News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
Sorted by date Results 1171 - 1195 of 1383
An Electric City couple was the first to board the new Keller Ferry, the Sanpoil, last Wednesday when it made its inaugural trip between Lincoln and Ferry County connecting SR-21. Lowell and Birdie Hensley were among some 200 people who gathered near the ferry to see Sanpoil elder Jeanne Jarred break the traditional bottle of champagne against the hull. This time the bottle was full of a non-alcohol beverage. The Sanpoil pieces were trucked to Crescent Bay in Grand Coulee for assembly and testing. Scores of local residents watched the Sanpoil...
A bear that wandered into Coulee Dam caused a little excitement for occupants of the Columbia View Apartments and later for residents on Tilmus Street. Police got the call from dispatch center about a bear near the apartment complex, but when police got there it had moved on to Tilmus. Robert Loch, who resides at 1137 Tilmus, advised police that the bear was in his backyard. Police described the bear as a “large black bear.” Police were joined by a tribal officer who requested a tribal resource officer be called to deal with the bear. The res...
Grand Coulee Police Department’s “bomb” dog Potter is being retired. Potter is handled by police officer Sean Cook, the second dog handled by him since he has been in the department. The city council Tuesday night passed a resolution declaring the dog surplus after nearly nine years service here. Potter and Cook have answered calls all over the United States, even once going to provide cover at a PGA golf tournament at Pebble Beach, Calif. Potter was present at the council meeting, and made the rounds greeting Mayor Chris Christopherson, City...
Members of the school board and district officials tour the Lake Roosevelt High School industrial arts shop Aug. 7 as part of a special meeting. Directors saw the results of a McKinstry project that put in air quality equipment and energy-saving lights from a near half-million dollar grant. The shop, with some updating, will remain as part of the new K-12 school complex project now underway. McKinstry, a Spokane firm, specializes in energy saving projects....
School bells are about to ring. The Grand Coulee Dam School District opens its door to students next Tuesday. The start of school will see three new faces as principals of the various schools. Newcomer Ronanda M. Liberty takes over as principal at the Grand Coulee Dam Middle School, after being hired this summer to take over from Brandon Byers who moves to Lake Roosevelt High School. He replaces Brad Wilson who left the district to take a position with the Chelan School District. Lisa Lakin, while not new at Center Elementary, starts her year a... Full story
Marlene Oddie, of Grand Coulee, is a semi-finalist in the American Quilter’s Society “QuiltWeek” show set for Oct. 2-5, in Des Moines, Iowa. Her quilt “Rosie’s Bomb” will compete with 176 others in the annual contest. First-, second- and third-place honors will go to quilters in five categories, a press release from the AQS national museum in Paducah, Kent. stated. Best of show will receive $10,000, with best hand, machine and longarm workmanship receiving $5,000 each. A total of $44,000 wil...
The Regional Board of Mayors is finding out that its operating agreement is a poor way to run a railroad. Facing emergency repairs at the Delano Transfer site a month ago, the mayors put a hold on the single bid they received to do the work, hoping to get more bids this time around. At Monday’s meeting the mayors still had only a single bid. Now the matter has to go before the four town councils for approval, which will delay the emergency work further. That will take about a month to make the circuit, and then the mayors face making a b... Full story
Late mail ballots in last week’s primary election didn’t change those who will advance to the general election in November. Coulee Dam Mayor Quincy Snow faces an uphill battle to retain his seat after Greg Wilder had over a 100-vote margin going into the finals. Wilder, who has challenged the town of Coulee Dam over its wastewater treatment plant plans, gained the favor of voters, receiving 177 votes to Snow’s 66. A third candidate, Shawn Derrick, a newcomer to politics in the town, garnered 23 votes. In Nespelem School Board races, for the P... Full story
It’s not just kids that ask the craziest things. One person at the Visitor Center asked Ivan Snavely, who heads the tour program at the Grand Coulee Dam, if they built the dam from the top down, or from bottom up. Snavely shared this question with members of the Grand Coulee Dam Area Chamber of Commerce at The Siam Palace last Thursday as he explained what went on with the tourist program at the dam. One of the most successful programs at the Visitor Center is the geocache adventure, in which v... Full story
Capt. Ryan Hunt took up a new assignment Aug. 1, with the Marine Corps in 29 Palms, Calif., as an instruction officer. The 1999 graduate of Lake Roosevelt High School and Washington State University is the son of Grand Coulee Police Chief Mel Hunt and wife Joyce. Ryan, who has served two assignments in both Iraq and Afghanistan, is the recipient of two Bronze Stars for meritorious action. One was for action in Iraq and the second for action taken in Afghanistan, where he was the commanding... Full story
Challenger Greg Wilder garnered 67 percent of the primary vote ended Tuesday night to place himself solidly in the general election race against Coulee Dam Mayor Quincy Snow. A third candidate, Shawn Derrick, placed third with 17 votes. Wilder picked up 160 primary votes to Snow’s 61. “I think the people sent a clear message,” Wilder said Tuesday night after the returns came in. The final count will be made on Friday, allowing time for ballots mailed at the last minute, Okanogan County election officials stated. A total of 238 ballots had b... Full story
The school board will meet tonight (Wednesday) in an informal setting with members getting a look at how the district’s energy grant was spent, and then given a walk-through of the new K-12 school site. The meeting begins at 6 p.m. and members of the board will meet at the Lake Roosevelt High School Industrial Arts Building. The meeting, officials said, will last about an hour and the public is invited to attend. The energy grant, just under a half million dollars, enables the district to upgrad... Full story
The Galaxy Smoke Shop has been broken into again. An employee, Jesus Lopez, said that he noticed the door ajar when he reported to work at 9:45 a.m., Sunday. Lopez reported that the door had been damaged around the deadbolt, and the door pushed in to gain entry. The shop was also burglarized July 18, and a 26-year-old, Michael Stead, was arrested after that break-in. When officers entered the building Sunday, they noticed that packs of cigarettes had been scattered all over. Some $80 in cash that had been lying under the cash register in plain... Full story
