Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
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Garfield/Palouse center Nathan Cocking rips down a rebound in front of LW forward Jeff Zimmer in the Vikings' 67-57 win Friday night at Palouse. Garfield/Palouse boys showed they have enough offense to make their defense hold up by starting off the hoops non-league season with a pair of double-digit wins over the weekend. Coach Tim Coles, who was worried about his club’s attack entering the season, was encouraged by the weekend’s performances. “Let’s hope we can keep it up,” said Coles. Steven Griffin had his outside shot working in Friday’s... Full story
South Bend Indians, playing in the school’s first title game, faced off against Colfax Saturday night in the Tacoma Dome without any secrets. The undefeated Indians were billed as a straight ahead team that chewed up the yards and possession time for four quarters and picked up enough TDs in the process to collect wins. (SEE MORE SPORTS PHOTOS ON PAGE A7 IN THE WEEKLY PAPER SECTION) Despite the all-out efforts of the Bulldogs, the Indians put that game plan in gear Saturday night and ground out a 28-8 win for the 2B title and the last c...
THURSDAY NASA announced the finding of a bizarre bacterium that thrives on arsenic in a strange, salty lake in California. The bacteria, called Halomonadaceae, not only feeds off the toxic element, but incorporates aresenic directly into it’s DNA. Chris Voigt, chief of the Washington State Potato Commission, ended a self-imposed diet of only potatoes that allowed him to shed 20 pounds in two months. Voigt also lowered his blood sugar and cut his cholesterol by one-third. He began the diet to protest a federal rule that barred families from p...
Paul S. Bickle and Vikki Kropp, who were arrested after officers located stacks of stolen property at a mobile home where they had been living in LaCrosse, were both sentenced last Friday in superior court. The arrests ended a summer crime spree in which businesses at Colfax and Pullman, and the Department of Transportation were hit. Bickle, 35, was sentenced to 68 months in prison. Originally charged with 21 counts, he pleaded guilty Oct. 29 to a reduced charge of four counts of burglary. Bickle, who has a record on 10 crimes going back 14...
Drivers can no longer travel the county’s Mail Route Road, after commissioners Monday changed its name to Cayuse Lake Road. The new name was requested by Jeremy Smith, who owns the only residence along the 6.8-mile road that runs east-to-west south of Ewan. “We were thinking we need a little facelift in the area,” said Smith. “So why not change the road name to something a little more hip?” Smith’s family has lived in the area since his great-grandfather moved there in the late-1930s. He said they have a field named Cayuse Flat, and in that...
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... Full story
Whitman County commissioners extended the county’s contract with Darry-Air, Inc., Ephrata, to spray noxious weeds in county-owned rights-of-way in the county’s three road districts. The county signed a deal with Darry-Air in 2008, and that contract includes three options to renew if the price remains the same as the original contracted price. Last year, the company sprayed 5,607 acres of county-owned property at a price of $24.71 per acre. Commissioners also approved a renewal of the county’s contract with Busch Distributors, Moscow, for the c...
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...
Whitman County finance officials had planned a summit Wednesday, Dec. 8, to try to reconcile investments logged in the county’s books with those recorded on bank statements. Earlier this year, Elias Siriani, a contracted accountant from the Anderson Peretti firm in Spokane, discovered county records showed $216,000 more in investments than could be confirmed on bank statements. County officials, wanting balanced books to input into the five-year-old, half-million dollar New World computer accounting software, plan to wipe the $216,000 off t...
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...
Farming land taken out of CRP will be the topic of the Colfax Palouse Direct Seeders breakfast meeting next Wednesday, Dec. 15, beginning at 7 a.m. in the United Methodist Church in Colfax. Tracy Eriksen of St. John will speak on his experiences with direct seed techniques to farm land taken out of CRP. Also, WSU research scientist Ian Burke will share research he has done on CRP takeout. Steve Kaufman of Farm Credit Services will host the breakfast. Contact Dennis Roe in Colfax for more information: rdroe@wsu.edu.... Full story
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...
A cool Snake River breeze blows chaff back onto the Almota rocks as Ron Dennison moves a spout pouring soft white wheat into a Portland-bound barge. Tuesday marked the last time a barge will leave the Port of Almota for the next four months while locks on the Snake and Columbia Rivers shut down for repairs at four dams. “We’ve still got plenty enough to do around here to keep us busy,” said Dennison, as he operated the barge loading spout at Almota Elevator’s port site. Due to replacement of entire lock gates at The Dalles and John Day dams on...
