Columbia Cascade Housing Corporation’s investment proposal for the Rhine Village apartments in White Salmon has been awarded $2.5 million from the Washington State Department of Commerce.  The funding is intended to leverage additional capital from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development to acquire the property, address physical improvements and extend the timeframe for which Rhine Village remains affordable.  Rhine Village was built in the 1980s.  West Klickitat Community Housing, CCHC and Chrisman Development have been collaborating with the goal of leveraging the state and federal capital investments to rehabilitate and preserve the 36 units in Rhine Village.

The Oregon Health Authority reported on Thursday the number of hospitalized patients with COVID-19 across Oregon is 1,150, which is 12 more than Wednesday.  There are 288 COVID-19 patients in intensive care unit beds, which is down nine from Wednesday.  There are 56 available adult ICU beds out of 641 total,  and 307 available adult non-ICU beds out of 4,354.   The OHA reported 2,437 new confirmed and presumptive cases of COVID-19 as of 12:01 a.m. Wednesday, bringing the state pandemic total to 294,392.  Wasco County was reported to have 23 new COVID cases, and Hood River County had eight.  There were 21 new COVID-19 related deaths in Oregon, raising the state’s death toll to 3,394.

The Oregon Health Authority’s COVID-19 Weekly Report, released Thursday, showed a slight drop in weekly cases, but an increase in virus-associated hospitalizations and deaths.  The OHA reported 15,753 new daily cases of COVID-19 during the week that ended Sunday.   That represents a 3% decrease and follows eight straight weeks of rising cases.  COVID-19 related hospitalizations rose again – though less steeply – from 1,000 to 1,036.  That marked another pandemic high.  It is the ninth straight weekly increase.  There were 176 reported COVID-19 related deaths, up from 119 reported the previous week.  That marked the sixth consecutive week of rising deaths.  The OHA reported 146,344 tests for COVID-19 for the week of Aug. 29 through Sept. 4.  The percentage of positive tests increased to 11.1%.  The OHA’s most recent update on COVID-19 breakthrough cases, released today, found that 80.7% of the 13,798 reported COVID-19 cases between Aug. 29 and Sept. 4 occurred in people who were unvaccinated.  

Much like other hospitals in the Northwest, Mid-Columbia Medical Center is experiencing an influx of COVID-19 patients.  MCMC Chief Clinical Officer Don Wenzler says some days 30 percent of their patients are COVID related, and all of the COVID patients are on some kind of oxygen support.  Wenzler says MCMC is seeing a wide range of ages with COVID-19, but the highest numbers are among those in their 20’s and 30’s, and most are unvaccinated.  Wenzler said MCMC has been fortunate to be able to continue to do elective medical procedures, but they have had to delay them at times, and he worries people aren’t getting the preventive care they need in the time frame they normally get it.  He emphasizes people with a health emergency should not hesitate to go to the hospital or their health care provider.

The Dalles Police Department says four people were arrested and charged with misdemeanor commercial sexual solicitation as the result of a recent online sting operation that targeted the demand side of prostitution and sex trafficking.  Investigators posted fake advertisements online for commercial sex.  The majority of those arrests were local individuals who reside in the area of The Dalles.  All cases have been referred to the Wasco County and Sherman County District Attorney’s Offices for review and potential prosecution.  In a statement, the department says the operation provided participating agencies a snapshot of how much prostitution and human trafficking is occurring within area communities.  The Dalles Police Department was joined by the Sherman County Sheriff’s Office, Columbia River Inter-Tribal Police Department, Homeland Security Investigations, the Gilliam County Sheriff’s Office, and the Mid-Columbia Human Trafficking Task Force in the sting operation.  Tips of suspected human trafficking can be reported to the National Human Trafficking Hotline at 1-888-373-7888.  

The Dalles Bridge will close at 8 p.m. this evening and be shutdown until 6 a.m. Monday in the first of a series of closures that will occur every weekend through Memorial Day of next year as the Oregon Department of Transportation does a bridge deck replacement project.  ODOT’s Peter Murphy says doing the re-decking in winter is not ideal, but it does avoid impacting tourist and harvest seasons.  ODOT has worked with the Army Corps of Engineeers to allow emergency vehicles to cross the Columbia River at The Dalles Dam when necessary.

An out-of-season outage will close The Dalles Dam’s navigation lock this coming Tuesday and Wednesday.  The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says a specialized rope-access, or climbing, inspection team will be performing an assessment, which is part of a required five-year cycle.  The Corps has a requirement to periodically and thoroughly inspect all hydraulic steel structures to ensure they are still safe to work behind.  The Corps says this outage is separate from the miter gate issue discovered during the annual lock outage and unanticipated extension in March 2021.  Portland District engineers plan to leverage any information gained from this inspection to better inform and optimize the repairs to be done in next year’s planned outage.

Hood River County is nearing having 80 percent of those 18 years and older vaccinated against COVID-19.  Oregon Health Authority statistics heading into the week put Hood River County at 78.7 percent of those above 18 having received at least one dose, with nearly 74 percent fully vaccinated.  The County is 268 people away from the 80 percent mark.  County COVID-19 Response Coordinator Daron Ryan says they are continuing to push to get more people vaccinated.  Ryan says case numbers are high with the Delta variant circulating in the community, adding the health department is asking people to adhere to state masking mandates to slow the spread of the virus.

The White Salmon Valley School District and the White Salmon Valley Education Foundation have recently received a variety of grants to support student achievement and well-being.  The district’s free after- school program for at-risk youth, A-List Adventures, received $347,000 of additional 21st Century Community Learning Center funding for the next two years for a new high school program and additional after-school support for existing programs.  A $23,800 “No Child Left Inside” grant from the Washington State Office of Recreation and Conservation will enable students in sixth to eighth grades to attend outdoor education programs.  A $15,870 grant from both the Washington State Arts Commission and the White Salmon Arts Council will provide artists-in-residency programs in the district.  A $5,000 grant from the Boeing Company will provide mental health and wellness support for students, while a $2,000 grant from the Klickitat County Community- Clinical Linkages Group via the Cambia Health Foundation will help fund Sources of Strength, a suicide prevention program, at Columbia High School.

As students return to Oregon classrooms for another school year, state health and education officials are asking people to do their part to slow the spread of COVID-19 so students can stay in school.  Appearing in a Tuesday press conference with Governor Kate Brown…Oregon Department of Education Director Colt Gill said everyone holds some responsibility to achieve a full-time in-person school year.  He asked Oregonians to wear a mask and get vaccinated to help achieve that goal.  Dr. Dana Braner, physician-in-chief at Oregon Health & Science University children’s hospital, said a return to in-person school is essential, not only for children’s education, but for their physical and mental health as well.  Although the school year has just begun, a few Oregon schools have already had to close or delay their start due to student and staff quarantines because of COVID-19 cases.