NEWS UNBROKEN
Thursday News 08/08
We've made it to Thursday. Yeah, it's kind of hazy out there again. And it's going to continue that way. We're going to look at the weather forecast coming up in just a little bit. Good morning, Eric Carpenter with you on KC V L K C R K. This year's been touring around the country celebrating with a lot of communities raising wildfire awareness. Smokey Bear going to be at the Kettle Falls area today. I'm Phil Tamaro. Here's more information about Smokey and how you can meet him and help celebrate the monumental birthday. My name is Megan Bush, and I'm a public affairs specialist with the Caldwell National Forest. This year Smokey Bear turns 80. So we are traveling all over the place celebrating Smokey. We're in Tanaskit at the public library there in Republic in Newport at the public library. Thursday, we will be in Kettle Falls Friday in Colville, also at the public libraries and those two locations. And our parties start at 10 and go until 12 noon. And we have crafts for the kids to make. They can make a little birthday surprise for Smokey. Smokey is present at all of these library parties. And we have tons of swag that we're giving out. And we even had a special story time. Of course Smokey Bear does not speak. He's bare, but we had one of our employees from the Republic Ranger District read a story and that was really special. So there's a lot going on to celebrate Smokey this week and we encourage everyone to come out. An extra special event is happening Friday at the Stevens County Historical Center in Colville. And that runs from one to four. And the Forest Service will be there. I will be there with a couple of my colleagues and we'll have a presence there to take a look at their collection of Smokey memorabilia from over the years and continue celebrating Smokey himself. Smokey the Bear's story is really, really special. He was found in the Lincoln National Forest in New Mexico. He was rescued by a fishing game warden after a wildfire had started. And he was injured and he was treated. He got great medical care. He was flown to Washington, D.C. where he became the Forest Service mascot. He represents safety around wildfires. He has five key messages around preventing wildfire. And if you'd like to learn more about Smokey Bear, we really encourage you to come out this week and talk to us and make him a birthday card and see Smokey yourself grab a picture with him. He's very important to our wildfire messaging. He's a symbol of prevention and being mindful when we're enjoying ourselves, recreating the forest. All right, Smokey going to be at Kettle Falls Library today, 10 till noon. Now to borrow the big celebration here in Colville, 10 till noon, and then the big celebration at the Historical Society and Museum, one till four o'clock. That's tomorrow afternoon. They are up at 700 north wind here in Colville, but 80 year birthday time Smokey Bear over in Kettle Falls today here in Colville tomorrow. You know the name Tempur Peak. If you have a bad back, you may already own one. The backbain relief is legendary. I have a secret for you. Tempur Peak mattress support system also provides a good night's sleep. You don't have to wait for a bad back. You can get a good night's sleep now. Don't take my word for it. Ask somebody who owns one. Come to Saunders for a seven minute test arrest and we'll change your life forever. Saunders furniture downtown, Colville. Well, the primary election now is over the ballots. They are still making their way into the final count. That's going to update from the Stevens County auditor, Lori Larson on how this year's election went and a little bit about the role of precinct committee officers. I would say it's been for the sailing. It's been as expected given the resources that we have one of our limiting factors and I would say it's noteworthy given the size of our county is that we don't currently have a ballot which is kind of on the front end of handling the mail as it comes in handling those ballots as they arrive into our office. There's a considerable amount of human labor that goes into sorting them by precinct, batching them into batches. Identifying if say, for instance, you get a ballot envelope back that doesn't have a ballot in it that it happens occasion as a whole procedure for reconciling the number of ballots we have with the number of envelopes we have. And so we lack some critical equipment in Stevens County. I've been in pursuit of it and had about 97% of it funded the grant on a couple of months ago, but I have not been given approval to purchase at fire commissioners. So one of the things that you're really interested in numbers people will notice is that at this point in the election, we in Stevens County have more estimated ballots left on hand to process as a percentage of our overall turn out than other counties. Because they're able to move stuff forward through faster on the