Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley
Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley
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On Dec. 2, Charlie Button, the CEO of Dayton General Hospital, gave this testimony in Olympia regarding House Bill 2130 that would change Medicaid reimbursement for all critical access hospitals and reduce Dayton's hospital budget by $404,000. No decision has yet been made by the legislature. On behalf of the Board of Commissioners of Dayton General Hospital and the residents of Dayton and Waitsburg, Washington, I urge you defeat House Bill 2130. Our state benefits from the strong network of rural and urban hospitals working together to ensure...
A Gift For Future Nurses A s we've all finished unwrapping our sweaters, scooters and snowboards after the recent holidays, another kind of gift must be noted. The Baker Family, Anita and Tom, give $500 to $800 to nursing students at Walla Walla Community College. This is one of the best gifts because an education and a career never gets replaced by a newer model or goes out of style. At last month's PEO Career Tea at Waitsburg High School, Anita Baker pitched this scholarship to the students...
After dispelling alarmist notions foretelling the end of the world in 2012 last week, we'd like to take the opportunity this week to look at what will happen next year or what we would like to happen. Some of the items that follow are predictions based on announcements made in 2011, while others are more in the realm of our wishful thinking. Overall, we feel 2012 will be a good year for the Touchet Valley. We expect Waitsburg and Dayton to get even more attention as travel destinations, hopefully sustaining the existing and new downtown...
To the Editor, The Walla Walla Port Commissioners acted wisely to eliminate Director Jim Kuntz's $25,000 deferred compensation package. In my opinion, the additional compensation beyond his base salary was both deceptive and excessive. Clearly, the total compensation of $159,726 he received last year was inappropriate and unjustifiable, in light of allegations of his unprofessional behavior in the workplace and his inability for years to bring jobs to the valley. The fact that Mr. Kuntz is still employed at the port in any capacity is the...
Nostrant Gets New Liver S EATTLE -- When Dennis Nostrant received an urgent call on his dedicated "transplant" cell phone at 2 a.m. on Dec. 4, he learned he had six hours to make it from his home in Thronton, south of Spokane, to the University Medical Center in Seattle. He had reason to be somewhat skeptical. Three times over the previous months he had received similar calls from his medical coordinator at the center calling him in to be ready for a liver transplant only to be told that, for...
The hills around Waitsburg were socked in Monday. Fog as thick as split pea soup obscured everything but a dozen feet in front. It was a reminder that it's sometimes hard to know or see what lies ahead. According to some students of history and prophets of doom, that's the way it will be for the global community in 2012. We're not talking about the normal ups and downs of the international economy or oil prices or food prices or regional conflicts. We're talking about the end of the world as we know it. It's supposed to happen about a year from...
To the Editor, I have been privileged to attend several adaptations of "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens. Among them have been the version performed on Broadway starring Hal Linden and Roddy McDowell, the Houston Texas Alley Theatre comic adaptation and the Raleigh North Carolina's Theatre In The Park production starring Ira David Wood III. I would stack our own Touchet Valley Arts Council Productions' adaptation up against any of those, Chapman and Ferrians could take the show on the road. The Liberty Theater experience started with the...
Elvira Laidlaw, co-author of Wait's Mill, told about the early 1900s worship at the new Little Brown Church on the corner of Main and Fifth streets (the First Presbyterian Church). This church was built in 1887. Before that time (1869), the citizens of Waitsburg celebrated at the new school house on Academy Street for Christmas. Her very first remembrance was of the Christmas exercise. She remembered dimly "the first Christmas tree and the decorations - the filling of bags of popcorn and nuts. There were recitations and dialogues by the...
Lions Are Always There WAITSBURG - When anyone in the community needs a new pair of glasses, funding for after-school programs or new lights for athletic fields in Waitsburg, the Lions Club is always there to help. "Our community would be lacking very dramatically if it hadn't been for the (Lions Club's) fundraising efforts," said Bret Moser, the club's president. The club, chartered in Waitsburg in 1964, now has 80 members and about 25 to 30 members who attend the club's bi-monthly meetings,...
