News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
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An assembly held at Lake Roosevelt in May included stories of how drugs and alcohol can affect someone, as well as rap music, and the students reacted strongly to it all. A survey of the students following the survey has helped enlighten staff to issues the student body is facing, and has propelled them toward helping deal with these issues. At the assembly in May, James Pakootas spoke about the dark path of drugs and alcohol he went down, how it negatively affected him, how he got into it, and...
The number of vendors planning to offer wares at the Harvest Festival this weekend in North Dam Park has grown substantially from the event several years ago when a community yard sale was its most significant offering. In fact, the list of vendors has grown by at least half just since last year, with some 37 vendors coming to sell their wares, plus 11 food vendors. Many of those will hail from the local area, with many from the popular Wednesday market attending. In addition to the vendors, the event hosts the final competition of the Pacific...
Imagine kayaking 1,250 miles down the Columbia River from Columbia Lake, in British Columbia, down to Astoria, Oregon. That's exactly what John Kuntz, of Fort Gamble, Washington, is doing. "It's beautiful," Kuntz said. "Lots of beaches, dramatic landscapes," adding that he's seen a variety of wildlife, including bear, elk, moose, river otter, turkey, coyotes, and at least the prints of cougars. Kuntz, who is paddling the river in part as a way of "teaching youth the art of adventure," left the...
CJ Saxon wins a heat in the junior relay race Sept. 8 at the Okanogan County Fair. In the fifth of the day’s races, Saxon was riding for the Marchand Relay team. — Scott Hunter photo...
Grand Coulee Police 9/3 - A chainsaw, valued at $1,500, was stolen out of a man’s truck on Good St. in Electric City. 9/5 - A Grand Coulee man said another man had threatened to punch him in the face a few days earlier. - A driver pulled over on Kent St. in Electric City was charged with driving with faulty brake lights. His passenger was charged with openly smoking marijuana in public after the passenger blew a cloud of smoke out the rear window during the traffic stop. 9/6 - A driver pulled over on Hillcrest was cited with driving without a...
An electric utility has created a new rate class that could dramatically affect the local development of an “evolving industry” with an Electric City participant. Grant County Public Utility District commissioners voted last week to increase electricity rates for high-power cryptocurrency miners to protect “Grant PUD and its customers from risk,” a PUD press release stated Aug. 28. “Starting April 1, 2019, cryptocurrency miners and other ‘evolving-industry’ firms will pay the first of a three-year, graduated increase to a new, above-cost el...
Any land owners, ranchers or farmers impacted by last month’s wildfires in Douglas County, including the Grass Valley Fire that threatened Grand Coulee and Coulee Dam, can attend a meeting next week to discuss “post-fire needs and priorities,” the Foster Creek Conservation District says. The district will hold the meeting next Tuesday, Sept. 11, from 4-6 p.m. at Pepper Jack’s Bar and Grille on Midway Avenue in Grand Coulee. For more information, contact district Manager Amanda Ward at 509-888-6373 or 509-449-2158.... Full story
Coulee Dam is in talks with Charter Communications, a nationwide cable television company that wants to serve the town. The town council reviewed a proposed contract last month that would grant a franchise agreement and allow the company to operate within the town. The company already operates in other local towns, but Coulee Dam has been served by a small company called Country Cable, which council members said had been the subject of many complaints. “One of the things that bothered them most was they called up this complaint line and they g...
Congressman Dan Newhouse, who represents Washington's 4th District, visited Coulee Medical Center Aug. 29 to discuss issues with rural hospitals, particularly in relation to obstetrical services. Newhouse, joined by staff member Liz Daniels, sat down to lunch from the Fusion Café with CMC staff at the hospital and watched a presentation by Beth Goetz, the obstetrical nurse manager at CMC. Goetz presented statistics related to rural area infant mortality compared to urban, maternal mortality,...
The body of a Colville tribal member who went missing late last month was recovered from the waters of Soap Lake on Friday evening, the Grant County Sheriff’s Office announced Sunday morning. Kayakers found the body of Michael Edwin Clark, 60, and notified authorities. Deputies recovered the body and Coroner Craig Morrison’s staff confirmed the body’s identity, a Sept. 2 release for GCSO said. An autopsy conducted Saturday was inconclusive due to the condition of the remains, but no obvious signs of trauma were found. Clark’s remains have be...
When Marcy Horne took over as principal at Nespelem Elementary School last March, she felt she had at least part of her orientation already accomplished. Horne had been the principal at Paschal Sherman Indian School from 2015 to 2017, a position that familiarized her with not only local issues, but some of the same families served by Nespelem. It has been helpful, she said, "just knowing the system and knowing the area. ... When you come in from outside the area, it does take a while to...
Free fire safety stuff available at market In addition to fruit, crafts, and kids’ activities at the Wednesday Market this week, Molina Healthcare of Washington is hosting a wildfire preparedness event, tonight, Sept. 5, at North Dam Park from 4-7 p.m. Attendees will receive free fire safety educational materials, Molina bags, hand sanitizer bottles, bandage dispensers, face masks for kids and adults, and additional fire safety resources from Coulee Medical Center and the local chapter of the Red Cross. Tonight, the kids’ activity, sponsored by...
