Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
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Nearing the end of the six-month moratorium on new or expansion of marijuana businesses in Whitman County, commissioners set a hearing on whether to extend it for Sept. 3 at 10:30 a.m. Board chairman Art Swannack noted that commissioners await a proposed ordinance now being created by the county planning commission. “We’ll give them all the time they need to craft an ordinance that’s well thought-out and has been subject to public testimony,” said Commissioner Michael Largent. The ordinan...
Incumbent Endicott Mayor Steve Salzman and council challenger Derek Starrett topped the three-way tallies after the primary election poll closed Tuesday night. Two proposals for the town of Farmington appeared to be on the brink after the Tuesday count, and proposals for the Colfax and St. John Cemetery districts were approved. Salzman, former council member who was appointed mayor at Endicott, received 34 votes and Daniel Larson received 16 to advance to the general election. Don Adsitt received four votes. Starrett topped the three-way race...
Whitman County commissioners Monday approved $1 million from the .09 economic development fund to go to the fiber-to-the-home and rural fiber extensions to transmitter sites project for the Port of Whitman. Another $600,000 was approved for the Moscow-Pullman Airport runway realignment. The $1 million will go to design and construction of a fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) network in five rural towns in Whitman County. The project will also bolster an existing transmitter network with mid-mile fiber...
Ashley Myers, 31, the suspect in the Sept. 28 fatal shooting of a man at the intersection of the Colfax Airport Road and Highway 26, was sentenced to 180 months in prison after pleading guilty to a reduced charge of second-degree murder Friday morning in superior court. Myers was charged with fatally shooting Kenneth Allen, 55, Coeur d’Alene, twice in the head with a .40 caliber pistol after the Chevrolet Tahoe in which they were riding was stopped off the Airport Road. Noting he believed Myers should spend more time in prison “to think abo...
Colfax Police Chief Rick McNannay returned to duty Aug. 1 after being out of action for close to 10 months. McNannay was ordered to report for duty Aug. 1 by the Colfax Civil Service Commission after a two-hour session July 2. The board ruled in favor of McNannay’s appeal of his firing in January. McNannay returned to a corner office in city hall which has been unused since he was placed on administrative leave with pay by Mayor Todd Vanek last October. He was subsequently fired Jan. 17, and he filed an appeal with the Civil Service C...
An accident on Highway I-90 near Alberton, Mont., took the life of a St. John woman and her daughter Saturday at approximately 6 p.m. Fatally injured in the collision were Amy Bass of St. John and her daughter, Matisen Rae Huntley, 18, a former Colfax High School student who had transferred to Moscow High School. She is also the daughter of Jason and Tara Huntley of Endicott. According to the Montana Highway Patrol report, the Chevrolet Impala driven eastbound by Bass veered across the highway and collided with a semi-truck at a high rate of...
Whitman County commissioners passed a resolution Monday against breaching of Snake River dams. “We thought we would reaffirm the position Whitman County has had for a long-standing period of time,” said Commissioner Michael Largent, who is also a board member for the state’s Salmon Recovery board. The board was asked to sign a letter on the matter at its last monthly meeting in July. Largent voted against it taking a position. “Salmon recovery is very non-political. I thought that who should do this are elected officials.” Largent also note...
Whitman County commissioners voted Monday to join, as a co-plaintiff, a proposed lawsuit brought by the Washington State Association of Counties (WSAC) regarding a 2017 state mandate for additional ballot boxes. Previous Whitman County Auditor Eunice Coker estimated 13 more ballot boxes would be needed here to comply. Two employees would be required to lock each of them at 8 p.m. on an election night. Whitman County was asked by the WSAC to join Snohomish County to be co-plaintiffs, as representative counties from the east and west side of the...
The Port of Clarkston July 31 responded to a study prepared by ECONorthwest and funded by Vulcan that argues the costs of the Lower Snake River Dams outweigh the benefits. “ECONorthwest and Vulcan should get their facts straight,” said Mark Brigham, commission chair, Port of Clarkston. “Remarkably, the report ignores the existence of the cruise industry and its economic benefits. And then the report fails to remove cruise passengers from baselines in forward-looking tourism and recreation analyses. Without the waterway passage made possi...
