News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
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Local veteran Fred Long served in Okinawa, Japan, among other places, during World War II, and has stories from his time there that you can read. And he shared more with us last week. Long, who last Saturday turned 99 years of age, wrote a series of short stories in 1999 that are still on the internet. He had been approached by J.A. Hitchcock, a woman whose father had also been in Okinawa. She wanted to honor him and asked Long to contribute a story from there. One story turned into more, and...
Two levies with a combined tax rate of $4.20 per thousand dollars of assessed property value will be on the ballot in February to replace expiring levies of the same combined rate. On Monday, the Grand Coulee Dam School District Board of Directors approved two resolutions containing the language of the levies for the upcoming ballot. Together, the levies are expected to raise between $1.4 million and $1.7 million annually from 2023 through 2026. The Educational Programs and Operations Levy seeks an estimated $2.50 per thousand dollars of assess...
Coulee Dam’s city council will consider a proposed vaccine mandate for employees tonight as part of its regular meeting at 6 p.m. in a meeting open via phone or an online service only. The issue was raised a council meeting a month ago and discussed again two weeks later. Tonight (Wednesday) the council has a drafted resolution to pass, reject or alter. The city of just over 1,000 must grapple with some of the same possibilities other agencies have: that requiring vaccination against the coronavirus, which has been made into a political hot top...
Grand Coulee Police 11/2 - A Banks Avenue property owner observed through a camera system someone measuring things on her property like a construction worker would do. She is submitting the video to police and just wants to know why they were measuring things on her property. - A television found outside Coulee Boulevard storage units, in the box, was not stolen as was thought by the man who found it, but rather was delivered there by mistake. The man who found it, along with an officer, delivered it to the man and woman who ordered it and live...
Incumbents in local positions appear to be keeping their seats as election results come in. Although there will be more votes to count, including 1,300 Grant County ballots, 1,760 Okanogan ballots, plus those arriving by mail postmarked on or before Nov. 2, vote counts so far for local elections have been posted. According to Grant County’s website, 25.35% of the county’s voters turned out. In the race for Grand Coulee Council Position #1, Ben Hughes leads 74 votes to 39 over Tracey Wright, with there additionally being 29 write-in votes. In th...
The Electric City council is prioritizing how they would like to spend $278,000 in federal American Rescue Plan Act funds. City Clerk Peggy Nevsimal told the council at their Oct 12 meeting that the guidance “is really loosey goosey” on how the money can be spent and how the city needs to report its spending. She and city engineer Steven Nelson, she said, have never seen money that is so “unstructured” regarding how to spend it, but there still must be a record of how they intend to use the money and how they ultimately do spend it. The cit...
The National Commander of the American Legion recognized two local veterans of World War II Monday at a luncheon at the local legion post in Electric City. Elmer Rinard and Fred Long will both celebrate their 99th birthdays this month. National Commander Paul E. Dillard and Washington State Department Commander Rick Sucee visited with veterans at their Grand Coulee Dam Post 157. Dillard is making a tour through the state and had several stops before and after the lunch. But he made a point of sh...
Locally, there have been six new cases of COVID-19 in the past week, with two new cases in Grand Coulee and Electric City, one each in Coulee Dam and Elmer City, and two in Nespelem. According to Grant County Health District data last updated Nov. 2, the Grand Coulee and Electric City area of the county has seen 150 total cases since the pandemic began, up by two in the last week, with new cases reported on Oct. 28 and 29. Twenty-five people are hospitalized in the county ranging in age from their 30s to 90s. There have been 185 deaths in... Full story
The intersection of Electric Boulevard and Crest Avenue in Electric City was never perfect, and the city has considered its fourth change to its stop signs in three years. The cross sections of streets that make up the intersection never quite lined up. Electric Boulevard, which runs southeast to northwest, lines up. However, the section of Crest Avenue that runs down a hill from the southwest, comes into it in an off-kilter, caddy-wompus way in relation to the other forks of the intersection....
Grand Coulee Police 10/25 - A woman reported her 2018 Ford Taurus was hit in the Safeway parking lot where her son had parked it for work. There was front end damage and the license plate had fallen off. The incident was documented for insurance purposes. 10/26 - Police observed a cut lock on a storage unit at B Street and Second Street, where the door to the unit was open. The items didn’t appear to have been rifled through. The renter of the unit said nothing seemed to be missing and put a new lock on the unit. 10/28 - While a vehicle p...
Community members like their spring and fall cleanups, a survey reveals, and expressing that may help pay for the cleanups. The cleanups involve free dumping of yard waste at the Delano Regional Transfer Station for residents of Electric City, Grand Coulee, Coulee Dam, and Elmer City, and sometimes curbside pickup conducted by local cities. Last week The Star reported that the Regional Board of Mayors was applying for a roughly $30,000 air quality grant from the Department of Ecology to pay for spring and fall cleanups in 2022, and a spring...
You can vote for your favorite scarecrow out of 17 total placed outside of local businesses and some residences in the Coulee community. The Grand Coulee Dam Area Chamber of Commerce is holding the scarecrow contest, which has had "a great outcome," according to Executive Director Rachelle Haven. Haven said she would like the event to be a regular thing depending on community feedback. "The scarecrows have all turned out awesome and very creative!" she told The Star in an email. The chamber has...
