Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley
Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley
Sorted by date Results 1294 - 1318 of 1333
Dear Editor, Ten years ago Clarence Stearns made a choice and a mistake that nearly ruined his life, not to mention being an affront to the country and to its laws. Ten years ago he thought his life was ruined anyway, with back-breaking child support and unfair alimony demands (by which I make no excuses for him, only supply background). He paid with a maximum sentence despite it being a first offense. He was a model prisoner in a minimum security facility. With his debt to society paid, his rehabilitation 100 percent, and despite the u...
Dear Editor, I would like to share with your readers why I support Rea Culwell for reelection as Columbia County Prosecutor. Prior to retiring and relocating to Dayton four years ago, I lived and worked in NC, SC, TX and VA. I was called to serve as a juror in each state. In October 2009, I received a notice to report to serve on the jury at the Superior Court of Columbia County. After the selection process, I was chosen to sit on the jury panel of a criminal trial. This was to be the smallest venue of all my judicial experiences, and I wasn't...
The bottom fell out of my stomach as Bill pulled the combine to a stop and stood from the driver's seat. "Okay, now it's your turn." "Uh," was all I could get out. Bill Blessinger, known around town as "Wild Bill," is a large man, wearing bib overalls on this day. He stood stooping in the cab of the wheat harvester and began edging his way around me, effectively scooting me into the driver's seat. "You'll be fine. It's just like driving a lawn mower," he said. Oh sure, I thought. And then he...
Last month my daughter, Bubs Cerma, and I stopped at Dunham Cellars located at the Walla Walla Municipal Airport. I mentioned to the young man who showed us around that I used to dance there during World War II. I found out later that I hadn't danced with soldiers there, because the Dunham Cellars had been used as hangars for B-17 and B-32 airplanes! In Robert A. Bennett's book, "Walla Walla, A Nice Place to Raise a Family," he writes, "Three days after Pearl Harbor it was announced in Washington, D.C., that Walla Walla was to be one of seven...
Recent city council meetings involved heated debate over a proposed city ordinance that, if passed, would allow unlicensed, uninsured, unsafe, and extremely noisy off-road vehicles (ORVs), including dirt bikes, to be driven on designated streets covering the length of Dayton heading to Eckler Mountain. Furthermore, this ordinance would allow loading and unloading of such four-wheel ORVs and dirt bikes from conveying pick-up trucks and flatbed trailers at any point along the route, be...
When Columbia County Sheriff's Deputy Jeff Jenkins searched Melinda Meske's home at Valley View Court in Dayton on the evening of May 6, he found 14 different colored baggy containers with trace amounts of methamphetamine. He also found one needle, two torches and a metal smoking device - enough evidence of controlled substances to send the 30-year-old woman to jail. It seemed disturbing enough that a mother of three, including an 11-year-old, a two-year-old and a three-year-old would be in possession of the items. But that's not where the st...
On the way home from Walla Walla recently we found ourselves stuck behind a combine on Highway 12. My first instinct was to finda quick way around the slow-moving vehicle so we wouldn't have to travel the rest of the way to Waitsburg at 30 miles per hour. I eased up right behind it, looking for an opportunity to pass it in the oncoming lane. Then I relaxed somewhat, remembering this is harvest time, and I backed off to make sure I didn't make the combine driver feel pressured. It's easy to forget that farmers have little choice in using...
It's 6:30 a.m. Granted, the sun is already angling in over the treetops in our yard off Main Street, but I wouldn't normally be up this early if it weren't for our brand new puppy. I'm wandering around in the dewy light in boxers and a T-shirt, giving him a chance to do his business. It's been two weeks since Lucy, our beloved Airdale, passed away after an accident. Last week, our older dog Snowy, a wire-haired Fox Terrier, succumbed to old age. Two weeks ago, I described how we picked tw...
Dear Editor, To see is to believe. After researching the candidates for the open Walla Walla County Sheriff's position, there is no doubt in my mind that John Turner is the right person for the job. Spend five minutes with John and it becomes very clear that he among any of the candidates has the best credentials and the ability to lead the department into the future. From his work as a gang unit police officer, corporal, senior lead officer, law enforcement attorney, and most recently serving in Iraq investigating and going after...
