10 CapitalPress.com
April 7, 2017
Washington
Little Goose lock reopening delayed until April 11
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Repairs at the Little Goose
Dam navigation lock have
delayed its reopening until
April 11, according to the
U.S. Army Corps of Engi-
neers.
The dam was originally
slated to reopen March 20
with the rest of the Colum-
bia and Snake river system
locks. Its reopening has been
delayed twice.
Operational testing of the
north gate revealed that the
pintle heel was not replaced
in the correct position under
a previous contract, the corps
said in a press release. The
north gate’s quoin blocks will
need to be machined to cor-
rect the defi ciency.
Surveying was performed
on the south gate, confi rming
the south pintle heel was also
installed out of position under
the previous contract. Correc-
Columbia and
Snake river dams
97
S na
ke
R
Capital Press
R i ver
By MATTHEW WEAVER
84
Major U.S. dams
N
20 miles
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Bonneville
The Dalles
John Day
McNary
Ice Harbor
6. Lower Monumental
7. Little Goose
8. Lower Granite
9. Dworshak
10. Albeni Falls
11. Grand Coulee
12. Chief Joseph
13. Libby (Mont.)*
14. Hungry Horse (Mont.)*
*Not shown
Sources: U.S. Army Corp. of Engineers
tions were made, and the gate
is being moved into place to
verify the alignment, accord-
Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
ing to the corps.
The pintle heel is a part of
the bottom hinge, said Gina
Baltrusch, corps spokeswom-
an. Quoin blocks are the thick,
vertical pieces of metal on the
outside of the gate that run
from top to bottom, creating
the water-tight seal between
the gate and the wall.
The corps will shave
roughly one-sixteenth of an
inch off the quoin block so it
will seal properly, Baltrusch
said.
“We regret the impact to
our navigation stakeholders
caused by this additional de-
lay in reopening the lock at
Little Goose,” project manag-
er Jason Williams said in the
press release. “We are doing
all we can to restore safe, reli-
able lock service as quickly as
possible.”
Columbia Grain in Clark-
ston, Wash., is one of the
companies that uses the river
system to ship grain to Port-
land for sale to overseas cus-
tomers.
Assistant vice president
Randy Olstad said he sup-
ports and trusts the corps
to make sure the repairs are
done right.
“It’s frustrating at this
point, but the river system is
extremely important for our
business,” he said.
His company had time to
prepare for the downtime, but
is eager for the dam to be re-
paired, Olstad said.
Customers have been un-
derstanding so far, he said.
“We’ve done our job, I
believe the corps is doing
their job,” he said. “This is
just an unforeseen circum-
stance we wish they would
have caught earlier, but did
not. That’s water under the
bridge. We’ve just got to deal
with it.”
Olstad declined to esti-
mate how much the delay
will cost the company.
“It’s more of our reputa-
tion, saying what we’re going
to do and doing what we’re
going to say,” he said. “I
think that’s more on the line
than anything.”
Funding for Washington wine research tops $1 million
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
SEATTLE — Funding for
Washington wine research is
taking a larger-than-usual
upward jump and cracking
the $1 million mark for the
first time.
The Washington State
Wine
Commission
an-
nounced March 30 that it
has recommended slightly
more than $1 million for
the Washington State Grape
and Wine Research Program
for the fiscal year beginning
July 1. It is administered by
Washington State Universi-
ty.
That’s up 20 percent from
last year’s $869,500 and will
allow for eight new research
projects, said Rick Hamman,
of Hogue Ranches in Pross-
er.
Hamman chairs the
Dan Wheat/Capital Press File
A load of winegrapes is dumped for crushing at Ancient Lake Wine Co. in George, Wash., last
September. The state’s wine industry has announced a big uptick in wine research money for the
2017-2018 fi scal year.
Wine Commission’s Wine
Research Advisory Com-
mittee, which reviews re-
search proposals annually
and recommends funding to
the commission. The com-
mission then makes binding
recommendations to WSU,
said Melissa Hansen, re-
search program manager at
the commission.
Research funding comes
about evenly from four
sources: the commission;
WSU’s Agriculture Re-
search Center, a state liter
tax collected on all wines
sold in the state and from the
nonprofit charitable organi-
zation, Auction of Washing-
ton Wines.
The auction had a very
successful auction in August
that led to the organization’s
contribution of $278,000 for
the coming year, up nearly
$80,000 from last year, Han-
sen said.
The added money will
help fund new research on
powdery mildew fungicide
resistance and crown gall in-
cidence, a new mite species
in Eastern Washington, im-
pact of pH on wine microbial
ecology and sensory charac-
teristics of Washington wines
and more, Hamman said.
“Previous research out-
comes have made signifi cant
industry impact and benefi t
everyone connected to the
Washington wine industry,”
he said.
There will be 18 research
projects this year. There’s
usually not enough money
to fund all the projects the
committee would like to fund
and it’s unusual to be able
to bring on eight new ones,
Hansen said.
Projects typically last two
or three years and several are
replaced with new ones each
year, Hansen said.
“Auction of Washington
Wines has made a huge dif-
ference. They’ve been a sol-
id supporter for more than
10 years and given more
than $1 million through the
years,” she said.
Environmental
bills pass Senate
committee
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
14-4/#4N
A bill to protect
340,000 acres of Okano-
gan-Wenatchee
National
Forest in the Methow Val-
ley of Okanogan County
from mining has passed
the U.S. Senate Energy and
Natural Resources Com-
mittee.
The Methow Headwa-
ters Protection Act of 2017,
S. 566, sponsored by Sens.
Patty Murray and Maria
Cantwell, both Washing-
ton Democrats, was in a
package of 56 bills that
cleared the committee
March 30 on a voice vote.
Cantwell is the ranking
minority member of the
committee.
The bill protects the area
from development into a
large-scale copper mine
and other mineral devel-
opment and protects the
headwaters of the Methow
River, which provides
clean water to downstream
communities and supports
local
tourism,
critical
salmon restoration, ranch-
ing and farming, accord-
ing to a Cantwell news
release.
Two years ago, Kinross
Gold Corp., a Canadian
mining company clos-
ing Buckhorn Mine near
Chesaw,
withdrew
an
application to drill 950
holes to search for more
gold on federal lands in
Washington, saying U.S.
Forest Service processes
were too cumbersome and
costly.
Cantwell sponsored or
co-sponsored three other
bills of the 56. One was
reintroduction of the Yaki-
ma River Basin Water En-
hancement Project, S. 714,
which originally passed the
last Congress to address
water needs of the Yakima
Basin.