Some workers in Washington state, faced with the ultimatum to get the jab or lose their jobs, have chosen to quit or retire instead of receiving a COVID-19 vaccination. With employees in various fields, including school, health care, and state government required to receive a COVID-19 vaccine as a requirement for their employment by Oct. 18, many workers in the state have opted to retire early or simply quit their jobs. Locally, council members for the city of Grand Coulee, as well as the mayor, expressed support for city employees to make...
Grand Coulee and Electric City have seen at least five new COVID-19 cases in the past week, while Coulee Dam has seen one more and Nespelem has seen two. According to Grant County Health District data last updated Oct. 26, the Grand Coulee and Electric City area of the county has seen 148 total cases since the pandemic began, up by five in the last week, with new cases being reported on Oct. 20. GCHD reported 103 new cases in the county on Oct. 25, and 65 on Oct. 26, but did not say where the cases occurred. Twenty-six people are hospitalized... Full story
If your Halloween plans include trick or treating, remember these simple safety tips. • Stick with members of your own household and distance from others when in crowded indoor and outdoor spaces. • Wear a cloth mask and remember: a plastic costume mask is not a suitable substitute. • Wash your hands before and after trick-or-treating. • Bring plenty of hand sanitizer. If you give out treats: • Limit candy to individually wrapped treat bags. This reduces the number of people who would typically... Full story
Grand Coulee PTA will be hosting their second Trunk or Treat event on Thursday, Oct. 28, from 5-7 p.m. Services, businesses, and community folks will be passing out treats to kids in cars as they drive around the school on the bus-loading route. No walkers please, say organizers. At the end, in the elementary parking lot, there will be a contest for the best-decorated car trunk. The winner will be decided by donation, and a trophy will be given to the winning car.... Full story
Grand Coulee Police 10/19 - A man reported being followed from Coulee Dam by a white Chrysler. He said that when he pulled into Safeway, the Chrysler pulled into the post office across the street and the driver got out and began filming him and his family. He confronted the driver and they exchanged words before the other driver drove off. The man just wanted the incident documented. - Police received permission from the owner of an abandoned trailer on King Street to search it anytime and were told that no one should ever be inside of it....
Taking a brief survey can help pay for 2022’s Coulee area spring cleanup, fall cleanup, and another spring cleanup in 2023. During the cleanups, residents of Electric City, Grand Coulee, Coulee Dam, and Elmer City are allowed to dump yard waste for free at the Delano Regional Transfer Station, and cities sometimes pick up yard waste for you from your street. Electric City Mayor Diane Kohout, on behalf of the Regional Board of Mayors, is applying for a roughly $30,000 air quality grant with the state Department of Ecology to pay for costs associ... Full story
Following the death of a city employee, Coulee Dam is considering requiring all employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Councilmember Dale Rey raised the question during a council meeting last Wednesday. Rey remarked on the recent death of one employee and a positive coronavirus test of another, although he said he was speculating on the cause of death. “Our town employees not only interact with each other and with us, but they also interact with and communicate with and are around members of the community,” Rey said, so requiring vaccinat...
Having received several complaints about loud fans at the cryptocurrency mining building owned by Canada-based Atlas Blockchain Group, Electric City is going to use a decibel meter to measure just how loud the fans really are. Electric City Mayor Diane Kohout said the fans on top of the building, formerly the Young’s Welding building on Coulee Boulevard, are loud and running 24 hours a day. She said people have reported having difficulty sleeping because of them, leading the city to look at their noise ordinance. Kohout explained that the c...
Two local counties last week reported 28 new COVID-19 related deaths. Grant County Health District reported nine deaths on Oct. 11, and nine more on Oct. 13 with the deaths occurring in the months of September and October. Of the 18 deaths in Grant County, 11 were men and seven were women; ages ranged from their 40s to 80s; 16 had underlying health conditions; three were fully vaccinated, and 15 were unvaccinated. Of those who died, nine were from Moses Lake, five were from Soap Lake, two were from Quincy, one was from Mattawa, and one from... Full story
Shaeden Capshaw grabs a gob of roasted marshmallow off a stick of the goo held by Gaven White at the first spirit week bonfire held in several years at Lake Roosevelt Jr/Sr High School Thursday night after a homecoming volleyball game. - Scott Hunter photo...
Attorney General Bob Ferguson led a bipartisan coalition of 15 attorneys general Thursday calling on Congress to pass legislation supporting local journalism. “High-quality, independent journalism is critical to our democracy,” Ferguson said. “Local outlets have been hit particularly hard by the COVID-19 pandemic — ironically, just when their role as distributors of reliable information has rarely been more crucial. We must do all we can to save local journalism.” The letter calls on key leaders to support and pass the Local Journalis...
Tribal police inspect a car flipped early Monday at the edge of Coulee Dam. The silver car destroyed a longstanding sign in the process but the driver, seen talking with police, apparently escaped serious injury. From Davenport, he initially told police he'd swerved to avoid a deer but later admitted he'd fallen asleep. A redacted police report wasn't clear on whether the driver was a juvenile but omitted his full name. The crash happened at about 7 a.m. A sign advertising the community...
I want to remind our Grant County taxpayers that real, mobile home, personal property 2nd half taxes are due by November 1st. Since October 31 is on the weekend, the due date is extended to the next business day. If you are sending your payment by mail, please make sure your envelope is postmarked on or before November 1st to avoid being considered delinquent. Please verify that all parcels that you intend to pay were included on your statements. Please send the bottom right side coupon of your statements if you are paying by mail for proper...