Dear Editor, I am delighted that John Turner is running for Walla Walla County Sheriff. Both of his opponents currently work for the Walla Walla County Sheriff and have for over 30 years. They've been the captains in charge for the last 12 years. Unless John Turner is elected, I tend to believe it will be more business as usual. Currently the sheriff's officedoes not provide 24/7 coverage, they ran our K-9 program into failure, and there is a huge lack of attention to the rising gang problems our area has been experiencing. As a former police...
When I was a child, I was fascinated with the beautiful bluebirds in the area where I lived in the "Old" Kettle Falls, Wash., north of Spokane. The western and mountain bluebirds were plentiful there in the spring and summer. The mountain species is typical of high elevations in summer, most common above 5,000 feet as quoted from "The Golden Field Guide." Both of the species are found in our Blue Mountains above Dayton, Waitsburg and Pomeroy. An excellent loop into the high mountains follows a ridgeline south from Dayton above the Nor...
The city of Dayton is currently in the process of adopting an ORV ordinance that would work in conjunction with Columbia County's already existing ordinance allowing ORVs access to the forest service boundaries on Eckler and Maloney Mountains via Mustard Hollow Road. This city ordinance, if passed, would allow ORVs to access Mustard Hollow Road from within the city limits of Dayton. Copies of the ordinance can be downloaded from www.daytonwa.com. During the first public hearing that held J...
In the Last Good Deed of 55 Plus Club caption last week, the names included in the caption should have read, left to right, Pat Largent, Delores Gohlman, Jeanetta Monfort, Lillian Judd, Loyal Baker, Janice Wills, and Mary Arland. The Times staff apologizes for the errors....
Dear Editor, I urge the people of Washington State to elect Charlie Wiggins for Supreme Court Justice. I don't have enough room to tell you why Charlie is the best candidate because I must inform you about the justice Charlie is running against, Richard Sanders. Judges cannot do anything that would create an improper appearance that he or she might favor a party to a case. Justice Sanders was disciplined by the Washington State Commission on Judicial Conduct for improperly personally interviewing sexually violent predators with cases pending...
Dear Editor: The Commerce Committee of the Commercial Club of Waitsburg is excited to share a new project. The vision of the project is to silhouette each of the downtown buildings with lights. The committee members have researched lighting and found that LED rope lights are very attractive and are the most economical, using only pennies of electricity for any given building each day. Marilyn and I have received many favorable comments about the lights on the Plaza during the Christmas season. One of the most gratifying comments came from a...
WALLA WALLA - After Lucy's passing early last week, we were keen on getting another dog but decided to look into adopting one instead of going to a breeder. That was after we had briefly considered the idea of getting a Lakeland Terrier (a cross between Lucy's breed, an Airdale, and our other dog, Snowy, a Fox Terrier) and found out the closest Lakeland Terrier breeder is well past Boise and charges $1,200 for a puppy. $1,200!?! You gotta be kidding me! Hey, we thought, there are far too many un...
"A wide net catches the most Ð ish." That was 23-year old Jordan McCandless's approach to fÐinding a job. He claimed job-hunting as a 40-hour per week com- mitment after graduating from Whitworth Univer- sity in Spokane. And after countless applications and interviews, he still had no luck fÐinding a job. Jordan described his dreams of one day becom- ing a U.S. Senator, and was willing to work any sort of job or internship to get his foot in the door. He said, "My main concern is mak- ing su...
The holidays are winding down. Your living room floor is littered with shards of wrapping pa- per and crushed cellophane bows. The trash can out the back door is sixty-five percent full of cardboard; the other thirty-five consists of crumbled styrofoam and hacked-open plastic clam- shells. The new toys were fun, but after a while Junior's remote control gizmo will suffer a fatal one-vehicle collision with Cousin Ellie's leg, and that twenty-seven- in-one screwdriver ding- dong you got Uncle...
Whether an accurate reflection or not, a community is often judged based on its school system. For a relocating couple with children, the quality of the school district in which a house is located will often be as much a deciding factor in buying a home as the size of the living room. Entire websites are devoted to ranking school districts by test scores, student/teacher ratios, ethnic makeup and more. A positive accomplishment reflects well on us all. Last week, as reported on Page 1, Waitsburg Kindergarten teacher Pamela Nolan-Beasley...
