Klickitat County is picking a new sheriff for the first time in a decade. Longtime Sheriff Bob Songer is retiring, and three career lawmen (John Bruce, Tony Warren, and Dwayne Matulovich) are running to replace him. We walk through two candidate forums, dig into the campaign-finance filings (including who the outgoing sheriff is funding), and cover the three-way County Commission race and the quiet PUD contest almost nobody is watching.

In this episode:

• Why the sheriff's seat is suddenly open, and how the three candidates differ on the posse, Flock cameras, and "constitutional sheriff" politics
• Follow the money: who is raising what, who is self-funding, and the out-of-state donors
• How the retiring sheriff is helping fund both a successor and a commissioner candidate
• The County Commission, District 2 race and the Dallesport data-center split
• The contested PUD race with no forum, and the rest of the ballot
• How and when to vote in the August 4 primary

Resources & links:

• Read the full written round-up at skamaniadispatch.com
• Candidate sites: johnbruceforsheriff.com · tonywarrenforsheriff.com · dwaynematulovich4sheriff.com
• Campaign-finance data: Washington Public Disclosure Commission (pdc.wa.gov)
• Sheriff retirement and the new posse law: OPB
• Watch the League of Women Voters of Klickitat-Skamania sheriff forum on their Facebook and YouTube pages
• Register to vote and check your ballot: klickitatcounty.gov

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.

Bingen City Council had a packed June. The new Hood River-White Salmon Bridge reached sixty-percent design, the city hired an engineer to push its long-awaited railroad Quiet Zone forward, and Olympia's latest housing rules landed on the council's desk. Here's your plain-English guide to what it all means for you.

In This Episode:

• The new bridge at 60%: the roundabout, the overlooks, and the toll-and-TIFIA math
• Quiet Zone: Gray and Osborne hired, the BNSF agreement signed
• Which of the state's new housing rules Bingen has to follow, and why it can't require affordable units
• Free e-bikes coming to Daubenspeck Park, plus new stop signs and a possible 20 mph limit
• TextMyGov emergency text alerts
• An early wildfire season, and lead paint at the Gorge Heritage Museum

Resources & Links:

• Read the full written Dispatch at skamaniadispatch.com
• Bingen City Council agendas and minutes: bingenwashington.org (AgendaCenter)
• Hood River-White Salmon Bridge Authority: hrwsba.gov

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.

Your 2026 primary ballot is about to arrive, and the Skamania County Chamber and both county parties put the contested candidates on one stage in Stevenson to preview it. In this special edition we walk the whole ballot: the nine-way race for Congress in District 3, both 17th District statehouse seats, and the county races for Commissioner, Assessor, and Clerk. Then we follow the money, and it tells a story of two very different elections stacked on one ballot.

In This Episode

• Congressional District 3: a top-two field of nine, and the two themes that dominated (election rules and timber)
• 17th Legislative District: how redistricting reshaped it, plus the mail-in voting split and the state capital gains "millionaire tax"
• County Commissioner District 3: both candidates reject the automatic 1% levy
• County Assessor: a real fight over how your property gets valued
• County Clerk: the friendly race
• Follow the Money: $80,000 statehouse races on top of $0 county races
• Every date you need for the August 4 primary

Resources & Links

• Read the full written edition at SkamaniaDispatch.com
• Check your registration and see your ballot: voter.votewa.gov
• Official state voters' guide (candidate statements): voter.votewa.gov
• Campaign finance filings: Washington Public Disclosure Commission, pdc.wa.gov
• Skamania County candidate Q&A: skamania.org

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.

It was a packed June for the Goldendale City Council, the county seat of Klickitat County. In two meetings, the council rescued a stalled housing rule by standing up a temporary planning commission, locked in a $221,000 grant to replace the historic library's elevator, and spent a good chunk of fire season arguing over smoke, dry weeds, and Fourth of July fireworks. Here's what it means for you.

In This Episode:

• Why Goldendale's Planning Commission went defunct, and the six-month workaround that keeps the ADU (backyard-cottage) ordinance moving.
• A $221,000 federal grant to replace the Goldendale Community Library's 40-year-old elevator.
• The first-quarter budget: a paper deficit, a $480,000 grant-timing swing, and a softening in retail sales tax.
• A downtown "burnout" event that filled a neighbor's home with smoke, and the older, thornier fight over unmowed weeds during fire season.
• Why both the fire and police chiefs argued against a Fourth of July fireworks crackdown.
• A statewide visit: the Secretary of State and international consuls tour Goldendale.

Resources & Links:

• Read the full written round-up on SkamaniaDispatch.com
• City of Goldendale agendas, packets, and meeting info (Zoom: 415-762-9988, Meeting ID 373 290 5204).
• Next regular council meeting: Monday, July 6, 2026, 6:00 p.m., Council Chambers, 1103 S. Columbus Ave.
• Community Days: July 10 and 11.

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.

What does it really cost to build a house near a wetland in North Bonneville? This month the City Council turned a routine environmental-rules update into a debate about affordability and local control. We also cover the North Bonneville Planning Commission, a firefighter bill four years overdue, a library open just six hours a week, and why sewer pipes are quietly straining budgets all across the Gorge.

