Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
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Taylor Engineering of Pullman has been selected to design the new water system plan for the town of Palouse. On July 11, representatives from Taylor Engineering, the Spokane office of the state Department of Health (DOH) and members of the town’s water and sewer Committee met. DOH officials explained in detail a 10-chapter manual on how to follow guidelines for the state-designed water system plan. Taylor Engineering must follow these guidelines over the coming months to meet state standards for a water system plan. “We want this to be in pla... Full story
County commissioners have put off signing of an employment contract for Public Health officer with Dr. Tim Moody because of a snag in health insurance coverage. Moody, who left his in-house position at the county health department July 11, will be retained by the county to pursue another position as the student health officer for Claremont Colleges in California. County commissioners discussed the issue at Monday’s commissioner meeting and Tuesday’s health board meeting. The issue still remained if Moody could be covered under county hea...
Palouse artist Thad Froio poses next to the wooden mammoth he and fellow artists constructed in the spring time. Froio was upset to learn it had been burned to the ground the night of July 10 in an apparent act of arson. The Palouse Police department has no further leads on who burned the wooden mammoth downtown July 10. Chief Jerry Neumann said all his potential leads have gone cold and the case of who torched the 12-foot-tall wooden behemoth is still open. Construction of the new Palouse Community Center is set to begin July 25 at the site...
After years of fund-raising, the first day of construction for the planned Palouse Community Center will be July 25. “It’s going to be a fabulous Christmas present for Palouse,” said Janet Barstow, a member of the center’s board, pointing out the project should wrap up just before Christmas 2011. Walter Construction of Spokane was selected as contractor for the project, with a winning bid of $483,600. A ground-breaking ceremony will be Aug. 4 at 5:30 p.m. at the building site in downtown Palouse. Final paperwork has been signed for a $150,00...
School districts around Whitman County are one more month into a four-month delay on seeing their monthly financial statements from the county treasurer’s office. The county switched to New World software in early April, but a problem with the software system has delayed the treasurer’s office in providing each school district with its monthly finance information. That delay slowed down each district’s ability to write up its 2011- 2012 budget and school business managers have been unable to provide school boards with end-of-month figur... Full story
Shaina Johnson cleared the fastest breakaway time at the Silver State International Rodeo in Winnemucca, Nev. Here, she is pictured on the 2.39 second run that won, on her 12-year-old stock-bred paint horse Hank. She lives in Rosalia. Sixteen-year-old Shaina Johnson of Rosalia walked away from one of the nation’s biggest high school rodeo events with a first place win in breakaway roping the week of July 5. Johnson competed in the Silver State International Rodeo in Winnemucca, Nev., as a member of the Washington State High School Rodeo Associa... Full story
Scott Edinger, a 1995 graduate of Colfax High School, is speaking this Sunday at the Country Bible Church in Dusty about a two-year mission to Rwanda on which he and his family will embark early next year. Currently, Edinger is the family life pastor at Northside Community Church in Newberg, Ore. Edinger is speaking at several churches where he and his wife Natasha have attended in the hopes of raising support for their mission to Rwanda. “I’ll be training the pastors and church leaders in Rwanda, and I’ll be helping to provide ministry oppor... Full story
Different stakeholders in the future of the John Wayne Trail spoke with the Gazette this week about the recent funding awarded to plan upgrades to the state-wide trail. The Washington State Parks Department has been recently awarded a grant for $96,000 from the state’s Resource Conservation Office to write a plan for repairs and upgrades to the trail. The funding will help write plans for three trailheads to be built at Malden, Rosalia and Tekoa. The trailheads would include parking lots and restrooms. Land-owner Gary Van Dyke owns roughly thre...
The county’s public health officer, Dr. Tim Moody, is taking a full-time health services job in California while still maintaining his position with the county. Dr. Moody told the Gazette he’ll be working long-distance advising the county on public health issues from his new job in Claremont, Calif. All of the advisory work he’ll be doing can be accomplished via electronic communication, he said. “I’ve handled outbreaks of measles when I was in Milwaukee, Wis. I’ve handled pertussis while looking at Mt. Rushmore,” he said. The doctor will b...
The Prosser man critically injured in a three-car accident south of Colfax July 5 was still listed in serious condition as of Wednesday morning at Harbor View Medical Center in Seattle. “He still has not regained consciousness,” said Washington State Patrol Trooper Rob Aucutt. Wednesday, July 13, marked the eighth day 29-year-old Christopher Beaver has been unconscious. Beaver, of Prosser, sustained massive head injuries when the 2003 Saturn he was driving collided head-on with a 2006 Mercedes on Highway 195 south of Colfax. EMTs used a Jaw...
Pheasant hunting in Whitman County stands to see a significant boost in the next two years if all goes as planned under a new federal grant recently awarded to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. A $993,231 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to WDFW has a three-pronged goal of opening up more private land to hunting and fishing in 11 counties on the east side of the state. Those three goals include financial incentives for farmers in certain counties to allow hunting on their land, working with farmers with land in CRP...
The wooden mammoth erected in downtown Palouse went up in flames Sunday night in an apparent act of arson. Palouse Police chief Jerry Neumann said the structure was torched around 8 p.m. Sunday. “It’s just a shame. It’s just a complete lack of respect,” said the creator of the mammoth, Palouse artist Thad Froio. “Honestly, we don’t have any suspects at this time,” Neumann said. “I believe there was a group in the beer garden who had a conversation earlier in the night about wanting to burn it. An hour later the mammoth is on fire.” All that rem...
