Maple Valley is at a crossroads. We can continue planning for a bright future of a central shopping and gathering place, including a Main Street, or we can continue to be known for old strip malls and business parks and a lack of restaurants and needed retail stores.
Thank you to staff writer Kris Hill for reporting on the alarming King County budget shortfall. (June 11, “Law and justice ‘in trouble’”). In addition to the cuts in the criminal justice system that were noted (about 80 percent of the general fund budget), there is a proposal that all health and human-service funding (the other 20 percent of the budget) be eliminated in three years.
How well do you, your family and friends know your country’s history? Take the following quiz and find out. Could make for some interesting conversations during the July 4th holiday weekend.
Thumbs up to a couple of major retail companies – Wal-Mart andHome Depot – for putting their money where their mouth is when they say they have local communities at heart.
I ask the questions, you give the answers:
And I thought the weather got people riled up. Going from meteorology to the energy industry put me in stormy seas.
Puget Sound Energy, my new employer, is merging with some Canadian pension funds and New York and Australian investors. Until now, I would have thought Canadian pension funds were as alarming as Melba toast, and Crocodile Dundee seemed like a fun guy. New York is another story. But this merger is causing a ripple, mostly due to myths about what it means to you and me and everyone who pays a utility bill.
Fireworks are as much a part of the Fourth of July as Old Glory and Uncle Sam. The problem is they can also damage property and hurt people if used inattentively or through blatant disregard for safety.
City’s tax gets you no matter where you live
The residents of Covington overturned the City Council the first time they passed the utility tax. Many of us were upset when they passed the tax again within a couple of short years.
However, this time there was no initiative effort to overturn it. as us citizens probably realized the council was going to do whatever it wanted to one way or another.
If I had a dollar for every time I’ve seen someone throw litter from a car or truck, I could afford gas a lot easier for my own car.
Thumbs up to the organizers of the annual Fourth of July fireworks show at Lake Meridian for hanging in there with next month’s extravaganza.
The great questions I get in my AskAndy@PSE.com e-mail box are one of the things I enjoy most about writing for the Reporter.
Here at the Reporter, we’re proud to say we have something in common with some local students who recently caught the eye of Washington’s secretary of state.
Shannelle Cayetano and Alex Hastings can head into their summer break from Mattson Middle School with something extra to be proud of: Their joint history project was chosen from among entries statewide for display at the Washington State Archives in Olympia. Secretary of State Sam Reed, who oversees the archives, formally saluted the pupils and their work as part of 2008 History Day.
This month, the King County executive, along with the sheriff, prosecuting attorney and judges from around the county revealed that King County is facing a budget crisis of great magnitude. This year alone, we may have to cut $20 million from the $660 million general fund. An additional deficit between $40 million and $70 million is predicted in 2009.
King County’s top cop, prosecutor and judges are rightly taking a stand – albeit a natural and plainly obvious one – against proposed budget cuts in the countywide criminal-justice system.
In this day of artificial insemination, single parenthood and adoption, women can certainly have children without men. So what do dads bring to the picture?
Many studies have shown that children do better in just about everything when they have an involved father. From better grades to higher self-esteem, dads have a positive effect on their kids all the up to adulthood.
My youngest child and only one still in school will be in ninth grade starting next fall, leaving her just four short years from high school. I’m already getting excited about the day she does the gown-and-diploma thing.
This may surprise you: King County Metro Transit is buying a fuel that is significantly more expensive than diesel, may be worse for the environment, may increase local food prices, may lead to global hunger and potentially cost King County more as a member of the Chicago Climate Exchange.
Thumbs up to the local libraries for giving a boost to their communities’ poets and the overall literary level.
On the surface, it may not seem all that significant that Friends of the Covington Library, Friends of the Black Diamond Library and the Maple Valley Library Guild jointly sponsored a poetry contest. But consider this: In an age when literature sometimes fades in the haze of technology-generated interests, validation of old-fashioned literary pursuits is more than a worthy thing. It’s essential.
The Washington State Republican convention last weekend in Spokane should have been dull and uneventful. All they had to do was approve a slate of national convention delegates to support the obvious presidential nominee, John McCain, vote for a short, concise party platform and leave town.
Instead, the tenacious Ron Paul people, who made up more than a third of the delegates, contested the McCain forces on virtually every front.
