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The La Conner High School track teams should feel at home today at Mount Vernon High School’s Bulldog Stadium for the NW2B/1B Championship Meet. That’s because La Conner enjoyed strong showings on the Mount Vernon oval last week during the 116th Skagit County Track and Field Championships. With reigning state 2B hurdles champion Tommy Murdock leading the way, sweeping his signature events, the La Conner boys placed fifth on their side of the county meet which was paced by 2A Anacortes. The Anacortes girls topped the team leaderboard whil...
An overflow crowd was on the same page with author Janet Yoder at La Conner Swinomish Library last Friday. Nearly 50 people attended Yoder's one-hour presentation honoring the legacy of revered late tribal linguist Vi Hilbert, who made preservation of the Lushootseed language and culture her life's mission. "We're so thrilled with this turnout," library director Jean Markert told the Weekly News afterward. "It's pretty incredible." Incredible is also a word often used to describe Hilbert, whom...
The La Conner School Board may not have to look far to find a successor to Dr. Will Nelson. Board president Susie Deyo last week raised the prospect of the school district hiring from within its ranks an acting interim superintendent to succeed Nelson, who is leaving June 30 after three years leading La Conner School District to accept a teaching post at Western Washington University. Deyo shared that option during an hourlong April 18 public “listening session” on campus. She and other board members had held a similar meeting with school sta...
The La Conner High School baseball team bounced back from three straight heartbreaking, one-run, extra-inning road losses to post convincing wins at Quilcene and Darrington. The Braves defeated Quilcene, a traditionally strong baseball program, by a 7-1 margin on April 17 and then trounced NW2B/1B rival Darrington 12-1 on April 19 to sweept the two-game season series. La Conner thus improved to 5-5 overall and 2-4 in league action going into a scheduled April 23 home game with conference foe Mount Vernon Christian. La Conner plays at Orcas...
Other teams brought larger rosters, but the host La Conner Middle School girls’ junior varsity track team had Faith. As in Faith Jenkins, who won three solo events to lead La Conner to top honors in its portion of a nine-school junior varsity track meet at Whittaker Field last Thursday. Jenkins, a seventh grader, swept the girls’ short sprints. She clocked 13.39 in the 100 meters and hit the 200-meter tape in 29.08. She captured the high jump with a leap of 4’-0”. Jenkins also joined teammates Rory Bird, Mia Delage and Cecilia Keith to place s...
Home or away, it didn’t matter where La Conner golfers played to win last week. The Braves were equally strong at their Swinomish Links home course on April 16 and at the Battle Creek Golf Club on Tulalip Reservation on April 18. La Conner edged visiting Lummi 137-148 with Corran Eisen taking top medalist honors by carding a low score of 43 over nine holes. The team scoring was based on the top three nine-hole scores recorded by each team, La Conner assistant coach Galen McKnight told the Weekly News on Friday. La Conner enjoyed an even w...
First Street isn't the only place in town with parking issues. The Whittaker Field parking lot on N. Sixth Street was jammed with vehicles April 10 when La Conner hosted the annual Skagit Showdown Track & Field Meet, drawing teams and fans from 2A Burlington-Edison and Sedro-Woolley and 1B Mount Vernon Christian. Some visitors thought their only parking option was inside an open gate leading to the school bus garage. One driver even parked in front of the gate, briefly causing heartburn for La...
No rest for the weary. That age-old mantra applied to the La Conner High School track teams last week. Just three days after hosting the much-anticipated Skagit Showdown, La Conner thinclads competed at the 24-team Cashmere Invitational April 13, where senior Tommy Murdock swept the boys' hurdles events and eighth grader Kiana Jenkins placed second in the girls' 200-meter dash. Murdock captured the 110s in 15.00 and 300s in 40.23 to pace the Braves, who finished eighth on the leaderboard. The...
Travel wasn’t kind to the La Conner High School baseball and softball teams last week. The Braves suffered a pair of heartbreaking one-run extra-inning losses while the young Lady Braves were dealt double-digit setbacks during visits to Coupeville and Friday Harbor. The Braves were edged 9-8 at Coupeville last Thursday and 5-4 at Friday Harbor Saturday. Each NW2B/1B league contest was decided in the bottom of the eighth inning as when La Conner dropped a 13-12 verdict at 1A Sultan on April 2. “It’s hard to believe we’ve lost three straigh...
It was an astounding Saturday afternoon in La Conner on several levels. That's thanks to the annual downtown Skagit Valley Tulip Festival Parade presented by Astound Broadband. A large crowd descended on First Street – cars were parked as far away as S. Fourth and Caledonia – to take in the now not-so-impromptu serpentine, which has evolved over four decades into a well-organized, half-hour, must-see event. The 2024 edition featured emergency vehicles entered by La Conner Hook & Ladder, Ska...
The La Conner School Board took its first small steps Monday toward finding a new district superintendent. A shorthanded board met for about 15 minutes in closed executive session to discuss the process for hiring a successor to Dr. Will Nelson, who announced his resignation March 29 after three years as the district’s lead administrator. He accepted a teaching post at Western Washington University in Bellingham. No action was taken during the closed portion of the meeting, in part because only School Board President Susie Deyo and board m...
A woman is elected the new mayor of a small town on the edge of the Pacific Ocean in November 2023. “I think Langley is a very sweet, quaint town. It is not homogenous. (That’s) my experience,” Mayor Kennedy Horstman told the Weekly News in a joint interview with Director of Community Planning Meredith Penny March 21. The city’s residents “are very different people passionate about a lot of things. They are not all in agreement. … We are all one community but there is a lot of diversity on views of the future,” Horstman believes. Langley, a ci...
