Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
Sorted by date Results 151 - 175 of 570
Palouse’s downtown quilt shop has moved uptown. Owner Bev Pearce is now operating Small Towne Quilts from her home in Palouse. “She’s just had a wonderful store front and awesome clients. All the traffic and all the vitality she has helped add to downtown Palouse will be missed,” said Palouse Mayor Michael Echanove. “I really accomplished a lot,” Pearce told the Gazette in an interview Jan. 4, a day after the downtown shop closed. The shop sold dozens of colorful bolts of quilting fabric, quilting supplies and had a quilting machine. Pa...
Colton school officials are seeking public comment on the $5.1 million school remodeling bond proposal which failed to gain voters’ approval last November. District residents are encouraged to attend meetings tonight, Thursday, and Jan. 13 to give their feelings on the proposal. The bonding measure was aimed at providing local funding for an overall $10.2 million remodeling project. School officials would like to put the measure back on the ballot April 26. District Superintendent Nate Smith said the two meetings are for the “sole pur...
Shane St. John, 35, Farmington, life-long county resident, was killed in an avalanche 20 miles northeast of Calder, Idaho, last Wednesday, Dec. 29. Searchers recovered St. John’s body under an estimated nine feet of snow at about 11:30 p.m., eight hours after receiving the report that he was missing. According to the report from the Shoshone County Sheriff’s office, St. John was snowmobiling with a friend last Wednesday on the Mastodon Road. Around 1:30 p.m., the other rider noticed St. John was missing and turned around to find him. He loc...
Uniontown is rebuilding its city staff following the resignations of several city employees last month in the midst of a heated budget struggle. Casey Green of Moscow was hired as the town’s new police officer at the Tuesday night’s council meeting. He will now patrol the town of 330 part-time as the only Uniontown officer. The town is also looking to hire a part-time clerk treasurer. A hiring committee has received 25 applications which they will narrow down to 10 qualified candidates by the end of this week. In the midst of a heated struggle...
A few users of the recycling facility at Palouse are leaving trash behind, so city officials are trying to get the word out about better facility maintenance. City crews took 12 hours, instead of the usual four hours, this month to dispose of the mound of debris left behind by citizens. Public Works Director Duane Griffin said they had to dig through the material designated for the compost chipper to pick out trash that can’t be put through the blades. Nails, Christmas lights and barbed wire are just some of the materials that can’t go thr...
Just because we are enveloped in Arctic conditions does not mean all Whitman County residents must spend the winter twiddling their thumbs indoors. No. You can get out. Here is proof. Take last Wednesday’s whiteout driving conditions. Chaos for driving, but great for sledding the day after. We have 73 days of winter as of this publication date (spring starts March 20), so get out there for some sledding before it is too late. Despite several spine-cracking sled accidents I had as a kid, sledding is still a fantastic way for me to kill an aftern...
Eleven independent food drives around Colfax sent in a giant wave of supplies to the Colfax food pantry during the holiday season. F.I.S.H. food pantry director Hannah Walker expects the stock to last until July. “I can’t believe one community can support all those drives,” Walker told the Gazette. Typical drives included the annual Boy Scout food drive, the Rosauer’s Hunger Bag drive and the cans from Jennings Elementary Can Race. Four churches also conducted food drives. St. Patrick’s Church Altar Society used a stocking stuffer format wh...
Whitman County schools will take a $1,417,405 hit over the next eight months, compliments of the state’s Dec. 11 special session. The figure may mean layoffs for some districts. “It’s going to be really hard on us,” said Rick Winters, superintendent for St. John/Endicott. The $1,417,405 is part of state-wide cuts legislators made to two school programs, K-4 enhancement and the EduJobs grant. Education Service District 101, the overarching educational district serving the eastern Washington region, did the math on those cuts and sent out the...