In This Episode

• The Critical Areas Ordinance heads to the state, and one councilor's cost analysis that reframed the whole debate
• The city pays off firefighter-pension dues unpaid since 2022, and a vote where the record and the recording disagree
• Sixty-five hundred dollars in tourism funds for a summer car show and Gorge Days
• A library that gets used every day but is staffed only six hours a week
• Blackberries, faded road lines, and a striping machine the city could not buy
• Why North Bonneville's fifty-year-old sewer lift stations are part of a Gorge-wide story
• What is next: a July 7 zoning hearing and a July 28 look at the Bradford Island Superfund site

Resources & Links

• Read the full written Dispatch at skamaniadispatch.com
• North Bonneville City Council agendas, minutes, and audio (the new "Supplemental Documents" link holds sheriff reports and written public comment)
• North Bonneville Planning Commission meetings & minutes: the draft Title 20 zoning revisions and the July 7 public hearing
• Fort Vancouver Regional Library: send comments on the North Bonneville branch through the FVRL website
• Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife Priority Habitats and Species and Department of Ecology Critical Areas / wetlands guidance

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.

The Skamania County Board of Commissioners rewrote the rules for rebuilding after a wildfire, giving burned-out families ten years instead of one. In this episode of Open Gorge, we walk through a busy June for the Skamania County Commissioners: a five-million-dollar storm road program, a mining company circling the Green River Valley, a sharpening fight with the Forest Service over timber money, and the first real talk of visitor fees as tourism strains the county.

In This Episode

• Title 22 is adopted: up to ten years to rebuild after a disaster, bigger footprints for small homes, RVs allowed on-site during a rebuild
• A road program reshaped by December's storms, and how the Wind River Highway detour is hurting Carson businesses
• The timber-revenue fight: "I want the floor to be fifty percent," a second school closure, and a state error that cost the schools
• Cascade Forest Conservancy's mine warning, and a county that says it's "locked in a box"
• Budget season opens with a "hold the line" message and a new finance system going live
• Tourism pressure turns toward fees; a shake-up at the Homeless Housing Council; Title III requests from six agencies
• Two retirements, and a July 30 deadline to comment on the Storedahl quarry

Resources & Links

• Read the full written Dispatch, with links to a year of past coverage, at skamaniadispatch.com
• Skamania County agendas, minutes, and meeting audio: www.skamaniacounty.org
• Comment on the Storedahl & Sons Quarry Draft EIS by July 30 (on the county website, at the library, or printed on request)
• Written comment to the Board: emerson@co.skamania.wa.us, by noon the day before a meeting
• Next meetings: Tuesdays, July 7, 14, 21, and 28, 9:30 AM, at the courthouse in Stevenson and by Zoom

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.

This month, the White Salmon City Council voted to make every new home EV-ready, and the debate was really about who pays for it. We've also got a denied housing appeal at the Planning Commission, a ten-thousand-dollar snag for the Fourth of July parade at the Community Development Committee, and a storm that closed a road. Here's your June in White Salmon.

In This Episode

• The City Council adopts an EV-ready ordinance, 5-0, and wrestles with affordability
• The six-year transportation plan, storm damage on Skagit and Scenic, and a drought summer
• Cluster mailboxes retired, Knowledge Bowl state champions, and a state housing-board appointment
• The Community Development Committee reworks heritage months and hits a $10,000 parade-closure wall
• The Planning Commission denies the Wyers Street reconsideration and eyes the short-term-rental "30% rule"

Resources & Links

• Read the full written Dispatch at skamaniadispatch.com
• White Salmon agendas, packets, and meeting recordings: whitesalmonwa.gov/meetings
• Submit written public comment: public.comment@whitesalmonwa.gov
• Next up: City Council July 1, Planning Commission public hearing July 8

Community Development Committee coverage draws on a recording from the Columbia Gorge Documenters, powered by Uplift Local (CC BY 4.0).

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.

This episode: Stevenson's June meant a sewer-ordinance rewrite that's almost across the line, a move to scrap downtown parking minimums, and a Board of Adjustment that granted one hotel parking relief while sending an accessory-dwelling-unit case back for more homework. We cover the Stevenson City Council (June 18) and the Stevenson Board of Adjustment (June 10), plus a city-administrator hire that fell through at the last minute.

In this episode:

• The revised sewer ordinance: who has to connect, who doesn't, and the one clause still holding up a vote
• Why Stevenson wants to drop its downtown parking minimums, and the national movement behind it
• The Artbliss Hotel parking variance, granted
• A continued ADU variance, and a fact-check on whether ADUs are "just money makers"
• A CPA hired for financial oversight, and a stalled administrator search
• What's next: the July 9 retreat, the July 16 council meeting, and a mid-July Board of Adjustment hearing

Resources & Links:

• Read the full written Dispatch, with every source linked, at skamaniadispatch.com
• City of Stevenson agendas, packets, and meeting video: ci.stevenson.wa.us/meetings and vimeo.com/cityofstevenson
• Going deeper on parking reform: Strong Towns (strongtowns.org/parking) and the Parking Reform Network (parkingreform.org)
• The ADU data: UC Berkeley's Terner Center and the Florida Housing Action Lab

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.