Whitman County commissioners conducted their first public hearing on the county’s 2011 budget Monday night with one notable absence - the budget. Commissioners Pat O’Neill and Greg Partch said they had not received a budget draft from Auditor Eunice Coker that could be used to finalize next year’s spending plan. “You cannot look into the future, or even begin to plan, if you don’t have a good set of numbers,” said O’Neill. “A lot of other counties know they’re deep in the hole and people have got to leave.” Whitman County is not to that poin...
With the future of Central Ferry Park uncertain, Port of Whitman Commissioners last Thursday discussed efforts to save it. The park, owned by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, now lacks an operator because Northwest Land Management opted out of its lease at the end of the recreation season. “I just wonder if we could start a conversation about redeveloping the park,” Port Commissioner Don Cox said at last week’s regular port meeting. Cox suggested a three-headed management team of the port running the park with help from the corps and the state...
Ten-month old Devin Kile of Pine City takes a careful look at Santa Claus in Pittmann’s Town and Country during Rosalia’s Christmas festival last Saturday. Devin is the son of Ken and Jessica Kile. Santa’s “helper” was Mike Day. Pictures from a busy holiday weekend in Whitman County are featured on the back page.... Full story
CITY OF TEKOA PUBLIC HEARINGS The City of Tekoa will hold public hearings for the 2011 budget and the 2010 budget amendment. The public hearings will be held during the regular council meeting on Monday, December 20, 2010 after 7:00 p.m. at the Council Chambers in City Hall. All citizens are encouraged to attend. Kynda Browning, Clerk/Treasurer 49/2C WHITMAN COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT REQUEST FOR QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE UPDATING OF MULTI-JURISDICTIONAL NATURAL HAZARDS MITIGATION PLAN 1. General Information Whitman County Departmen... Full story
It was French playwright Albert Guinon who made the following sage observation: “There are people who, instead of listening to what is being said to them, are already listening to what they are going to say themselves.” Most people at all familiar with the name Max Schmeling know him as the Great Nazi Hope, the boxer produced by Adolf Hitler in the 1930s to defeat Joe Louis, supposedly proving Aryan superiority. (He did defeat Louis in a match in 1936, though he lost a rematch in 1938.) What most people don’t realize, though, is that Schme...
These reports are from the previous four issues of the Daily Bulletin in Colfax. They are reprinted here for the benefit of Gazette readers who reside outside of Colfax. Some accounts have been updated. ************ Two hurt in Dusty accident Two people were hurt Dec. 3 in a car-truck collision at the intersection of Highway 26 and Dusty Road. According to the Washington State Patrol report, John R. Appel, 60, Pomeroy, was driving a 2007 Chevrolet pickup truck south on Dusty Road and stopped at the sign on the north side of the highway at...
Another round of heavy snowfall could see city crews dumping snow into the South Palouse River with the use of a state permit. Andy Rogers, public works director, said he has been informed the state Department of Transportation has obtained a permit to dump the snow into the river and will provide dump trucks and a loader if needed in the coming weeks. Rogers said the city is running out of places to pile snow. Dumping street snow into the river was a standard procedure in Colfax for years, but the practice has been curtailed because the... Full story
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...
The History Channel * On Dec. 19, 1732, Benjamin Franklin of Philadelphia first publishes “Poor Richard’s Almanack.” The book, filled with proverbs preaching industry and prudence, was published continuously for 25 years and became one of the most popular publications in colonial America, selling an average of 10,000 copies a year. * On Dec. 17, 1843, Charles Dickens’ classic story “A Christmas Carol” is published. When Dickens’ father was thrown into debtors’ prison in 1824, 12-year-old Charles was sent to work in a factory. The miserable t...
Whitman County’s planning commission gave unofficial approval last week to changes in county zoning code that would reduce the public process required to build in unincorporated areas. The changes give Planner Alan Thomson sole discretion to permit construction of some projects that currently require conditional use permits from the citizen board of adjustment. Thomson Monday said the changes are designed to speed the permit process. The code changes would eliminate the board from ruling on construction of cell phone towers and accessory f...
Colton school officials are launching a second effort to fund remodeling of the aging Colton school building. Nov. 2 a proposal for a $5.1 million bond measure over 20 years was approved by a majority of district voters, but it failed to top the state’s 60 percent approval rate required for bonding measures. When all votes were totaled, the count was 301 in favor and 282 against. Over these next few months, Colton Superintendent Nate Smith said they will solicit the residents’ opinions on what should or should not go into the remodeling. “Ob...