Fast-drifting snow created hazardous driving conditions across the Palouse Wednesday, dumping six to eight inches. National Weather Service meteorologist Matt Fugazzi said the weather is expected to take a dive toward extreme cold today, Thursday. “There’s no snow [expected] the rest of the week but there is a very cold Canadian arctic air mass moving into the area,” Fugazzi said. Night-time temperatures in the teens or single digits are expected every night until next week with day-time temperatures expected to only rise to the upper teens...
All county department heads Monday departed the county commissioners’ final budget meeting with a 2.61 percent cut to their budgets for next year. Commissioners bridged half of the $660,000 deficit Monday for the 2011 budget by ordering a cut of $330,000 to be shouldered by the county departments. No department is anticipating layoffs at this time. “I don’t want to say I’m happy, but I’m satisfied with the way things turned out,” said Prosecutor Denis Tracy, whose department faces a cut of $18,000. The 2011 general fund budget had a $660,000...
Bleachers of children are screaming and cheering, fists pumping, feet stomping the rails. A collective, roaring chant for each competitor fills the room and shakes the floor. Children scream and cheer for their champions of the can race Dec. 17. The ruckus in the Colfax Jennings Elementary gym is almost deafening as can after can rolls down the ramp in the annual children’s Can Race. More than 400 children from the kindergarten through eighth grade school Friday watched each classroom compete against other classrooms until a final winner r...
Officers seized tens of thousands of dollars in stolen property and a large stash of illegal drugs from a rural residence at Thornton Dec. 16. In a bust that drew agents from five Spokane and Whitman county law agencies, officers seized a 37-plant marijuana grow, a quantity of methamphetamine and thousands of dollars worth of stolen property and car parts. “The vast majority of it was everything from electronics like TVs or car stereos. There was also numerous vehicle parts off of many stolen vehicles,” said Whitman County Sheriff Brett Myers....
Alana Brunner’s voice does not catch as she talks about her terminal brain cancer on the phone with the Gazette. Her voice does not crack as she talks about her father’s debilitating stroke last year and it does not crack when she mentions she does not know how soon she will die. Instead, the 25-year-old Palouse woman brings up her faith, her focus on the good things in her life and in particular, her year-long quest to build a children’s home in Uganda. In between monthly rounds of chemotherapy, Brunner is working with Palouse Federated Churc...
Palouse residents will see their water and sewer bills rise for the second year in a row this February. The council voted Dec. 14 to raise the Palouse base water rate by $5.50 and the base sewer rate by $3. They also voted to raise the overage fee for water from $1 to $1.25 for every 100 cubic feet over the allowed base amount. Citizens saw their bills rise last year when the council chose to activate a utility tax on water and sewer. Citizens saw, at minimum, a $2.30 addition to their utility bill last January after the city council voted to...
The long-standing picnic shelter at Klemgard park will get a new metal roof. Years of Palouse weather have worn out the cedar shingles of the shelter, said park ranger Dave Mahan. Now the roof leaks in several spots. “What we’re going to do is we’re going to get the metal roofing material and strip the old roofing material,” he said. He pointed out the wooden shingles are going on 30 years old. “I’d like to get it done before spring really hits,” he said. Schedule for replacing the roof this winter will largely depend on the ferocity of t...
Funding for the kid’s fishing day at Gilchrist Pond is still on the rocks. County officials are searching for sponsors of the popular children’s fishing day in the spring. The county’s annual children’s fishing day was notified in early October by the state they would lose approximately $2,500. Those funds usually come from the state, which partially funds the fishing day. County officials are knocking on doors for funding earlier this year in hopes of bridging the gap before the end of January. Program leaders are trying to seek out new, po...
The sparkly sign of Tekoa’s newest coffee shop says it all; come here to get jazzed on caffeine. Inside, couches covered with Zebra patterns, a shiny metal counter and bright hanging bulbs light up the shiny interior for willing coffee connoisseurs. “I wanted it to be retro and a little bit funky. It just kind of came together,” said Melinda Wilkins. The name derives from the combined names of Melinda and Rob Wilkins’ daughters. Located along Tekoa’s Crosby Street, the business opened Nov. 9. It offers traditional caffeine fixings such as m...
