Established as The Skamokawa Eagle in 1891
Established as The Skamokawa Eagle in 1891
Sorted by date Results 901 - 925 of 2583
To The Eagle: After reviewing long postponed and now essential repairs to Wahkiakum school buildings we reflected on everything that good school facilities mean to a community. Positives include increased property values as families and children stay in the area, federal and state payments in support of schools continuing to bring essential revenue that ripples throughout the county, community pride and quality of life reflected in youth activities and accomplishments, and encouragement of employment and job growth. Then we reflected on...
To The Eagle: How good it is to have a few weeks to decide if we want to buy a $28.75 million house with a no down payment 22 year mortgage? Depending on the interest the cost could double. Not only that but some investor is making a profit on the amount of property taxes we have to pay. This is my way of summarizing why I will vote no on the proposed bond issue. I hope everyone else will, too. Please join me in encouraging our school administrators to work for us in the most economical way possible by using levies instead of bonds. Working...
To The Eagle: I have been working on getting numbers for Wahkiakum School District 200 and after a bit of hair-pulling, I am ready to share them. The current taxable value of the district is $428.5M. This excludes $11.0M of value for properties subject to the senior exemption. There are 4,146 properties in the district owned by 2,147 people. 772 properties are exempt (government owned, etc.) There are 233 personal property accounts valued at $13.8M. Another 166 senior properties contribute $3.1M in value not exempt from taxation. The remaining...
To The Eagle: The Wahkiakum School Bond measure is coming up for a vote and there appears to be a fair amount of misinformation out and about. The current high school building reached its predicted end-of-life 20 years ago, and should have been renewed then, but wasn't. The last bond, 20-plus years ago, upgraded the elementary school to the bare minimum, leaving the school district to absorb ongoing maintenance and ongoing repair costs from money that could have gone into instruction. The predicted cost of this bond, based on the school...
To The Eagle: The Wahkiakum County Democratic Party voted at its general meeting January 11, 2020 to support the Wahkiakum School Bond after studying the facts. We urge everyone to educate themselves on facts and go on a scheduled tour of the high school Thursday and Friday for three weeks. Anyone can also call Brent Freeman at the high school and ask for a tour. Please vote yes for the school bond. The above was written as Vice Chairman of the Wahkiakum County Democratic Party. On a more personal note, for several past years I sent my...
To The Eagle: Haven't written in a while which another person mentioned to me the other day. It's not that I have nothing to say, it's more like no matter what I say it makes no difference. Preaching to the choir is just that and I find myself better able to be friends, good friends, with folks that are diametrically different in thought, philosophy and practice if I keep my thoughts to myself. Given that, I still find it just amazing what is going on in our once great nation. I find it difficult to think that America has been made great by...
Vote no on school bond issue To The Eagle: After reading the very informative article about the needed repairs to our school in last week’s Eagle I had only one thought: How much was this going to cost me? The article cleverly never mentioned the cost to the taxpayer but it did mention that repairs would run about $35,000,000, which, to me, seemed high. In fact I just learned that Elon Musk’s new 600 acre Tesla factory in Germany will run about $45,000,000. So one can see the absurdity of their initial bid for repairs. I have also learned tha...
To The Eagle: Vote Yes for the Wahkiakum School Bond. It’s the necessary and right thing to do. Built in the early ‘60s, the high school was built with pride to last. But it wasn’t built to last forever. The high school has stood nearly 60 years without any significant updates, remodels or repairs. That’s 20 years past the predicted life expectancy and something needs to be done now. Here are some of the reasons why: • There is no sprinkler or other fire suppression system at the HS. • The existing fire alarms do not function properly. • Sch...
To The Eagle: It is no secret that the state of Washington has botched up school finances, the most recent example being the court-ordered enhancement of school funding which our legislature distributed in such a way as to penalize small rural school districts like ours at the expense of larger urban districts. In our local history, a decade-and-a-half ago we defeated a couple of bond issues to replace the J.A.Wendt elementary school for over seven million bucks and ended up with a remodel job for under three, and then-superintendent Bob...
To The Eagle: Silence allowed many dictators to continue their brutal regimes. Since we are allowed to have free speech and opinions in this country, thank God, we are also allowed to point out, what we deem to be bad policy and bad behavior. We have a leader, who has a Senate, Attorney General, Supreme Court and ‘personal’ media outlet. This is hopefully as close as it will get to a dictatorship. The Republican states have done their utmost to quell the votes of those they deem to be voting for Democrats. It is paramount to get out the vot...
To The Eagle: The impeachment crisis is ridiculous. Our legislators can’t see themselves that they, too, are liars and abusers of power. The moment Trump became president, they’ve wasted taxpayers’ dollars yearly hunting for excuses when they should be a team working to MAGA. Our past presidents spent billions of taxpayers’ dollars to other countries. Have those countries paid us back? For example: Former President Obama sent billions to Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia for weapons, $225M to Palestine for humanitarian aid and climate change....
To The Eagle: Vote no on school bonds, or you’ll be signing a blank check for unknown costs. The Eagle reports these improvements will cost ‘about’ $35.4M. Ever had a remodel done to your home with an ‘about’ estimate and it actually cost 50 percent more? When you bought your home the bank charged you fees and a loan interest rate based on your credit. By the time you pay off your home you will have paid back more than double/triple the loan amount – same goes for a bond issue. Our county does not have AAA credit rating – so our interest will...