Workers on Main Street and Spokane Way, curving up the hill in the background, in Grand Coulee patch up portions of the streets that will see more work yet. Construction could be done by the end of this week "but I can't make any promises," said City Clerk Lorna Pearce about the $183,163 project that involves patching and double chip sealing of the streets. The work is being done by Tommer Construction out of Ephrata. - Jacob Wagner photo...
Earth movers reshape the hillside above Peter Dan Road Thursday. Peter Dan Road is open to traffic now, but with delays during construction. A small fire on the downhill side of the road reportedly started when a bulldozer struck a rock and created a spark. The fire was nipped in the bud by the crew, which used their machines to move dirt onto it before it could spread. Construction is expected to take about another month, according to Okanogan County Public Works. - Jacob Wagner...
Grand Coulee Police 8/28 - Coulee Medical Center requested police assistance with a combative patient being brought in by Colville Tribal Corrections. The patient was cooperative upon arrival in an ambulance, and police assistance was not needed. - Grand Coulee Avenue dogs had food and water when an officer checked on them at a neighbor’s request. No barking was heard by the officer, as had been reported by the neighbor. - A purse found at Coulee Creamery was returned to its owner. - Checking on a report of a burglary on Cardinal Road, p...
More than a dozen teachers attended Monday's Grand Coulee Dam School District board meeting, where Pamela Johnson and Carrie Derr spoke on behalf of their union to make a case for higher pay to keep quality teachers in the district. Johnson and Derr, the president and vice president of the Grand Coulee Dam Education Association, took turns reciting lines from their prepared speech. "In our last school year we lost one third of our teaching staff," the speech began. "Most of these teachers have...
The Grand Coulee Dam School District may change the qualifications for a substitute teacher so that more people would qualify. According to the Office of Superintendent for Public Instruction, Washington state requires a substitute teacher to have a bachelor’s degree or higher, to have completed a teacher preparation program, an alternative route program leading to certification, or three years of out-of-state teaching with an out-of-state certificate, fingerprints, and a background check. An emergency substitute teaching certificate, on the o...
In a special meeting Wednesday, Coulee Dam decided it would would notify the EPA of the potential of sewage in the streets of Elmer City because of a dispute between the towns. Adivsed by the city attorney that it cannot make a gift of its citizens’ funds by paying for new pumps for its customer, council members sought to find another way to help while not backing down in an apparent standoff between the towns that use the wastewater treatment plant operated by Coulee Dam, which is finishing a new one. “I think that Coulee Dam has gone way out...
B Street closure could last another year Grand Coulee City Council decided to wait another month before approving a time extension for the closure of the east end of B Street during the construction of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s fire station. Council members said it would be smart to ask the USBR to agree to repair the street after they are done using it for the construction. They said the USBR expects the station to be done in spring of 2019, but the extension would allow for the closure of the road to last until October of 2019. The r...
Ric Gendron dips his brush for more color on a painting he's working on at Saturday's Plateau Native American Art Show in North Dam Park. Gendron won first place in the show sponsored by the at Northwest Native Development Fund. - Scott Hunter photo...
Coulee Medical Center has been making remarkable strides toward digging its way out of debt, is heading toward profitability, and is even expanding its services, unlike many rural hospitals, administrators and other public officials say. "It's an amazing story as compared to where they were a year ago," Grant County Treasurer Darryl Pheasant said Tuesday. "This is a great success story for them." As treasurer, Pheasant oversees all county finances, including the debt incurred by municipalities...
Due to complications from a new state law, the city of Grand Coulee is considering no longer issuing business licenses. The new law requires a lot of extra work for the city to coordinate with the state and the businesses, work that City Clerk Lorna Pearce feels may not justify the $4,500 a year the licenses bring into the city. If Grand Coulee chooses to continue issuing licenses, Pearce explained, their licenses would have to be issued from the state of Washington website. “We’ll have to wait for them to give us our money, pull reports fro...
Once again, we come to the community to thank everyone for a fantastic summer season at the VET Center. Our American Legion Post appreciates everybody who came by and shopped with us during our sale season. Although it seemed like a really long stretch for those of us who worked every week to gather and prepare all the treasures that we had for sale, the time flew by as we greeted many of the same people on a weekly basis. With all the community support, our sales assisted us with gaining the funds we need to help Veterans in the area. Our...
Red tape, protocol, and a failure to communicate is keeping the Grand Gallery of Arts from reopening. Faran Sohappy owns a business called Music and Beyond. First located off of Midway Avenue across from Safeway, Sohappy was selling CDs, music equipment, movies, and more. Sohappy jumped at the opportunity to move his business to the Grand Gallery of Arts building on Main Street. The move to the new rented space would enable Sohappy to, in addition to running his shop, host music events on the stage and produce music, something he is passionate...
At last week’s Grand Coulee City Council meeting, the beginning fund balances for 2018 were set, numbers that would typically have been approved in January. “I have spoken with the state auditor’s office and they agreed to allow us to draw a line in the sand, take the money we know that we have, and reappropriate them,” explained City Clerk Lorna Pearce, who took over the clerk position in February of this year. “There hasn’t been good financial tracking for the past seven years,” Pearce continued. “It’s been a disaster. The state auditor’s o...