The Palouse city council voted July 23 to postpone a compliance date from Aug. 7 to Oct. 9 for Palouse Welding & Machine, a longtime local business which drew some complaints to city hall for things laying out on its lot near Main Street/Highway 272 at the east edge of town. The complaints regarded outdoor equipment storage in violation of Palouse Municipal code. City Administrator Kyle Dixon sent a notice to Alex Anderson, proprietor, June 6, noting the violation, with a stated compliance date...
A three-week, county-wide rumblestrip and striping project was to begin Wednesday on Hume Road, part of a list of roads to get new rumblestrips followed by re-painted centerlines and white fog lines along the the edge of lanes. The work is funded by $610,000 in grant money received last year from the Federal Highway Safety Improvement program. Dean Cornelison, assistant county engineer, estimates five to seven working days for rumblestrips, then a day to seal the strips’ 28 miles with a l...
Mark Borleske has been working with the Rosalia Chamber and local businesses to use vacant storefront windows to display scenic or historic aspects of Rosalia and the Palouse area. Borleske is looking for materials to display in a storefront that displays the route and locations on the Palouse Scenic Byway. He is seeking a fairly large map depicting the byway that a person on the sidewalk could see and understand through storefront glass. He believes this kind of display can draw further interest in the area and create more pedestrian traffic...
Washington Department of Ecology is proposing to change the water quality standard for Total Dissolved Gas during the spring season to spill more water over the dams at crucial times to help juvenile salmon migration in the Snake and Columbia Rivers. “Increased spill over the dams has the potential to be a win-win for salmon, orca, and power generation,” said Heather Bartlett, ecology’s water quality program manager. “We are at a critical time for our orca and salmon. This is a change we can make relatively quickly to help with the long-te...
Pullman Barracudas topped the five-team tri-county meet at the Colfax pool Saturday by rolling up 549.5 team points for the all-day meet which concluded the season. Other team scores were St. John/Endicott/LaCrosse Washtucna 361, Garfield/Palouse/Oakesdale/ Plummer 320, Colfax 151.5 and Pomeroy 122. Bree Myers, Pullman swimmer in the 12-under girls class, swept all six of the individual races and set records in the 100 freestyle, butterfly and the 100-yard individual medley. She clocked 1:04.21...
Tournament four: 8-10 years: Kaitlynn Ward 55, Vivian Riley 77. 11-12 years: Jacob Ward 52....
Registration deadlines for National Lentil Festival’s 3-on-3 basketball tournament sponsored by Gritman Medical Center, co-ed softball tournament and the Circles of Caring tennis and pickleball tournaments are approaching. Registration for the annual Lentil Fest 3-on-3 Hoop Classic for players in grades 3 through 8 is due no later than Aug. 9. The co-ed softball tournament is an all-day event at the Pullman City Play Fields. Games start at 8 a.m. with a three-game guarantee. Registration and the $175 entry fee must be submitted by 5 p.m. A...
Sprinklers neared a return to normal operation at the Colfax cemetery this week as staff members finish setting up a renewed electrical programming system. The cemetery has not been watered since mid-June after a period of manual operation followed what is believed to be a lightning strike last fall that marred the system. “It just gradually got worse,” said Ron Hinnenkamp, chairman of the cemetery board. Joe Rupe, the sexton/groundskeeper, got replacement parts at Umbrella Sprinkler Services in Lewiston and put the system back together. Now...
Last week in a 24 hour period, 31 innocent people were shot and killed in two mass shootings. Nearly 40 additional people were injured. The massacres occurred in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas. Sadly, the shootings were predictable, not as to time and place, but as an increasingly regular event in America. These two shootings followed the attack in Gilroy, California. Although the definition of a mass shooting differs, one count puts the number of mass shootings at 248 through July 31 of this year. Reportedly, 979 people were shot and 246...
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is playing a sophisticated game. Since her Democrats took the House, she's the one who has steadfastly fought off a hasty plunge into the impeachment of President Donald Trump. In the process, she has appeared to resist the more volatile factions in her caucus, particularly the attention-grabbing newbies, along with impatient Democrats nationwide who have loudly demanded that she clear the way so they can drop the I-Bomb. She will not like this comparison, but Pelosi has been the tortoise racing with her rabbits, her...