Uniontown passed a slashed 2011 budget Monday night in the wake of a month of staff resignations. A crowded city hall watched as the five-member council passed the budget and made a plan for a private audit of the town’s finances. The town’s current expense budget is $297,894 for 2011. The overall budget, including water, sewer, reserves and capital improvement funds totals $997,699. The town currently has no police and no full-time city clerk. In the midst of a heated struggle over balancing the 2011 budget, city clerk/treasurer Cheryl Wal...
The dog was sleeping in a wet culvert every night, scrounging food scraps around Oakesdale and suffering from an ear infection. Pete and Margaret Leonard, proprietors of Oakesdale’s The Country Attic, diligently put out food for the hungry stray for most of this year, even though the dog wouldn’t let the two near him. Then winter hit. Pete took one look at the snow pounding in over the Palouse and put his foot down. “We knew he wouldn’t make it another winter out there on his own,” Leonard told the Gazette in an interview Dec. 10. Leonard d...
Colton was passed over for state funding for the town’s proposed new road. The state Transportation Improvement Board (TIB) sent word to all winners of TIB grants in late November and Colton was not among them. “I was really disappointed because I really felt like we had the right thing. Safety was a big issue for our school kids. You’d think that would score pretty high,” said Colton mayor Jerry Weber. Eight other towns in the county placed high enough on the TIB scoring to qualify for the grants which were announced last week. Colton applied...
Residents of Whitman County should know there is a reasonable amount of help available for paying a high heat bill with winter now in full swing. Community Action Center (CAC) offers one-time financial help for citizens struggling with a heating bill, if they meet eligibility guidelines. CAC offers a pair of programs. The Low Income Home Heating Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), a federal program, helps families with an adjusted gross income up to 125 percent of the federal poverty line. Families are given a one-time financial boost for...
Ornaments of a most rare nature will hang and twirl for spectators in a month-long art sale and show at the Bank Left Gallery in Palouse. Twelve artists, most from the Palouse, have stitched, glued, snipped and colored Christmas ornaments for the “Cloaked in Wonder” show. The gallery each year holds a themed Christmas art show. The theme this year is recycled material. The show runs Dec. 4 to Dec. 31. Every artist made their decorations, using largely discarded material like doll heads, tin cans or baby clothes. For example, one ornament was...
Uniontown currently has no police and will soon have no city clerk. In the midst of a heated city struggle over balancing the 2011 budget, City Clerk/Treasurer Cheryl Waller and temporary deputy clerk Patty Kelly both resigned. Waller’s resignation officially starts at the end of the month. Long-time Uniontown police officer David Lehmitz turned in a letter of resignation as of Nov. 30. Lehmitz told the Gazette he resigned, among other reasons, after reasoning the city budget could be better off with one less part-time officer. However, he w...
In an open letter to men they met at coffee shops or bookstores, someone wrote the following; “I don’t know what it is about your books and your maps and your chewed pencils and your clipboard and your small notebooks and your tapping fingers and your preoccupied way of drawing in the margins.” The next frame reads, “I have never been able to resist sincere eye contact.” The letter is one piece of a collaborative art show of Palouse artists now decorating the interior of Pullman’s Paradise Creek Brewery. Eight artists from the town of Palouse...
The state auditor’s office has cleared Palouse city hall of five accusations brought by citizen Jim Farr. The state auditor sent a letter out Dec. 1 to city hall and to Farr, to report the town was cleared on all accusations. Farr, among other accusations, told the state auditor some Palouse city council members were voting in measures that padded their own personal businesses or property. The state annually audits the city’s finances and procedures. Because of Farr’s complaints, the state checked into these matters in addition to its regular a...