Patti Dynes, 83, born Patricia Reinhert, left her beloved family and partner on March 23, 2024, peacefully at home on Pull and Be Damned Road. A local girl, she was born on June 15, 1940, and raised near Burlington-Edison High school – a park where her home used to be. She graduated in 1958 from Burlington-Edison High School. Patti moved and has lived in La Conner so long, her library card number was in the middle teens. She and her good friend, Patty Person, two dynamic women en...
The shorthanded La Conner Braves baseball team had a long afternoon in Sultan April 2. The 2B Braves, minus key starters for a non-league spring break road game, trailed early but rallied late to force extra innings before falling 13-12 to the 1A hosts. La Conner (3-3 overall) erupted for nine runs in the top of the seventh inning to tie the score at 11-11. Braves reliever Kenai Zimmerman then set Sultan down in order in the home half of the seventh, pushing the contest to an eighth frame. In the top of the eighth, La Conner took a brief 12-11...
A La Conner Elementary School student is getting an advanced education on the hardwood. Josie Catubo, an 11-year-old fifth grader, is making the grade as a member of the Pacific Northwest Rain girls' youth basketball program. Founded by former Mount Vernon High School and Western Washington University hoops standout Tyler Amaya, Pacific Northwest Rain is the premier basketball training center in Northwest Washington. "I practice twice a week and we have about six tournaments a season," Josie...
Meet Josilynn Straathof, La Conner Soroptimists' February Student of the Month. She is the proud daughter of Brian Straathof and DeAnna Young and has attended La Conner High School since her sophomore year. She is currently senior class president and the student representative to the La Conner School Board. She said it has been interesting experiencing the workings of the board. She uses her leadership skills as class president leading the fundraising and attending the many events required. She...
The Kiwanis Club of La Conner has announced its students of the month for March. High school student of the month is Tyler Cicotte, a junior. Tyler's parents are Vince and Barb Cicotte. Tyler's favorite class is Spanish and he's excited to be going to Honduras with the Spanish class in June. He likes to play basketball, golf and video games. After graduation, he wants to attend college, but has not decided what he might study. Middle school student of the month is Annika Keith. Her parent is...
Five years ago, 10th District State Rep. Dave Paul successfully lobbied his colleagues in Olympia to provide funding to build the La Conner Swinomish Library. Paul was at the library for a March 27 town hall that included several of La Conner's appointed and elected officials, including Mayor Marna Hanneman. Those attending the forum asked Paul questions related to education, housing and Washington State Ferries. Perhaps most important, they secured Paul's commitment to back La Conner's...
Reigning state hurdles champion Tommy Murdock won three solo events, Morgan Huizenga climbed atop the medal podium twice, and the Lady Braves captured two relay crowns as La Conner High School’s track-and-field teams finished near the top of the leaderboard at an 11-school meet hosted by Mount Vernon Christian on March 28. Murdock claimed one of his signature events – the 110-meter hurdles – and placed first in the 100- and 400-meter sprints to help lead La Conner to a third-place finish on the boys’ side of the March 28 trials. MVC edged C...
If it wasn’t for bad luck, the La Conner High School’s softball team wouldn’t have any luck at all. For the second time in four outings, head coach Loran James’ young club came up on the short end of a one-run contest. The Lady Braves (0-4 overall; 0-2 in league) lost 7-6 March 29 to visiting NW2B/1B rival Orcas Island. La Conner had earlier dropped a 15-14 non-conference slugfest at Muckleshoot. After escaping town with its narrow triumph, Orcas (2-8 overall; 2-2 in league) pounded league foe Concrete 29-11. La Conner travels to Concret...
La Conner High School senior Hallie Walls has been selected as the Soroptimist International of La Conner Honored Student for the month of April. It's easy to see why when you look at all the activities she is involved in. Most recently Walls narrated the school play. She enjoys drama and participated in the play her freshman year. She just finished up her fourth year on the Knowledge Bowl team, this year as co-captain. Walls has played golf on the school team since her sophomore year. It is a...
Swinomish Tribal Senate chair Steve Edwards, a La Conner High School graduate, enjoyed a warm homecoming when he met with school board members March 25. Edwards, known for his conciliatory leadership style, focused his remarks on building bridges between the La Conner School District and Swinomish. “It’s great that we can come to the table and have an open discussion,” said Edwards. “We all grew up together. We all know one another. We’re a community here.” Edwards was the second local elected leader to address the board in recent weeks, foll...
The COVID-19 pandemic limited fundraising opportunities for La Conner High School’s Class of 2024. Santo Coyote Mexican Kitchen is helping the class make up for lost time. Santo Coyote donated 20% of its proceeds March 22 to the La Conner High School senior class, which looks forward to taking its end-of-year trip to Disneyland later this spring. Restaurant manager Cristal Perkins said that Santo Coyote’s benefit raised about $800, including what was collected in a donation jar, toward travel and lodging costs to be incurred by the class dur...
La Conner High School thinclads seem to be on the right track two weeks into the 2024 campaign. The school’s boys’ and girls’ track teams enjoyed a second straight strong outing March 20 at Coupeville with several among coach Peter Voorhees’ charges making their season debuts. “It was another good week for us,” Voorhees said. The Lady Braves placed a close second and the boys were third on their respective team leaderboards. The La Conner girls, behind dual-event winner Morgan Huizenga and superb finishes in the relay events, trailed mee...
La Conner School District Director of Finance David Cram offered a realistic assessment last summer when presenting student enrollment numbers and the year’s budget to the school board and Superintendent Will Nelson. The head count in the elementary, middle and high schools had dropped below 500, to 490 full-time students. He projected a student population of 448 in 2026-2027. Cram’s forecast is turning into reality. His mid-March estimate for September, the 2024-2025 school year, is for 30 fewer students. His larger concern is that the new...
