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The honorable Patricia Paul was reappointed as a tribal court appeals judge with the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, in Grand Ronde, Oregon in July, her fourth two-year appointment. She is a member of the Inupiaq Tribe. Paul received her law degree from Seattle University School of Law. She earned a bachelor’s degree in liberal studies from Antioch University in 1993. Paul is a business and estate-planning lawyer specializing in land use law and federal Indian law and practices law in La Conner. She lives on the Swinomish Reservation w...
On July 18, the Skagit County commissioners approved a six-month moratorium on offsite compensatory mitigation of salmon habitat. “Offsite compensatory mitigation” means habitat restoration projects that mitigate for environmental impacts that are a considerable distance away. The moratorium expresses the commissioners’ concern that Seattle City Light (SCL) may go on a spending spree purchasing land in the lower estuary of the Skagit River. SCL is halfway through the five-year process of renewing its license for its three hydroelectric dams...
Some 50 mostly masked and generally partisan western Skagit valley residents came to the La Conner Civic Garden Club last Thursday to hear State Rep. Debra Lekanoff (D-Bow) extol her colleague, State Rep. Dave Paul (D-Oak Harbor) and praise the qualities of candidate Clyde Shavers. The two candidates for Legislative District Positions 2 and 1 might have gained a few votes but they definitely increased their campaign fundraising totals as State Rep. Alex Ramel (D-Bellingham), speaking last,...
Another election season – year – is underway. Ballots are in the mail for the Aug. 2 primary. Your best ballot casting options are the county drop boxes at the La Conner Regional Library on Morris Street and on the Swinomish Reservation at their social services building. Please vote. You are what democracy looks like. For that reason the Weekly News is once again endorsing you, citizens of greater La Conner, this election. Your most crucial votes are the statewide offices of secretary of state, U.S Senator and the 2nd Congressional...
Kurt Bassford quietly goes about his business each day – whether at work, tending to family obligations or lending a hand to friends and relatives – but his example doesn’t go unnoticed at Swinomish or in La Conner. A 1976 La Conner High School alum who works for Dunlap Towing and as a commercial fisherman, Bassford twice has received honors voted by the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community for his commitment to maintaining a healthy and sober lifestyle. His plaques are displayed at t...
School’s out for summer. The next La Conner School District board director elections are in 2023, but this spring the district’s school board made slight adjustments to the five director district boundaries. The 2020 census obliged adjusting director boundaries to match population growth, now over 5,000 residents. The school board voted on new boundaries at its May meeting, adopting maps that adjusted the five district boundaries distributing residents as equally as possible to fairly rep...
A good farming year is easy to recognize, says John Thulen of Pioneer Potatoes. “My ancestors bought a pickup, built a barn or added on to the house,” he said. It’s all in the county register. With record rainfall, late freezes, a cool spring and rising prices for diesel and fertilizer, 2022 looks like a no-pickup, no-addition year. Many fields have been too wet to plant, like four of Jason Vander Kooy’s under the east side of Pleasant Ridge on Bradshaw Road. Water from the Ridge “comes off faster now that the east side of Ridge is getting m...
Swinomish and Fire District 13 officials have begun taking steps for a joint community paramedicine program. “It’s still in its infancy stages,” said FD 13 Commissioner J.J. Wilbur at their monthly meeting June 9. He is also a Swinomish Indian Tribal Community senator. “We’ve had preliminary discussions about a potential partnership between Fire District 13 and Swinomish,” said Wilbur, “but it hasn’t gone to the full Senate yet. We’re still doing our homework.” Fire Chief Wood Weiss, firefighter Andrew Schram and the Swinomish Tribal po...
La Conner High School has held annual commencements for more than a century but the 5 p.m. June 10 graduation at Whittaker Field will offer something new. Those attending will be officially welcomed in four languages, Lushootseed, English, Spanish and American Sign Language. “We’re excited about that,” La Conner Middle and High School Counselor Lori Buher told the Weekly News. In another all-time first, the Class of 2022 boasts co-valedictorians and co-salutatorians. Charity Dakota Jordan, who r...
For J.J. Wilbur and Skagit County Fire District 13, what is old is new again. Wilbur was appointed to the fire district panel May 12 after a four-month hiatus. He had served as a commission appointee through 2021 but was ineligible to stand for the seat during last year’s election because he was also on the ballot for a La Conner school board position. Veteran firefighter Bobbie Scopa ran unopposed for the open seat. But Scopa resigned as a fire commissioner last winter, due to moving to Arizona. That opened the door for Wilbur – who is a...
Ryan Booth can check several boxes on his resume: National Park Service ranger, Washington State University assistant professor of history, and Fulbright Scholar, to name a few. Now add film star to the list. Booth, a 1995 La Conner High School graduate, provides expert commentary in several segments of a new documentary about Black soldiers who served in the U.S. Army more than a century ago. “Buffalo Soldiers: Fighting on Two Fronts” premiered last weekend at the Seattle International Fil...
It is not every day that an action by town officials is greeted with applause. Last Tuesday was one of those days. That’s when in-person audience members attending the April 12 town council hybrid meeting at Maple Hall put their hands together to support the panel’s decision to hire Aaron Reinstra for a new paid dual fire chief-code enforcement officer position. The post will pay $56,160 annually. “This is one of the best moves for the community we’ve seen in a long time,” Mayor Ramon Hayes said following the unanimous 4-0 council vote to c...
