School Board will meet on Thursday
||| FROM ORCAS ISLAND SCHOOL DISTRICT ||| Orcas Island School District School Board is scheduled to meet on Thursday, Feb. 25 at 5 p.m. They are still hosting their meetings online via ZOOM, which is available to download for free. Here is the link to sign up: https://zoom.us/freesignup/ Please click
Guest Opinion | Republicans challenge who votes in 2022
||| FROM HEDRICK SMITH for RECLAIM THE AMERICAN DREAM ||| Washington – The 2020 election let the genie out of the bottle. More than 100 million American voters discovered it was easier to vote by mail or to vote early in person and avoid the Election Day crush. Voter turnout
Letter to Editor | New medical center now has a solid foundation
||| FROM VELMA DOTY ||| Orcas community has come a long way in its struggle for stable medical care. After decades of fundraising and large private donations to different doctors and clinics we are now where ALL are part of the solution through the “Hospital District." We had a group
Registration now open for San Juans Agricultural Summit
||| FROM KATE MIKULAK FOR SAN JUAN COUNTY EXTENSION ||| Registration for the 9th annual San Juan Islands Agricultural Summit is now open! From March 20 to April 16, join farmers, producers, and food system advocates to learn and discuss ways to build an equitable future for all involved in
First case of B.1.351 variant identified in Washington State as cases of B.1.1.7 increase
||| FROM STATE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH ||| OLYMPIA --The Washington State Department of Health (DOH) along with Public Health – Seattle & King County and the UW Medicine Virology Lab, announce that the B.1.351 variant of SARS-CoV-2 has been detected in King County, WA. The variant, initially identified in South
Recording of Feb. 18 Island Hospital community briefing now available
||| BY SUSAN MCBAIN, ORCASONIAN REPORTER ||| Island Hospital (IH) has posted the recording of its most recent Community Briefing for Orcas residents, held via Zoom last Thursday, Feb. 18. The link is on the Orcas Island page of IH's website at https://www.islandhospital.org/orcas/. The presentation summarized progress to date on
Hot Topic #43 | Info on COVID vaccine second dose
||| FROM BRENDAN COWAN for DEPARTMENT OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT ||| As vaccine continues to roll out, an increasing number of islanders are receiving their second doses. Below is some key information to keep in mind. If you’re not going to read to the end, here’s the quick and dirty: When
Here’s something you don’t see every day that will happen on Orcas tomorrow
||| FROM JEANNIE SHARPE for PORT OF ORCAS ||| Tuesday around 11 a.m. the airport will have a Blackhawk helicopter come and pick up a set of stairs that are in the midfield tie down area, and transport it out to Point Doughty. Several people have asked me to let
Kruse Reviews | A Shot in the Moonlight
||| BOOK REVIEW by JENS KRUSE ||| January 21, 1897 When the guns fell silent and the white men took cover, George Dinning burst out of the back of his little wooden house, wearing only his undergarments. He ran through the frigid January air, and when he reached the tall
Island Hospital’s current workshop topics include diabetes, advanced directives
||| FROM RACHEL LAMBERT for ISLAND HOSPITAL Living Better with Diabetes Join Registered Dietitian and Certified Diabetes Educator Mary Beth Robinson MS, RD/LD, CDE in a discussion on healthy eating, being active, and reducing risks to help manage diabetes on Wednesday, March 3 at 10 a.m. This is a free,
Food System Team forges ahead with work on community food assessment
||| FROM CAITLIN LECK for SJC FOOD SYSTEM TEAM ||| For the last ten months the San Juan County Food System Team, comprised of representatives from WSU San Juan County Extension, San Juan County Health and Community Services, San Juan Islands Agricultural Guild, San Juan County Agricultural Resource Committee and
Planning Commission takes a look at climate change
||| BY STEVE BERNHEIM, ORCASONIAN REPORTER ||| If you are concerned that San Juan County government is not doing enough to reduce the county’s carbon footprint, you should know the Planning Commission just received a briefing at its Feb. 19 monthly meeting on how climate change and its consequences for
Letter to Editor | Island healthcare looks finally poised for success
||| FROM TONY GIEFER ||| Access to medical care is a right. Perhaps unfortunately, medicine is also a business. Providing medical care has to somehow be financially sustainable. In the 16 years I’ve been here, Orcas has not had a sustainable model – until now. With the hospital district taxes,
Inslee signs $2.2 billion COVID relief bill
||| FROM GOVERNOR JAY INSLEE'S OFFICE ||| Gov. Jay Inslee today signed House Bill 1368, which appropriates $2.2 billion in federal funding that has been allocated to states in response to the ongoing COVID emergency. The legislation takes effect immediately. “Our focus this year is relief, recovery and resilience, and this
It’s the year of the Ox, and Eth-noh-tec has stories, recipes to share
||| FROM DANA SHERRY for ETH-NOH-TEC ||| It’s Chinese Lunar New Year 4719 - the year of the Ox! Celebrate on Feb. 25th at 5pm with Robert and Nancy by making Chinese wonton dumplings for your own special broth! We will wrap together and learn how to best cook them.
EDC to begin asset mapping with SJ Makers Guild
||| FROM MICHELANGELO (MICKEY) VON DASSOW for SJ ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL ||| Makers – from craftspeople to engineers and from hobbyists to business owners – are invited to join the Economic Development Council of San Juan County (EDC) to begin asset mapping with the San Juan Makers Guild on Friday,
