New legislation that impacts Pierce County

The 2023 regular session for the State Legislature ended Sunday, April 23, 2023. The Legislature acted on many bills and budgetary items during the session that will benefit Pierce County residents and all of Washington. Many of these actions support priorities in areas of housing affordability, infrastructure, and public safety that are aligned with priorities…

Paving coming for parts of State Route 7 

Fish passage work at two creeks, paving coming for State Route 7 in Pierce CountyProject consolidates work, cuts costs   EATONVILLE – More than five miles of State Route 7 will see construction between Eatonville and Spanaway into fall 2023. The project will remove two barriers to fish passage and repair miles of the highway surface. Combining…

Parkland Community Assn. March 28

The 501(c)(3) status arrived in March 2023 and the Parkland Community Assn. (PCA) is now fully operational. The next meeting for the organization will be Tuesday, March 28, 6 p.m. at the Trinity Lutheran Church hall. The Parkland Community Assn. began last May with a group that formed to Save the Historic Parkland School (1908)…

Washington’s Democracy Dominoes Falling?

By Robert A. Matney Of great concern are recent and fast approaching upcoming events involving Washington’s “Sunshine Committee” (SC). The SC’s decisions could prove devastating for all citizen activists and the public in general. Around 1972, Washington voters approved what became the Public Records Act (PRA). That contained only 10 exemptions it ballooned to about…

Farms to commercial airports? Graham meeting Jan. 13

The Coalition Against Graham and Eatonville-Roy Airports will be holding a meeting at Graham Kapowsin High School on Friday, January 13, 2023 for the public to come hear about and hopefully express their feeling about the two sites (of 3) that the Washington State Legislatures Commercial Aviation Coordinating Commission (CACC) has selected as potential sites…

Godzilla is on the horizon or is that Baby Huey?

For those of you who love your quiet, safe, inexpensive little enclave of Spanaway, or Frederickson, or Parkland, guess what? Godzilla has reared her head again. $200,000 of state money has once again been placed in the Washington State budget by Rep. Melanie Morgan of the 29th District, for the purpose of an incorporation study…

Dire warnings on our watershed – dialogue

Several members of the Chambers Clover Watershed Council have been exchanging some very concerning emails recently. Based on their experience, credentials, and length of service in the stewardship capacity, these are worth your interest. (Cindy Beckett, Don Russell and Kurt Reidinger) Starting with a reply to Ms. Beckett’s email in the previous article, “Destruction of…

Rep. Morgan plants $200k for incorporation study in State budget again

Rep. Melanie Morgan of the 29th Legislative district is trying again. She had a proposal to get $200,000 incorporation study money from the Washington State budget for the area Pierce County just rezoned called “Centers and Corridors.” The idea is to make it one big city. (Larger than Tacoma I might add.) You will not…

What the 2020 Census reveals about Pierce County

The 2020 Census was released late this decade, somewhat caused by squabbles about how it would be conducted and somewhat caused by working through the pandemic. Where the population numbers land impacts representation, number of Congressional Districts, and how the new lines are drawn to balance the population in legislative and county districts. The population…