The latest “Love La Conner” design for Gilkey Square seems a better one; it is shorter and includes a place to sit and ponder the Channel, Fidalgo Island and the Swinomish Reservation across the water. The “Love La Conner” theme, however, confuses me. The designers apparently believe it is important to tell visitors to "Love La Conner." If the design doesn't include those words, visitors might not know that Loving La Conner is the right response. Many people who visit La Conner do leave loving La Conner, I’m sure. But, I imagine they end up lo...
The past seven years have transformed the relationship between the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, Skagit County and local tax districts like the La Conner School District, Fire District 13 and the La Conner Regional Library. As the Swinomish Senate prepares to announce its 2022 voluntary contributions to these partners, this is a good time to reflect on their importance to our shared community and all that we have achieved together. History could have turned out very differently. After a 2014 federal court decision removed close to a...
For Fire District 13 commissioners, it was numbers that told the story of how 2022 is shaping up. The biggest one is $300,000 in funding support from the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community. Commissioners approved an interlocal agreement during their hybrid meeting Friday, April 8. Other numbers shared by District Fire Chief Wood Weiss tracked falling COVID-19 cases in the district, while calls for service – including those for patient transports – rising. Positive COVID-19 cases on Swinomish Reservation were under three dozen over...
I don’t wish to initiate a “letter to the editor” debate, but Ms. Shimeall’s response (Weekly News 3/23) to my and Mr. O’Donnell’s recent letters begs clarification. First, she asserts that living in Shelter Bay (SB) on leased “Swinomish land” is possible because the tribe generously “granted us the privilege”. The fact is, anyone living on leased land in SB does so purely because of a business deal Axel Osberg/Osberg Construction Co. negotiated with the tribe in 1968 - the master lease - which is up for renewal in 2044. Osberg did all of t...
The surreal became all too real last Wednesday as a few locals watched from both sides of the Swinomish Channel and the Rainbow Bridge, witnessing what for decades has been an everyday occurrence here. With cell phones and cameras in hand, they captured images that morning of Dunlap Towing skipper Tom Zimmerman bringing a log tow south past town, Swinomish Village, and Shelter Bay to storage off nearby Goat Island---a familiar scene that has played out for as long as most locals can remember....
I found it concerning when I read the recent letters by Mr. O’Donnell on March 9 and by Mr. Elliott on March 16 about taxes paid by Shelter Bay. Anyone buying a home here on leased land is clearly informed that we live here because the Swinomish Nation has granted us the privilege. In any lease situation, we do not presume to tell our landlord how to use their income. But even more than that, a non-native living here should not be taking the same position (or taking the same for granted) as we would living on land that is solely part of the U...
Local emergency response volunteers will sport less gray hair if a recruitment drive by Skagit County Fire District 13 and the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community is successful. An effort by the tribe and fire district to grow the ranks of CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) was announced by Capt. Ted Taylor during the monthly District 13 hybrid meeting Friday morning, March 11. Swinomish Emergency Management Coordinator Brian Geer is leading the effort. “Brian is way out in front on this i...
A story and a satire I was in the Tav last Friday afternoon having a bourbon and a beer before I went out to Anacortes to get my oil changed, there not being any place in town for automotive work. I was telling my friend McCoy that while I was out I was going to get a couple of bunches of daffodils for the Mrs. She really likes those yellow blooms on the kitchen table this time of year. She says they remind her of the sun when she gets up early in the dark after that damned daylight savings time kicks in. So McCoy says to me “Hat,” cause he kno...
The coronavirus pandemic continues to make its presence felt and not just in the number of new cases recorded across Skagit County over the past month. The virus crisis forced Fire District 13 to run smaller crews in early February and its three-member board of commissioners returned to a remote monthly meeting format last Friday. Chair Bruce Shellhamer logged in from a hotspot on Whidbey Island and faded in and out during the hour-long session. Those breaks were so frequent that fire chief Wood Weiss offered to provide musical interludes. “I’l...
The current COVID-19 surge has local officials modifying game plans to stem spread of the virus. The La Conner School District has adopted a two-week (Jan. 14-26) pause of spectator attendance at indoor district events, allowing only two family members per student participant or athlete to watch. The Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, whose public health team confirmed 35 new cases of COVID-19 between Jan. 6-10, is stressing that its members limit social gatherings and always wear masks when indoors with persons outside their households....
A white Christmas gave way to a blue Boxing Day. And even more blue conditions – in terms of plummeting temperatures – greeted the La Conner area this week with additional area-wide lowland snowfall anticipated Thursday. That forecast led Kamiak School District officials to announce as early as Monday that its girls’ basketball team would not travel to La Conner for a non-league basketball game scheduled here tomorrow night. The Dec. 30 La Conner High boys’ home non-conference bas...
A two-year journey brought Gov. Jay Inslee to La Conner last week. Inslee chose Swinomish Reservation as the locale from which to formally announce proposed salmon recovery proposals that have been in the formative stage since 2019. He chose Swinomish as the site to unveil his salmon initiatives for the 2022 state legislative session, in large measure as a tribute to the late Lorraine Loomis, a Swinomish IndianTribal Community leader who chaired the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission prior...
Longtime Shelter Bay manager David Franklin dropped a metaphorical bomb of his own on Pearl Harbor Day with the surprise announcement of his resignation as manager of the local residential community. In his Dec. 7 missive Franklin announced he is stepping down Jan. 28 from the high-profile role he has filled here for eight years. Franklin, with more than two decades experience in community and resort management, wrote that he is “leaving Shelter Bay for a new opportunity and a new chapter in my career.” Franklin told the Weekly News on Mon...