The funds have been raised for at least eight solar panels in memory of Palouse’s Mike Carlton. The solar panels will be on the roof of the soon-to-be-built Palouse Community Center and will partially provide the electrical needs of the building. In tandem with the solar panel project, the center in mid-June learned it was awarded a $20,000 grant from the Inland Northwest Community Foundation. The grant will pay for a special heating and cooling system for the building that conserves energy at a much higher rate than most other systems. C... Full story
Washington State Parks and Recreation was recently awarded a grant for $96,000 to prepare a plan for repairs and upgrades to the John Wayne Pioneer Trail. The grant will develop a site plan and secure local permits for the development of trailheads along the trail at Malden, Rosalia and Tekoa. The site plan, to be designed over two years, will lay out the details of each traihead, such as parking spaces, restrooms and picnic tables, according to Bill Fraser, regional planner for the Eastern Regional Office for Washington State Parks and...
Inappropriate materials thrown into the Palouse compost pile are back-logging the city’s time using the chipper to process the materials. City staff has found big logs, bottles and root balls in the compost pile, matter which cannot be chewed up by the public chipper and which must be removed by hand. The town council has heard details on the junk problem at several council meetings in the past few months from city Public Works Director Duane Griffin. County Recycling and Waste Reduction Coordinator Judi Dunn-Grey spoke at the last council meet... Full story
Community Action Center is constructing four houses for low-income families along Palouse Cove Road outside of Palouse. Foundations and frames of the stick-built homes are partially completed. “It allows a moderately paid person to get into home-ownership,” said Dale Miller, housing program manager for the Community Action Center. Funding for CAC’s Self-Help Housing Project comes from the federal government’s Housing and Urban Development fund, Community Frameworks, a non-profit in the Pacific Northwest. Also the payments on other houses which...
The 2011 Whitman County Relay for Life kicks off tomorrow, July 8, at the Colfax High School track. Eighteen teams will participate in the all-night event. Many team members hail from other small Whitman County towns, including a team from St. John/ Endicott. “It’s a good night to remember people that have lost their lives to cancer and those that have survived this terrible disease,” said Deanna Leinweber, committee member for the Relay for Life. As team members take turns at walking the track throughout the night, many other Relay for Life ev...
A Prosser man sustained life threatening injuries in a three-car collision south of Colfax Tuesday morning. Christopher Beaver, 29, Prosser, was flown by Life Flight helicopter to St. Joseph Medical Center in Lewiston and then flown to Harbor View Medical Center in Seattle Tuesday night. Beaver, who sustained head injuries, had to be extricated from his Saturn. The mid-morning accident backed up SR 195 traffic for miles in either direction. Drivers of two other cars left the scene with minor injuries. “It was a very serious collision,” sai...
The Colfax food pantry is now in need of even the most basic supplies. A record year of requests has left the shelves of the pantry barren of essentials like Top Ramen, spaghetti sauce and mayonnaise. “What we really need is a group that would like to take on a food drive,” said Gail Webster, director of the Colfax Community Action Center, which manages the Colfax food bank. Supplies like boxed or canned foods are needed, Webster said. Specifically, items like peanut butter, potatoes, dish soap, pasta, spaghetti sauce, cream soups and bak...
Palouse’s Grange Hall building will officially close Aug. 1. The Palouse Arts Council made the decision to close the hall after they decided the price to buy the building was too high. One more wedding has been booked at the building before it closes. The council has maintained the building for the past eight years, and sought to buy it in order to apply for grant funds to upgrade the building. Washington State Grange legally owns the building. The arts council made several offers to buy it, but said each of their offers was turned down. “They... Full story
As schools around Whitman County begin to see the state’s 1.9 percent cut in funds to pay teacher salaries, it falls to each district how to accommodate that loss of funding. Many school districts issued reduction in force, or layoffs, in early May in anticipation of losing funding from the state education department. Now that the state has issued the final budget, school districts can more accurately examine their own budgets in light of possibly bringing staff members back on the payroll. Some districts will maintain teacher pay levels by t...
Gazette Reporter A sign with a brief description of the history of Elberton was recently erected in the former town, which is now a county park along the North Fork of the Palouse River. Park board member Dennis Cartwright of Elberton installed the sign June 6. At the June 9 park board meeting, he shared a picture of the new sign with park board members. Cartwright lives in Elberton and has sat on the park board for the past five years. The area has been without a sign for almost 10 years. A portion of the sign reads as follows: “In the 1... Full story
Erina McGuckin has opened a counseling office in Oakesdale offering trauma counseling for children, adolescents and adults. Her office, La Bramasole, is located in the former Root 66 Studios office on Steptoe Avenue. “There are a lot of studies out that show adults who have traumatic experiences in their past have approximately a 60 to 70 percent chance of being diagnosed with trauma,” McGuckin said. McGuckin moved her practice to Oakesdale from Rosalia after the building in which she kept her office there closed. She has a B.A. in psychology f...
Mitz’s Cabinets of Colfax is moving to Garfield. After the original cabinet shop burned down last November, owner Craig Mitzimberg has been running his business temporarily out of a space in the former Inland Power Building just north of Colfax on Highway 195. The new shop will be housed in the building which formerly housed the grocery store in Garfield and a former hotel building. “We’re doing a bunch of the work in there right now, getting it ready,” Mitzimberg said. Mitzimberg bought the former grocery store building from his brother, T.J.... Full story
In 2004, Connie Brown, school counselor at Garfield, tossed a bottle filled with student notes into the Selway River in Idaho. Seven years passed. This May, the school received all the notes back in an envelope in the mail. Brown said she was surprised when Garfield principal Zane Wells handed the letter to her. “I didn’t think about it again until the principal handed me the letter and said, ‘This is going to make your year,’” said Brown. Justin Stewart of Hamilton, Mont., pulled the bottle out of the Clearwater River in Orofino on a fishing...