It's 2015. Waitsburg is a thriving town with every store front filled with merchandise, customers and activity. Visitors come from all over to experience a one-of-a-kind Main Street. During the day, families wander up and down the sidewalks, patronize the hardware and grocery store, browse at the retail stores and linger at the coffee shop or the diner or the Mexican restaurant. At night, they move their feast from one downtown restaurant to another, one bar to the next, while all together supporting several dozen jobs and helping to pay for...
To the Editor: As a member of the group of Waitsburg residents who take advantage of the delivery of drugs to the Waitsburg Clinic, I want to thank the Waitsburg business owners and individuals who have given so generously to see this service continued. For some in the community this is truly a medical necessity for their health care. For others it is a way to maintain their independence and see a savings in time and money as well. So a thank you to: Hubbard Law, the Whoop Em Hollow Café, The Times and Markeeta Little Wolf. I want to also to...
Man's Best Friend T he winter sun had already gone down on the western horizon, but it was still quite light in the hills east of Waitsburg when Dizzy and I went for our run late one afternoon last week. Several times a week, we pick a different country road to jog. We like Bolles Road. Whoop Em Hollow Road is a favorite. We've been up Lower Hogeye and down Whiskey Creek. This time, we chose Smith Hollow, following Eighth Street out of town past the cemetery under the eye of Butter Cup and up...
TACOMA - At Saturday's state championship game, the Cardinals' home crowd didn't have a live mascot like Blitz, the big bird of the Seahawks, or the Mariners' Moose, to fire up the crowd. They didn't need one. They had the lovely WP cheerleaders and they had Melissa Harting, whose one-of-a-kind voice has been booming from the sidelines of ball fields for years now. We want to salute Harting and the hundreds of other dedicated hometown fans for coming out to support the boys of fall on the other...
Dear Editor, With the recent elections finished, and after reading a few articles posted in local papers about the hospital board's race and the desire from some to see change in the hospital district, I felt compelled to write a letter in support of the hospital, and the positive changes that I have witnessed over the last several years. I have worked at the hospital over the last 15 years, currently as an employee (for the last year and half) but prior as a consultant for 13 years. I have seen many changes, many of which have transpired over...
About Needs & Good Deeds WAITSBURG - - A Waitsburg resident who prefers to remain anonymous told the Times that she takes full advantage of the prescription drugs drop-off program co-sponsored by Elk Drug, Columbia County Health Systems and the City of Waitsburg. In her late seventies and describing herself as "lowincome," she has limited mobility and even more limited resources to pay for gas to go to Dayton, so she benefits from being able to swing by the Waitsburg Clinic to pick up...
When the Cardinals gathered near the uprights for their post-game huddle at Edgar Brown stadium Saturday night, the coaches were as ecstatic as the players and fans after their resounding victory over arch rival Colfax. "It's no longer a dream," assistant coach Troy Larsen told them. "Go ahead and pinch yourself." Larsen's excitement was an invitation to everyone to revel in a new reality: the Cardinals are going to the Tacoma Dome to play in the state Superbowl of their high school sport, known as the Gridiron Classic. Never in the modern...
To the Editor, I want to express my thanks and gratitude to all the voters of Columbia County and Waitsburg who came out and voted during this past election. Thank you so much to all who wrote letters, made phone calls, and otherwise campaigned for me. You are appreciated far more than words can express! We have our work cut out for us, but we will work as a team and with continued community backing the Hospital District can pull through! Please write letters, send emails and make phone calls now, today, to Governor Gregoire to let her know we...
Center Sees Big Numbers WAITSBURG - The Waitsburg Resource Center, which opened in the AmericanWest Bank in December 2010, is being used by our neighbors more than ever. The city's food bank had been run out of the basement of the Presbyterian Church for 25 years until the bank offered up its space. The churches in town formed a board and its new visible spot and word of mouth is bringing more neighbors through the doors, said Bethany Moser, the chairwoman of the board. The Leos Club at...
A s many readers may remember, we were hopeful, but a bit skeptical, about the prospects for this season's Tigers team. After losing veteran head coach Rick Hamilton and seasoned assistant coach Bart Baxter, who guided the first-year team to a magical winning season, we were wondering how WP would top that performance. We weren't sure how the new head coach, Precott High School teacher Mark Grimm, who had general coaching experience but not in soccer, and his assistant Jay Potts would do with the young team. There were some questions about the...
