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Dangerous current
We’re writing this letter with hope that it may save you or your
child’s life.
This past weekend our family was enjoying the day in our boat on the
Columbia river. We had pulled our boat up on the sand bar that is
normally exposed.
Moments later we heard cries for help. We saw a young man waving his
arms and screaming. His friends were frantic. My husband jumped in the
boat and he and our daughter had pulled up beside the young man within
seconds.
My husband grabbed for him and he slid through his hands. He then
jumped in the water and with help from others on the sandbar tried to
locate him beneath the surface.
It was so heart-wrenching to stand there and watch for what seemed
like hours. Though they all tried their hardest, they were
unsuccessful in saving this young man. His body was found a couple of
hours later. All I could think of was this young man’s family.
What a terrible thing to hear on this beautiful day that your son
would not be coming home that night.
The current is VERY dangerous where the Hood River flows into the
Columbia. As I stood on the sandbar talking with people, they said
they had no idea that the current was bad there.
You can see where the Hood River and Columbia intersect, the water
ripples in that spot.
Please, please, please talk to your children about the dangerous
current! It is deceiving when you start walking out in the water from
the beach. One second you are wading in water to your ankles, the next
step drops you off into water over your head.
This is not the first time we have attempted to help a person in this
location. Ironically, last year we were beached on that same sandbar.
We heard the cries for help and luckily we were successful in using
our boat to help a man whose children had gotten caught in the
current.
He had brought them back to safety but had ingested water in doing so.
We took him in our boat to the marina so the ambulance could pick him
up.
I hope you share this information with everyone you know.
Our hearts and sympathy go out to this young man’s family.”
Brenda and Rick Graves
Hood River
Relay for Life kudos
Congratulations to the participants, sponsors and benefactors of
this year’s Relay for Life event.
This Columbia Gorge event raised $100,428 for the American Cancer
Society. The total amount raised over the past 10 years if
$892,822. Thanks to the many individuals and businesses that
pooled their resources to continue to work toward a cure for
cancer.
It is exciting to see a small community do so much to help in this
effort. Our goal for 2007 will be to raise a minimum of $108,000
bringing our total to $1 million!
Based on past performance I believe the Columbia Gorge is ready
for the challenge. I trust the community will come together again
the third weekend in July 2007 to reach this goal in our fight for
a cure.
Tony White
Hood River
Keep up cemetery
Will the owners of Idlewild Cemetery explain why the cemetery is
not maintained? You should be ashamed!
Years ago we chose the spot where my mother is buried because it
was beautiful and tranquil with lilac trees blowing in the wind.
Now when I visit I come prepared with tools to pull weeds and
clean the mud off her headstone. Many headstones are covered with
weeds and barely visible.
I was told by the groundskeeper “it’s too windy” to do a better
job. My mother and the others in Idlewild Cemetery deserve more
respect.
Trish Captain
Washougal, Wash.
Casino roadblock
Last month there was a major news story about the proposed Warm
Springs Casino that went inexplicably unreported by the Hood River
News. However it was picked by the Associated Press, the
Oregonian, KGW Channel 8 and published in Portland, Seattle and
throughout the Northwest.
On July 20 a memo was released to the public that the U.S.
Department of the Interior has declared that the Warm Springs
Tribe’s casino application failed to meet federal environmental
requirements and announced that the “Scoping Report,” the
fundamental justification for the project, must be rewritten. This
action casts the entire proposal in doubt and may require the
Tribe to build its new casino on its own 640,000-acre reservation.
This announcement has enormous significance because it requires
the Tribe to re-write their “purpose and need” statement, which is
the fundamental cornerstone of the casino proposal. The DOI
decision requires the Tribe to go back to the drawing board. The
BIA will supervise revision to the purpose and need statements and
will require an on-reservation casino alternative to be analyzed.
The decision confirms that an off-reservation mega-casino proposal
in the heart of a National Scenic Area has significant legal
problems and is not favored by the Department of Interior. The
Department also knows that the proposal is overwhelmingly opposed
by residents of Oregon who oppose the casino by a 2:1 margin.
The announcement confirms that the Warm Springs Tribe should
pursue a new casino resort on the Tribe’s 640,000-acre reservation
where federal laws are more favorable. A new on-reservation casino
located on U.S. Highway 26 would protect the Gorge and its
communities, provide additional revenue for the Tribe, provide
more jobs for tribal members and would be fair to all the other
tribes in Oregon. The Grand Ronde Tribe has even offered to help
finance the construction of new on-reservation casino for the Warm
Springs Tribe.
On July 26 the U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources voted to
prohibit off-reservation casinos, such as the Gorge casino
proposed by the Warm Springs Tribe. A clause in the bill however
would allow pending projects to be considered if they meet a
strict grandfathering test in the bill. The casino must be located
in the “primary geographical, historical and temporal nexus” of
the tribe. This means that the casino would have to be located in
Warm Springs, NOT Cascade Locks or Hood River. If this bill
becomes a law, it is likely that the Gorge casino proposal is
dead.
What are the two concepts underlying this article? The proposed
Gorge casino is looking more and more doubtful and it pays to read
beyond our local paper.
Peter Cornelison, field representative,
Friends of the Columbia Gorge
Hood River
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