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With no president, a committee to consolidate local towns, starting with Electric City and Grand Coulee, is without a leader.

With the COVID-19 pandemic throwing a wrench into things, and Ben Hughes, who had been heading up a consolidation committee, moving from the area last year, the effort towards consolidation has lost some steam.

Before the pandemic, the committee, with input from planning consultancy group SCJ Alliance, was working toward consolidating the cities of Electric City and Grand Coulee, both of which are in Grant County. From there, they could explore adding Coulee Dam and Elmer City further down the line if there was interest.

Before the pandemic began in 2020, the committee planned to a proposal to consolidate the two towns on a ballot. If passed by voters, it would require the towns, by law, to consolidate.

Hughes said last year, before he moved from the area, that he was struggling to find legal guidance towards writing up the ballot measure.

The Star recently asked a handful of other people on the committee if they had any communication with one another, or any plans to regroup and re-evaluate the effort to move forward, but those asked, in essence, simply shrugged.

Jim Keene, who owns land between Electric City and Grand Coulee in the Delano area, which isn’t technically in a city, said he is interested in meeting with a committee and to pursue being annexed into Grand Coulee in order to provide a contiguous border between the two cities, which could help the consolidation effort.

But without an apparent leader of the committee, the effort is at a standstill.