front end. We always get all of our ballots process, but we don't have that tool. And I've been making the case now for almost a year that it's time Stevens County is not a small county. We are a small ish medium-sized county and bringing up that level of professionalism is something that I'm pursuing. Anybody who visits our processing center will be that we have a wooden cubby that we use for sorting ballots by precinct, whereas some of our neighbors are a little bit more sophisticated and are able to process ballots much quicker, because they've got the equipment, the modern equipment to process that on the front end. So an artifact of pre vote by mail. I think precinct committee officers used to kind of be responsible for the polling places in their precinct. We've been vote by mail for well over a decade. And so those passed and no longer assigned to precinct committee officers precinct committee officers basically are the elected representatives to the two political parties. That's how the political party organizations are built is from the elected PCOs, but they don't have a local precinct level poll job, like they may be wanted. If folks have questions about the status of their voter registration, they can check up themselves online at vote, wad.gov. It requires the first name, last name and date of birth. They can verify the status of their voter registration there. They can always come into our office happy to help. Some folks may want to update their signature on file. That's a good way to make sure that there are no questions once we've processed those ballots that the voter actually voted their own ballot. If they've had some change in their signature over time, they're encouraged to come in and update their signature. And so we'd love to visit with them about that and anything else. Thank you. All right. We're going to talk to Lori Larson a little more tomorrow. They changed the location where they process things for the ballots. They have moved out of the county sheriff's ambulance building and they've moved on to South Main Street. We'll talk about that tomorrow. We'll talk about the status of our voter registration. We'll talk about the status of our voter registration. We'll talk about the status of our voter registration. We'll talk about the status of our voter registration. We'll talk about the status of our voter registration. We'll talk about the status of our voter registration. We'll talk about the status of our voter registration. We'll talk about the status of our voter registration. Well, at least here in Colville, our homeless shelter is kind of open and when they have a fire down there, the fire department gets there. And there's not a whole lot of surrounding structures. That issue is going on up in trail the day before yesterday. They had a fire. First fire was underneath the west end of the Victoria Street Bridge. The fire department had to respond to a fire there. It was a big homeless camp located underneath the bridge, caught fire. That caused the closure of the bridge for about an hour while emergency crews extinguished it. They don't believe the bridge itself was damaged, but they have electrical wiring running on the underside of that bridge. Apparently there was damage there, but the bridge not structurally damaged. No one injured in that incident. And then the next morning, yesterday morning, the homeless camp that had been set up on the other end underneath the bridge in trail, it caught fire. A lot of smoke, black smoke caused the bridge to be closed for a while. So, before yesterday, about 8.30 at night, the west end of the bridge got fire. And then yesterday morning, it was the east side of the bridge under the bridge on fire because of their homeless camps. The Kettlefall School District is currently seeking a skilled and reliable bus driver for the 2024-2025 school year. Accelerate your career in this high demand field. As a bus driver, you will be transporting students and staff on regular school routes and extracurricular activities, such as field trips. Get part of our team and help us continue to provide safe and efficient transportation to our community. Apply online at kfschools.org or call 509-738-6625 for more information. Another one of the big national retailers that are struggling, Big Lots. Now, back in June, Big Lots in a filing with the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission said they plan to close up to 40 stores. Well, since June, fairly short timetable, that number has grown into the hundreds of stores to be closed. Here in the state of Washington, there are currently 26 big lot stores. Big Lots now confirming they are going to close 18 of the 26 stores in Washington. That is going to include the Spokane Big Lots that is their shopping center there on the Newport Highway. So the Spokane Big Lots is now scheduled to close the company. They say customers can expect to have 20% off of merchandise