeping up property and putting drug offenders away. Billups lives on Burdin Boulevard and repeatedly has been to council meetings to make formal complaints. “I want to know why you don’t do something,” she repeatedly stated last Tuesday night. “There are junk cars, garbage everywhere,” she declared. “I want to know...
Interested in a job working for the federal government and have been frustrated trying? Then there’s help coming with two meetings scheduled, one Sept. 30 and the other Oct. 2. The meetings are designed to assist the job seeker in using the USAJOBS website, the official job site for the federal government. The first session, Monday, Sept. 30, will be at the Nespelem Community Center where interested parties can learn about job opportunities both with the federal government and the Colville Confederated Tribes. This session lasts from 10 a.m. t...
The Care and Share Food Bank needs some help. Manager Fern Blaylock said Monday that after that evening’s deliveries the food bank shelves will be nearly empty. Blaylock said that the truck delivery that was received will be gone by Monday night, and the next delivery won’t be for a week and a half. The food bank is open Mondays at the Church of the Nazarene and is currently assisting some 100-130 families. Blaylock said that the food bank is in critical need of canned foods and money to purchase meats and perishable goods. Persons can mak...
Volunteers are the nuts and bolts of most organizations. It is especially true at Banks Lake Golf Course, now managed by Port District 7. The Port District took over management of the course two years ago when it was in danger of being closed, and has continued to administer and finance the course’s operation. This year, in particular, volunteers have been the nuts and bolts that have held the course together. And surprisingly, according to port authorities, the course has improved in large part because of an army of dedicated volunteers. T...
The city of Grand Coulee approved its latest law enforcement contract with the Bureau of Reclamation at a special meeting of the council last week, while another local police department didn’t get a similar extension of the program. The new contract with Grand Coulee -- for one year with extensions possible for two more years -- was essentially the same as the bureau’s just-lapsed contract with the city. Police Chief Mel Hunt said his department is one officer short, and the city’s civil service board has just advertised to fill the position. C...