Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
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“Rock the Stock” is the theme of this year’s St. John Community Fair and stock show which opens today and runs through Sunday, April 27. Today, Thursday, from 8 a.m. to noon, food, sewing, adult arts & crafts, photography and flower entries are accepted. The Cook Shack opens at 11 a.m., and from noon to 5 p.m., livestock entries will be accepted. Judging in the Home Ec. Building will be held from 1 to 5 p.m. and the building will be closed to the public during judging. At 5 p.m. the building will be open for evening viewing. Starting at 9 a.m...
Native plants are almost extinct on the Palouse, but the Palouse Conservation District hopes to remedy that. Conservation District Manager Jennifer Boie said that the district is in the second part of a three-phase process of identifying potential prairie remnants in Whitman County. She said Latah County has gone through a similar process. “Any native plants in the Palouse Conservation District area is determined with aerial photos and natural agricultural imagery,” Boie said. The second pha... Full story
Whitman County officials were notified last week that Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services suspended its long-term rating on the county’s general obligation bonds and removed the rating from CreditWatch. County commissioners Monday during their regular meeting discussed the ramifications of the notification and concluded they aren’t really sure how this will affect the county’s financial business. The rating was suspended because the county didn’t submit paperwork needed to satisfy S&P’s policy. “I’m concerned about how this affects us. Thi...
Whitman Conservation District board members April 10 approved to move to a new location at the former JJ Building Supply. The conservation district is leasing office space at the south end of the store building at $500 per month until the end of the year. They are leasing the space from John Pearson who is now offering lumber and other building supply materials at the location. According to the lease, the district will rent on a month-to-month basis after Dec. 31. Pearson will supply the wi-fi service, and the district is responsible for other...
In a few years, the marina section of Boyer Park must be replaced. Port Director Joe Poire told Port of Whitman Commissioners at the April 3 meeting that the biggest problem is the marina docks which are now 40 years old. They are deteriorating and the pilings are coming loose. Port commissioners hope that the port can afford to replace the docks when the time comes. The marina was originally built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in the early 1970s. The port leases the park and marina from...
Two state Department of Ecology officials were seen observing land along Big Alkalai Creek Monday. Jan Moore who lives in Hay noticed an unfamiliar vehicle pass by and then recognized the two men inside. They were Mike Kuttel and Chad Atkins from the Spokane DOE office. The two DOE staffers had attended two DOE meetings hosted by the Whitman Conservation District in Colfax earlier this year which followed objections to DOE inspections and letters on potential livestock pollution last August. According to DOE Spokane Communications Manager...
Jenny Meyer of Endicott is celebrating. For the last 25 years, Meyer has been running the Endicott Food Center, where people go to not only get essential supplies, but where people go to what has become the hub of Endicott. On April 9, Meyer was presented with flowers and a dinner certificate by a number of her customers who appreciate her hard work and devotion. “She puts in long hours,” said one friend Kenda Hergert. “We really appreciate her.” On Saturday, Meyer hosted a celebratory barbecu... Full story
Starbuck may be the center for a wheat straw processing plant. But it remains to be seen if Whitman County farmers will benefit from it. Mark Lewis and Dave Powers of Columbia Pulp Mill wanted to talk to farmers about their proposal to build a straw processing plant near Starbuck, but not one farmer attended the Tuesday morning presentation with the exception of county and port commissioners. The few people who did attend explained farmers were out in the fields on a nice spring day. Although the crowd was sparse, Lewis explained the proposal...
Port of Whitman County commissioners April 3 noted continuing changes at Boyer Park and Marina. A port application to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for expansion of the RV portion of the park with another 12 to 14 spaces was discussed. Port Director Joe Poire said increased sizes of RVs over the past few years require larger rental spaces for the RVs. The additional spaces will be located along the north side of the day use area. The port will make the addition pending approval from the corps. The next project will be addition of three renta...
Whitman County commissioners on Monday signed an agreement for the Martin Hall Juvenile Detention Facility. During a workshop before the commissioners’ regular meeting, commission chair Art Swannack said as of March 27, there were 38 juvenile inmates at the center, more than twice the number in the last couple of months. He also commented that Spokane’s juvenile hall was at maximum capacity and could not take any more juvenile offenders if Martin Hall went over capacity. In February, the hall housed an average of 13 juvenile offenders. The ame...
Bikers beware - the sixth annual FastLane Tail of the Snake run is scheduled for April 19. According to one of the organizers, Roger Zaring of Dusty, the ride is hosted by the Palouse 3N1 Ridaz which is part of the Christian Motorcyclists Association and the L/C Gospel Riders. The ride is open to all responsible riders from novice to expert, with on-road and off-road routes. With the warming temperatures, this is a spring opener for the group. The ride is free but if riders donate, they are...
A familiar face is leaving the Endicott City Hall in December. Sue Bafus, who first started working for the city in the fall of 1971, said she’s seen many changes in the small town over the years. Bafus said she began collecting water bills, then worked as the city treasurer and when the position was combined with the city clerk, took on the combined position. “I’m just tired of working,” she said Tuesday morning in city hall. With two grandsons in Spokane who are very active in sports, Bafus s...
The building formerly known as the Hamilton Drug Store on Main Street in Colfax is slowly coming back to life. Whitman County Library Director Kristie Kirkpatrick reported on Monday to county commissioners that the building adjacent to the library will now be known as The Center. “It will be the educational and social hub of Colfax,” Kirkpatrick said. The Center will be open year round and will feature exercise and yoga classes along with art exhibits. Colfax Chamber of Commerce also will be...