at stores that are closing. For top-notch service and unmatched choices in insurance products, you can depend on the folks at Guide Insurance Services in Callville for Home and Auto, Farm, Life, Health, Personal and Business Insurance Policies. Call for a free quote and take advantage of rates, benefits and services designed to give you more for your money. Call Guide Insurance Services today at 6845850 or visit them at 621 South Main in Callville. Well, tomorrow is when kind of the registration and some of the judging is being done at the Valley Community Fair. The big day for the Valley Community Fair is Saturday. That's when everyone turns out and sees all the things that are going on, but they are going to have music Friday night. The no pre-registration required to enter items at the exhibit hall, that from 8 till noon on Friday. Horse judging and games in the arena, that's going to be on Friday. The pre-registration was required if you were going to bring a horse. Also, there's going to be goat and lamb fitting and showing that the big day coming up Saturday, for the little south of Astounded Valley, the Valley Community Fair, getting underway music on Friday and then a whole day of activities on Saturday. Bright Beginnings Preschool has begun enrollment for the 2024-2025 school year, with classes available for the seedlings class for kids ages 3-4 and the sprouts class for kids ages 4-5. Enrolling with Bright Beginnings provides an academic hands-on play-based program with a comfortable learning environment. They also do community guest visits and field trips, family fun events, music and movement programs, along with social, emotional guidance and support. Give Bright Beginnings a call at 509-68-4-2686 today, or register at callvillebrightbeginnings.com. They had a lot of four legged friends at the Mariner game last night, and it was the night you could bring your dog to the ballpark. It was the dog of a game. The Troy Tigers beat the Seattle Mariners 6-2 last night, 3rd straight loss for the Mariners. It was Meadows catch, going to be the lasting image of last night's game as Seattle fell out of first place in the American League West slipping a half game behind Houston. Houston wins, the Mariners lose, it was two outs in the bottom of the eighth inning, Seattle was trailing 3-2. Cal Raleigh drove the slider into deep center field, Meadows tracked the ball right back at the fence, timed his jump perfectly well above the top of the wall, and the ball dropped into his glove for the out. Earlier in the game, Raleigh had homered in the fourth inning with one aboard, the only Mariner score last night. Seattle's George Kirby labored to get through five innings through 97 pitches, 65 strikes. outfielder Julio Rodriguez was doing some outfield work with the rest of the team before the game on Wednesday, still no scheduled time for getting him back in the games. The Mariners have recalled infielder Ryan Bliss from AAA Tacoma, Bliss returns to the Mariners, who is hitting 227 RBI's in 31 games. Also they sent outfielder Kade Marlow, he was optioned to AAA Tacoma. Seattle's going to throw a right handed pitcher Brian Wu in the series finale tonight against Detroit. Baseball on 92.1 KCRK. The New York Mets come to town for a three game series starting on Friday. Seattle Seahawks football, that gets underway, the first of the three preseason games to a clock pregame. Coming up on Saturday, the Seahawks down in Los Angeles to take on the Chargers. A look at today's local weather forecast brought to you by ABC, heating and electric for 11 West 2nd in Colville. If you're looking for a little comfort in your life, call the expert, your carrier dealer at ABC, heating and electric give them the expected high today, 48 overnight, 88 sunshine Friday. Real slight chance of some thunderstorms Saturday, Saturday night, high temperature around 88, 87 Sunday, Monday, 84, cooling to 81 on Tuesday, 82 Wednesday boy, first part of the week sounds like nice comfortable weather. Carrier dealers, the authorities at getting peak performance from your heating and cooling system, see them, ABC, heating and electric. No wind in the valley, the barometer up a little more, 30.25 or starting the day off at 62 degrees. Good to have you with us here on the radio. I'm Eric Carpenter and this is KCVL, KCRK. If you're a private landowner in the Colville Valley, Vog and Brothers Lumber, a longtime local business and a player in the area, is ready to offer competitive prices and fair market value to purchase your standing timber, logs or timbered acreage. The experienced forestry staff at Vog and Brothers offers free consultations and assessments of your forested land and can also assist in the Department of Natural Resource Permitting Process when you are ready to harvest your timber. Call the forestry staff today at 509-684-5071 or look for additional information on the web at www.vogandbrothers.com.