The Dalles Public Works Department will be painting the center and side lines on high traffic streets Tuesday and Wednesday.  Work will begin at 6 a.m. both days, weather permitting.  Motorists are asked to watch for the crews and avoid driving on the wet paint.  The paint truck will be preceded and followed by warning vehicles, with signs calling attention to the wet paint.  The trucks will be spaced according to the necessary drying time of the paint.  Attempting to pass or drive between the trucks will result in a messy striping job and paint damage to the motorist’s vehicle.

A 28-year-old man from Germany died after a large tree fell on him Tuesday afternoon while he was hiking on the Pacific Crest Trail northwest of Trout Lake.  According to the Skamania County Sheriff’s Office, search and rescue personnel attempted to do CPR for Finn Bastian of Preetz, Germany, but they could not revive him.  He had been hiking the Pacific Crest Trail with two other people.  According to his hiking partners, a large tree fell on Bastian while he was crossing a wooden bridge.  The Sheriff’s Office says the tree appeared to have rotted at the base, causing it to fall.  Later Tuesday evening, another hiker on the Pacific Crest Trail had to be taken to a hospital after informing emergency dispatchers he was suffering from a stomach virus and was unable to walk.  41-year-old Shane Brown of Crescent City, California was brought back to the trailhead by search and rescue crews and transported to a hospital for treatment.

The mainstem Columbia River from the mouth at Buoy 10 upstream to The Dalles Dam will remained closed to steelhead retention through September 30 due to poor projected returns.  The states of Oregon and Washington decided to extend the August steelhead retention closure through September after the projected return of upriver steelhead was downgraded from the preseason forecast of 118,200 fish to 86,000 fish.  This expands on regulations adopted earlier this year to help reduce impacts to upriver steelhead which included area-specific retention closures, a reduced bag limit when open, and a no-fishing sanctuary at the Deschutes River mouth. 

The North Wasco County School District 21 board will be busy in September, with three meetings during the month.  Most notable is their September 12 session to interview consultants to help with their process to replace retiring Superintendent Candy Armstrong.  Armstrong says they are getting ready to be prepared for applicants to begin to be accepted at the start of the calendar year.  The district would like to get someone hired by April 30 to be ready to take over on July 1.

A federal judge in Yakima has ruled that the disputed Tract D, over 121,000 acres at the southwestern corner of the Yakama Reservation, including Mt. Adams and the Glenwood Valley, is within the reservation’s boundaries.  In his decision, U.S. District Judge Thomas Rice wrote Tract D is within the exterior boundaries of the reservation as determined in 1982 by a Bureau of Land Management surveyor and intended in the Treaty of 1855.  Klickitat County officials had argued during a bench trial last month boundaries set by Congress in 1904 that did not include Tract D were correct.  Rice’s ruling also says state juvenile delinquency laws and traffic offenses committed by Indians on the reservation are governed by federal and tribal laws rather than the state under a 2014 retrocession proclamation by Washington Governor Jay Inslee, addressing two cases that led to the boundary question coming before the court.  Rice did write that the State of Washington retained jurisdiction over criminal offenses involving non-Indian defendants and victims, so the state and by necessity Klickitat County have criminal jurisdiction over offenses committed by or against non-Indians within the Yakama Reservation, including Tract D.

The Klickitat County Sheriff’s Office says it will provide the primary response in the County when wild animals conflict with humans.  In a Facebook post, Sheriff Bob Songer indicated they have decided to immediately establish the program in response to numerous cougar sightings in communities throughout Klickitat County and the problems cougars and bears are causing for farmers and ranchers.  The statement says livestock and domestic animals in the County are being killed by cougars and bears on a regular basis.  Songer says the Sheriff’s Office Deputies and Volunteer Sheriff’s Posse/Special Deputies will provide the Primary Response to dangerous Wildlife-Human Conflicts, and will work closely with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, along with Goldendale and White Salmon police when they have cougar or bear sightings in their jurisdictions.  The Sheriff’s Office requests people who see cougars or bears threatening public safety or domestic pets and livestock to call 9-1-1.

The first in a series of open houses on public transit in the region will take place on Thursday in The Dalles.  Columbia Area Transit, The Link, and Mt. Adams Transportation Services will be answering questions about current and expanding schedules.  CAT will begin providing the Columbia Gorge Express service through an Oregon Department of Transportation service grant.  In combination with other funding, CAT will be offering services on the Express from The Dalles to Portland seven days a week.  The expanded service will make stops in Hood River, Cascade Locks, and Multnomah Falls before its final stop in Portland’s Gateway Transit Center.  Thursday’s open house is from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the Columbia Gorge Community College Building 2 Lecture Hall.  Further open houses are scheduled in September in Hood River and Cascade Locks.

The Northern Wasco County People’s Utility District board has named Wayne Jacobson to the panel.  Jacobson will take his positon on Tuesday.  He was appointed to fill the seat for Subdivision #3, which was left vacant by the passing of Clay Smith.  Jacobson is the former owner and operator of Hear’s The Answer Hearing Center.

Crews responded to a ground cover fire southwest of The Dalles on Tuesday morning.  According to Mid-Columbia Fire and Rescue, they responded to the fire near the 3700 block of Three Mile Road.  Just over an acre burned in the fire that was reported a little after 10:30 a.m. Tuesday.  MCFR, Dallesport-Murdock, Oregon Department of Forestry, and Forest Service crews were all involved in the firefighting effort.

After over two hours of discussion, The Dalles City Council reached consensus to allow a partnership between The Dalles Main Street program and Friends of the Waldron Brothers Drugstore to further develop and provide more information on their proposal to save the Gitchell Building over the next six months before seeking proposals for its demolition.  The two organizations have proposed rehabilitating the building at its current location along the Union Pacific Railroad tracks at First Street for use as a bike hub, public event space, and offices for the Main Street program, but Councilors expressed doubts because of the proximity of the tracks and the potential for future expansion of the municipal wastewater treatment plant requiring the building to be removed.  Councilor Tim McGlothlin and other members noted it may be best to move the building, acknowledging six months is not a long time to fully develop a plan.  Main Street’s Todd Carpenter said the group has assembled commitments for cash and in-kind donations, and has identified grant possibilities.