JOEL MARTIN

Quincy National Night Out scales down

QUINCY — Quincy’s National Night Out was more compact this year, which worked out well, said QPD Sgt. Joe Westby, who’s in charge of event planning for the Quincy Police Department. “National Night Out is a big event, and the fact that we’re able to shrink it up is like a breath of fresh air,” Westby said. “If you're always doing the same thing, it's kind of nice to switch things up and see how it works.” National Night Out took place Thursday on the block of C Street next to the police station, a shift from previous years when it was held at Lauzier Park. The smaller space meant fewer emergency vehicles for children to explore, but it also meant less walking for attendees. Grant County Fire District 5 brought a fire truck, and the Grant County Sheriff’s Office had a patrol boat. Renew, the Grant County behavioral health agency, had a booth and so did Quincy Partnership for Youth. Veterans Operation Creation sang the national anthem, and the Quincy Animal Shelter brought kittens that piled over each other making friends with passersby. As before, the QPD served grilled hot dogs.

Quincy Police retirements leave big shoes to fill

QUINCY — There are some big shoes to fill at the Quincy Police Department. “We’re losing 48 years of experience between them,” Quincy Police Chief Ryan Green said at the retirement party for Capt. Jorge Trujillo and Det. Damon Powell Thursday. Trujillo, who grew up in Sunnyside, has been with QPD for 19 years, he said, coming on as a patrol officer fresh out of the military. From there he served as a field training officer, a detective and finally captain. “I consider him my left-hand man,” Green said. “He runs the operations side of the house … He knows the agency very well, and he knows the community.” Trujillo has some projects around the house to tackle now that he’s retired, he said.

Big fun on a small scale

Wheat Land Communities’ Fair opens Thursday

RITZVILLE — The Wheat Land Communities’ Fair isn’t as big or as flashy as some of the county fairs around central Washington, but the folks who keep it going like it just the way it is. “It’s somewhere you can go and get an old-time traditional feeling, and you’re comfortable letting your kids roam the grounds and experience all that it has to offer,” said Board Member Lori Williams. “It’s more of a feeling than (one) specific thing,” The fair starts Thursday in Ritzville and runs through Sunday. Starting Friday, the 56th Ritzville Rodeo will take place alongside the fair at the rodeo grounds. This year the entertainment budget was expanded, Williams said, to be able to offer more fun that’s covered by the cost of admission. For the kids, there’s face painting, balloon art, Lego crafts, races, contests and games. Children can also ride on a little train towed around the fairgrounds behind a tractor.

Choosing plants for a drought-resistant garden

MOSES LAKE — Heritage gardens, with native, drought-resistant plants, aren’t just nice to look at, they’re economical, and they make a difference when the water bill rolls around, said Columbia Basin Conservation District Conservation Director Dinah Rouleau at a class hosted jointly by the CBCD and Habitat for Humanity Aug. 11.

BASIN EVENTS September 2026

COLUMBIA BASIN — The summer is over, and it’s time to start the fall festivities. Here’s a taste of what awaits you in September.

Back-to-school event includes free eye exams and glasses

MOSES LAKE — When the new school year starts, some Moses Lake children will be able to see the front of the classroom a little more clearly, after a free event Monday. “Anyone in the community can get vision screening; if they need it, they can get prescription eyeglasses mailed to them at home,” said Coordinated Care CEO Beth Johnson.

School supply giveaway helps Scout earn Eagle status

MOSES LAKE — A lot of work went into the bags of school supplies that were being given away at the Boys & Girls Club in Moses Lake Monday. “I went around town with some of the other Boy Scouts in Troop 75 asking for donations at EDUBS C/S and B’s Barbershop and other places downtown,” said Francisco Guerra Campos, 17, of Moses Lake. “And a few days later The Home Depot lent us some boxes that we could set up at (businesses) to get donations from their customers … Some other people donated money, and we went to Walmart and bought the stuff with the donations.” The giveaway is Guerra Campos’ Eagle Scout project, one of the steps toward achieving Scouting’s highest honor. Besides the project, to be an Eagle Scout, a scout must earn at least 21 merit badges – 13 in required areas and eight additional elective badges – as well as holding leadership positions in the troop, according to the Scouting America website. And all that has to be completed before his 18th birthday, which in Guerra Campos’ case is next spring.

Tent revival coming to Moses Lake

MOSES LAKE — Blue Heron Park in Moses Lake will be abuzz with faith next week, when Glory Cloud Crusade holds its annual tent revival. “It’s like having church, but under a tent,” said Nini English, one of the organizers of the event. “We’re uniting the Moses Lake community to worship God and bring hope to the community.” Glory Cloud Crusade partners with about a dozen local churches and ministries to put on the five-day event, which involves services every evening Sept. 2-4, and two on Sept. 5 and 6. The event’s name is taken from a passage in the Book of Exodus, in which God showed his presence by covering the Israelites’ tabernacle, or sacred tent, with a cloud.

Stuck on science

Kids discover physics at museum program

MOSES LAKE — It was just another Saturday at the Moses Lake Museum & Art Center, with Program Assistant Savannah Betz explaining non-Newtonian physics and the scientific method to a group of grade-school children. “We know that something is solid because we can feel that it’s solid,” Betz said. “We know that something is liquid because it looks like liquid and feels like liquid. And you know that something is a gas because, well, you can’t see it, really. Sometimes you can smell a gas, and you kind of feel it as you wave your arms around. (Oobleck) is called a non-Newtonian fluid because it doesn’t conform to those states of matter.”

Credit union shreds sensitive documents, collects for food bank

MOSES LAKE — The Moses Lake branch of Solarity Credit Union held a paper-shredding event Saturday. “We’re encouraging everybody to bring any of their documents that they don’t want lying around, that you don’t want anybody to get their hands on,” said Solarity Community Activation Activist Sean McEwen. People took up the offer at a fairly steady rate, McEwen said, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Anybody who wanted to, Solarity members or not, could bring up to three boxes of documents to be shredded at no charge, and if they brought a nonperishable food item for the Moses Lake Food Bank, they could bring an additional box. The documents were loaded into a secure CI Information Management truck to be carted away and destroyed.