Here’s a thought…
“The competition between Nature and the economy is deep and broad.
In the short term, the economy usually wins. In the long term …?”
BILL APPEL
Eastsound Water cited for repeated safety violations
Total penalties exceed $24,000 ||| FROM CORY HARRINGTON ||| Eastsound Water Users Association has received multiple safety and health citations from the Washington State Department of Labor & Industries (L&I) following workplace inspections conducted in
4th Annual Earth Day Month – Update
Poet Laureate Rena Priest is joining the 4/25 Concert ||| FROM SAN JUAN ISLANDS MAKERS GUILD ||| 2026 marks the 4th year of engaging Earth Day learning experiences on Orcas Island and adds new features.
Grow Your Own Food | Free basic gardening class series
||| FROM SAN JUAN COUNTY COMMUNICATIONS ||| Community members interested in growing their own vegetables this spring are invited to register for Grow Your Own Food – A Hands-On Gardening Series, a free, four‑part lunchtime
Let’s talk public transit for Orcas & the San Juans
||| FROM COLIN WILLIAMS for FRIENDS OF RURAL PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION ||| You're Invited to a Community Meeting Hosted by the Friends of Rural Public Transportation, Thursday, March 26, 2026, 1:30 PM - 3:00 PM, Orcas
Weather Alert | Heavy rainfall
||| FROM NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE ||| Special Weather Statement National Weather Service Seattle WA 1211 PM PDT Thu Mar 19 2026 San Juan County-Cascades of Whatcom and Skagit Counties- Cascades of Snohomish and Northern King
Guest Opinion | Paul Ehrlich was early, not wrong
||| FROM ELISABETH ROBSON ||| Paul Ehrlich When Paul Ehrlich died recently (March 13, 2026), many of the obituaries and articles about him repeated a familiar judgment: he was alarmist, even brilliant, but
Land Bank meeting coming up on March 20
||| FROM SAN JUAN COUNTY CONSERVATION LAND BANK COMMISSION ||| The San Juan County Conservation Land Bank Commission will hold its monthly meeting Friday, March 20. The meeting is scheduled from 8:45am – 11:10am via
Review the Critical Areas Ordinance update at community meeting on April 6
A first draft of the updated regulation is now available for public comment, and the Department of Community Development (DCD) is holding a community meeting to accept feedback and walk residents through the documents. |||
The Island Gardener for March 2026
||| FROM ORCAS ISLAND GARDEN CLUB ||| March in the garden is always a bit of a tug-of-war between patience and pure excitement. Even after all these years, I still find myself getting swept up
Earth Day Orcas News | Join in the 4th annual celebration
||| FROM MARCY MONTGOMERY for EYE OF THE WHALE ARTS ||| 2026 marks the 4th year of engaging Earth Day learning experiences on Orcas Island and adds new features during this month-long series of Science,
No Place Like Loam | The pruning mistake creating water sprouts
(and costing you fruit, time, and money) ||| NO PLACE LIKE LOAM by ALEX TAMAYO WOLF ||| The Problem Made Visible I walk the same roads through Eastsound most mornings. It’s an old habit now.
Spring 2026 Great Islands Clean-Up | Our power, our planet
Join us for the 2026 Spring Great Islands Clean-Up on Saturday, April 18 ||| FROM SAN JUAN COUNTY COMMUNICATIONS ||| When islanders work together, small actions add up to big impact. This spring, the community
News Brief | AI and the decline of human agency
||| FROM POPULATION BALANCE ||| AI, under the dangerous control of tech oligarchs, is creating a world with shrinking human choice, creativity, and connection. How tech journalism emphasizes novelty and business profits and amplifies tech
Larsen announces $17.5 Million investment in Skagit Transit
||| FROM THE OFFICE OF U.S REP. RICK LARSEN ||| WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, Representative Rick Larsen (WA-02) released the following statement: “Finally! Trump’s Department of Transportation (DOT) released $17.5 million it was holding hostage that
News Brief | Inside the dirty, dystopian world of AI data centers
||| FROM THE ATLANTIC ||| This is Colossus: a data center that Musk’s artificial-intelligence company, xAI, is using as a training ground for Grok, one of the world’s most advanced generative-AI models. Training these models