Fact checking: It seems most major newspapers now have fact checkers; The Eagle isn't a major newspsper, so we rely on trusted outside sources, notable the Associated Press. Here are links to others: https://www.snopes.com/, https://www.politifact.com/, and https://www.factcheck.org/. Additionally Wikipedia articles usually include footnotes referring readers to sources. And as stated in last week's column, if one doesn't want to trust Wikipedia's articles regarding climate change, one can find plenty of scientifically based sources at the...
To The Eagle: I feel fortunate that I was able to attend Wahkiakum High School just a few years after it was built. The building looked shiny and new, the teachers were great, our teams exceled, and it was a fun place to learn. This has not changed except the building is no longer shiny and new. It is nearly a 60 year old building that shows its age. Most of its basic infrastructure (electric, plumbing, HVAC and safety equipment) are well past their intended life of service. And it does not meet what our students need to be successful today....
To The Eagle: First, I would like to thank the editor for responding to my question about incorrect information in a recent letter published in The Eagle. I was delayed in getting my response into the paper and as it turned out the editor did a much more thorough job than I would have. My delay was a result of thinking about the issue of incorrect information being published in any of the many venues that have become available to use in this electronic age. Over the next 10 months we are all going to be exposed to information that may not be...
To The Eagle: There’s a bright future because of the positive efforts by Jaime Herrera-Beutler: HR19 Lower Costs, More Cures- bipartisan law to lower prescription drug prices and protect access to new therapy. HR4996 Helping MOMS-combat maternal mortality crisis. HR4995 - Maternal Health Quality Improvement Act of 2019-Improving quality of maternal health for moms in rural areas. $875,000 in local grants to prevent youth substance use. Jaime was awarded the prestigious 2019 Public Service Award by the American College of Obstetricians and G...
To The Eagle: Kudos to Editor Rick Nelson for his fine selective research used to slam my reference to the Petition Project in these pages a fortnight past. He used Wikipedia, which is the absolute gold standard for denigrating commentary on conservative people, institutions, or ideas. And there was much actual fact included, though it arrived in somewhat bent and battered form. The project was indeed initiated by Dr. Art Robinson of OISM and submitted to the U.S. Senate, who responded by refusing to ratify (by a vote of 95-0) the 1997 Kyoto...
To The Eagle: The contempt and ridicule from the left is unfortunate and a continuing bleeding wound to the nation's spirit. Democrats have no sense of good civic spirit. They would rather tear our country apart than acquiesce to our overwhelmingly successful president whom they hate. The whining and complaining from many of our senior citizens is especially appalling. Here we have genuine great results and achievements that are derided and belittled by childish "adults." Fools who roar and harangue about climate change, [the...
Darned if you do and darned if you don't? When I first started in this business in the 1970's, I remember an editor proclaiming that one shouldn't add editor's notes to letters to the editor. So, I sometimes let things go that I know are incorrect. In these cases, I hope the readers themselves will police the offense. This happened last week, and I had a call from a reader; I suggested the caller submit a letter, but, alas, it didn't come. So, with the help of a family member, here's this about a letter printed last week: The statement,...
To The Eagle: During the early 1930's the U.S.A. had just passed the jingoistic anti Japanese Act in Congress, shutting down Japanese immigration to America and institutionalizing anti-Asian bigotry in this country. At the time, Japan was a parliamentary democracy. Its right wing political party was dominated by the military and its leader General Hideki Tojo. He pushed for the policy beginning to dominate the Japanese empire that “Asia should be ruled by Asians.” This was the period when Surinam, French Indochina, Hong Kong, India, the Phi...
To The Eagle: Wahkiakum County is unique because this is the only county of this size to have such an active Chamber of Commerce and a Visitors Center open to the public. Some of the activities the Chamber conducts include strong county marketing campaign, support of employers and businesses, and event management. Our goals include making our community a great place to live and work, to support our quality of life and encourage organized growth. Next year, the Chamber will host many events including our famous Crab and Oyster Feed, Bald Eagle D...
To The Eagle: After parsing the free-floating professorial grammar in last week’s letter, I find myself accused (I think) of using facts, being Republican, and pontificating over Trump, to which I plead “close but no cigar.” Many of my previous letters have been in response to attacks on Trump who needs no defenders, having run rings around all his opponents and critics. Of course, I do think Mr. Trump’s a pretty smart fellow, since he agrees with me and has tackled a bunch of problems that I’ve been crusading about for 30 or 40 years, in...
To The Eagle: Today is Christmas, and I want to wish Happy Holidays to all! Now why the title above? I will tell you why. I was having an on line chat with an old friend who suddenly mentioned, a bit forcefully, being a “Hard Core Liberal.” That comment was followed soon after by, “For sure! What a s—t show in Washington DC.” These comments got me to thinking. I hear a lot about what people do not like. But I do want to know how they think it could be made to happen. This lead to the fact this country is showing signs of being divided i...
To The Eagle: When sick and hateful people take a rifle and shoot nine people dead over the course of 15 years, those dead are the more fortunate. It is the children, parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, friends, classmates, teachers, and more who are the victims. The many who have to live with the pain and trauma for the rest of their lives. So it’s not just nine dead people we are talking about. Now think of how many ruined lives across America who are victims of assault weapons. I hope that no one you love is killed b...
To The Eagle: There are two things I have a hard time understanding these days. The first is if our current White House administration has nothing to hide, why not let the people being requested to testify in the impeachment hearings say what they know? Wouldn’t that prove overall innocence? Not allowing them to speak is like vehemently resisting showing previous year’s income tax returns. What’s so bad that needs to be hidden? The second is these same people saying we have a great economy. How can the U.S. have a supposedly great economy when...