The current extended lock closure at Little Goose Lock & Dam may have some impact on the corps’ annual practice of barging young salmon downstrean. The barging operations generally start no earlier than April 21 and no later than early May, according to Bruce Henrickson, corps information specialist. At present the corps has eight of its 10 fish barges at Lower Granite and two downstream in Portland for maintenance. One option, in the event river shipping remains blocked at Little Goose, would be to bring the two barges upstream from Portland a...
A new barge mooring area is under construction at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Lower Granite Lock & Dam on the Snake River. The contractor, TSS/Garco Joint Venture of Richland, started construction at Lower Granite in November. The project has been awarded on the bid of $6.969 million. The corps is asking visitors and anglers to stay out of the land and water construction areas because of safety concerns. The north shore tailrace area just below the dam and gated access road to the tailrace are closed during construction. The area is a c...
Following a recommendaton from Public Works Director Mark Storey, Whitman County commissioners Monday approved $3,798,330 for construction of a new solid waste transfer station to Halme Builders, the highest bidder on the project. The 3-0 vote was taken over the objections of the low bidder on the project, Clearwater Construction of Spokane. The Clearwater bid was $246,510 under the Halme bid. In a workshop session Monday before the meeting, Storey told commissioners that Clearwater was contesting the bid award. Paul Clary, president of... Full story
Steve Fulton, president of Unifine Mill, will be at the Palouse Knowledge Corridor session April 3. Unifine’s presentations will be from 2 to 5 p.m. at the BellTower Event Center in Pullman with other businesses highlighted during the event. The Unifine whole grain flour milling system has been under development at WSU for the last 60 years, according to Fulton. With consumer demand growing for locally milled whole grain flour is skyrocketing, Fulton said. WSU Design Clinic teams have updated the milling system design, the first of which is c...
Students are helping package soup mix for low income families. Storehouse Executive Director Tom Riedner is watching the organization that is dear to his heart grow even more. Riedner grew up on a farm near Colton and got his first after-college job at Continental Grain and worked in the grain industry for 22 years. After he became unemployed, he was approached about directing the charitable organization and eagerly took the reigns. Storehouse was born in 2010 and has already fed thousands of people locally and worldwide. With a donation of...
The new committee that encompasses farm groups and the state Department of Ecology, called the Agriculture and Water Quality Advisory Committee met for the first time on March 19 in Lacey. According to the DOE website, a broad array of agricultural interests is participating on the new advisory committee to improve working relationships and ensure both water quality protection and a healthy agricultural industry. As the committee meets, members will discuss and provide advice and guidance about the work DOE does to prevent pollution. The purpos...
LaCrosse Community Pride members hosted a second meeting March 20 in the meeting room next to the LaCrosse Market to discuss future projects for the town. The first community meeting was Jan. 16 when about 50 people discussed how to make LaCrosse a destination. At that meeting, the Pride group invited Robin Ohlgren of the Southeast Washington Economic Development Association to conduct roundtable discussions about LaCrosse’s assets, improvements and additional economic development. From that mee...
A power outage caused Rosalia residents to go without water for a short time this weekend. According to Rosalia Mayor Nan Konishi, the town experienced a power outage about 1:30 a.m. on Friday which was repaired by Avista at 12:30 p.m. Friday afternoon. “Everything appeared to be fine until I got a phone call on Sunday from a person who lives up on the hill who had no water,” Konishi said. The pumps at the water plant had not turned on after the power outage and the town’s reservoir was empty. Konishi said an automatic alarm normally alert...
During the regular Monday morning workshop, Whitman County Commissioner Art Swannack discussed a possible rental agreement with the Whitman Conservation District. WCD is looking for new office space since the Natural Resources Conservation Service developed a new policy about charging rent to the conservation district that would amount to $25,000 annually. The conservation district board said that the district can’t afford the rent and have elected to move its office by mid-summer. One of the possible office spaces the district is investigating...
Whitman County Sheriff Brett Myers asked the county commissioners Monday to add more than $50,000 to the sheriff’s budget, most of which would be for a deputy’s salary. At the end of last fall’s budgeting sessions by the commission, one deputy position was eliminated in cutback’s of the sheriff’s budget for 2014. Myers budget was cut $323,000 from his original budget proposal of $3.5 million. Myers at the commission workshop session Monday said he has a deputy in training now, and he needs to know what the next step will be – to let the dep... Full story
This time it’s not a rumor. A wolf was spotted near Dusty on March 6. It was an ordinary Thursday morning, a little before 8. Roger and Peggy Zaring, who live south of Dusty, had just come into the house from feeding their cattle when Roger looked out a window and saw an “enormous dog.” The dog, he soon realized, was a black wolf. Zaring said the cattle are in a pasture close to his house and the wolf was trotting across an alfalfa field close to the pasture. “It was very black and dark and was...
Port of Whitman County commissioners March 6 approved a request to research the possibility to purchase a trash compactor for Boyer Park and Marina. Port Director Joe Poire told the commissioners that the trash compactor itself would cost almost $24,000. The entire project which includes a concrete slab, fence and lighting would cost about $40,000, he said. “We’ll place it upwind of the park,” Poire joked and then assured the commissioners there would be little or no odor. It will be placed west of the park, as far away from the campsites as it... Full story