The Sanpoil, the new Keller Ferry, will be christened in special ceremonies Aug. 14, at the south shore terminal, officials reported. Ceremonies will be from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., after which the Sanpoil will go into service, replacing the Martha S. The $12 million 20-car ferry was built in pieces by Foss Maritime at its Rainier, Ore., plant and trucked to Grand Coulee for assembly at a special location at Crescent Bay. Monday the Sanpoil was out on Lake Roosevelt going through tests conducted for... Full story
The state’s Transportation Improvement Board came to town and Grand Coulee’s city council liked what they heard at their meeting Tuesday night. Executive Director Stevan Gorcester told the council that the TIB would be interested in assisting the city repair or replace sidewalks on Main Street and on Federal Avenue at a cost far beyond what a present grant is for. The TIB had okayed a sidewalk on Spokane Way, but when members found out that Center School was moving, the project was nixed. The city hurried and came up with a project to imp... Full story
A late night fire last Wednesday destroyed a home at 1131 Tilmus Street in Coulee Dam. The house was occupied by Gloria Simpson, and firefighters said that there were no injuries. The blaze was reported at 10:30 p.m., with fire units responding from Coulee Dam, Grand Coulee, the Bureau of Reclamation and Elmer City. Grand Coulee Fire Chief Richard Paris said that one room in the house was left pretty much intact, but the rest of the residence was lost. “It appears that 90 percent of the structure is gone,” Paris said. Investigation of the bla... Full story
The seniors are getting mobile. The Grand Coulee Dam Senior Center’s new once-a-month program of going to Spokane to shop has been successful and they are already planning trips to theater productions this fall and winter. The seniors recently were given a 14-passenger bus by People For People, and the donation was barely in their possession before they took their first trip. Seniors now go to Northtown Mall the third Friday of each month, hauling passengers for $15 per person. There were 11 o... Full story
Get ready for the community’s first Harvest Festival, Sept. 14, 15. It will be a family affair with games for both the kids and adults. A similar, but less ambitious, event happened last October. Sponsored by the Grand Coulee Dam Area Chamber of Commerce, the two-day event will feature a barbecue competition cook-off with connections to the Pacific Northwest Barbecue Association. There’s a prize purse of $2,500, and those participating will have a cook off of pork, brisket, ribs and chicken. A second competition is a pie baking contest, wit... Full story
Mike Mooney is a magician of sorts. Not the sleight of hand kind, but the type that takes a pile of material and makes something beautiful out of it. Mike builds cars, the custom and hot rod type. His cars are eye stoppers. The attention to detail … the paint … the upholstery … the chopping and fitting. Mike was named to the Street Rod Hall of Fame in 2010. It wasn’t entirely because of the cars he builds, but also because of the help he provides to other people. Then in June, Mooney took th... Full story
A Quincy farmer, who had offered a $2,500 reward for information that would help him recover his stolen truck and trailer, could pick up his own reward after spotting them just outside Grand Coulee. Kevin Weber, of Weber Farms in Quincy, a pilot, flew around the countryside Saturday in his private plane, trying to find his truck and trailer, which had been stolen sometime between Wednesday night and Thursday morning. He spotted them near Grand Coulee in Lincoln County and alerted the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office. Lincoln County deputies, a... Full story
The Grand Coulee Dam School District board passed its 2013-14 budget Monday night after a public hearing on the matter. No one showed up to question the $9.5 million budget. The new budget exceeds the one for the 2012-13 school year by more than a million dollars. Superintendent Dennis Carlson said the increased revenue comes largely from the way the state is funding education. The state Legislature has responded to the Washington State Supreme Court’s ruling that Washington is underfunding education and will pay districts about $7,000 per s... Full story
A Nespelem man was arrested and booked into Okanogan County Jail Monday after being identified as the person who broke into the Galaxy Smoke Shop last Thursday. Police stated that Michael Stead, 26, was identified through security cameras on site. After Stead was identified, police learned through a phone tip that the suspect was at a trailer residence in Elmer City. Police found Stead there, standing out in the yard with a piece of foil in his hand. He later told police he used the foil to smoke a pain pill. An employee said that she thought e... Full story
Dan Foster, the new superintendent of the Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area, is learning how to do more with less. And it may be only an omen of things to come. He told chamber of commerce members last Thursday that he is operating with 6 percent fewer resources than what were available the year before, and if the sequester problem at the national level isn’t solved, the next year it could climb to 12-13 percent. Foster said adjustments this season have included such things as mowing l... Full story
Jerry Beierman, a Grand Coulee resident known for raising record-sized veggies, thinks someone doused several of his plants with some kind of poison, he reported to police Saturday. On Monday, Beierman said that three tomato plants, two bean plants and one cucumber plant were killed, along with an area of his lawn. He also said another plant had died, he thought from a separate incident. Beierman said he was concerned that others might suffer the same type of vandalism, and he was afraid that someone might still eat vegetables from poisoned pla... Full story
The story of a puppy that was taken by some people from Poulsbo had a happy ending. A man reported to police that while he was in Safeway shopping, someone took his little white female Husky pup named “Sage.” A review of a security tape showed that the dog jumped out of the back of a vehicle and went underneath it. Two people coaxed it out, and then took it. An Electric City woman reported that she saw the people earlier in the day at the veterinarian’s office. After reviewing the tape, the officer stated in his report that he had seen the c... Full story