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PEOPLE compiled by

Ben Olson

watching

Quotes about democracy: “Democracy’s a very fragile thing. You have to take care of democracy. As soon as you stop being responsible to it and allow it to turn into scare tactics, it’s no longer democracy, is it? It’s something else.

It may be an inch away from totalitarianism.”

Sam Shephard Playwright, actor “The bedrock of our democracy is the rule of law and that means we have to have an independent judiciary, judges who can make decisions independent of the political winds that are blowing.”

Caroline Kennedy Author, attorney, diplomat

“Where you see wrong or inequality or injustice, speak out, because this is your country. This is your democracy.

Make it. Protect it. Pass it on.”

Thurgood Marshall The first Black justice of the U.S. Supreme Court

“The freedom to criticize judges and other public officials is necessary to a vibrant democracy. The problem comes when healthy criticism is replaced with more destructive intimidation and sanctions.”

Sandra Day O’Conner The first female justice of the U.S. Supreme Court

“Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a president and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt 32nd president of the U.S.

DEAR READERS,

These have been trying days since the riot on Jan. 6 at the U.S. Capitol. I urge everyone to embrace calm and kindness in the days ahead. I also think it’s important to view video footage of the event. There’s an awful lot of it, and it’s not easy to watch.

Honestly some videos left me in tears, but it’s necessary to see exactly what went down at the Capitol so we can all agree that this should never happen again. There are videos showing a policeman screaming in agony as he’s being squeezed into doors by hundreds of storming rioters. There are videos showing rioters dragging Capitol police down the steps and beating them with a flag pole flying an American flag – a particularly ugly symbolic usage of the flag. We all have to bear witness to these events and hold those that participated in this incident accountable, which, yes, includes President Donald Trump for his role inciting this riot. Trump supporters were drawn to the rally based on a lie that there was widespread voter fraud, egged on by sycophantic party loyalists and whipped into a violent mob by his words. It was truly one of our worst days.

Is this the America you all want? Is this what greatness is?

– Ben Olson, publisher

READER 111 Cedar Street, Suite 9 Sandpoint, ID 83864 (208)265-9724

www.sandpointreader.com Publisher: Ben Olson ben@sandpointreader.com Editorial: Zach Hagadone (Editor) zach@sandpointreader.com Lyndsie Kiebert (News Editor) lyndsie@sandpointreader.com Cameron Rasmusson (emeritus) John Reuter (emeritus) Advertising: Jodi Berge Jodi@sandpointreader.com Contributing Artists: Ben Olson, Ross Hall Collection, Bill Borders.

Contributing Writers: Zach Hagadone, Ben Olson, Lyndsie Kiebert, Lorraine H. Marie, Sandy Compton, Brenden Bobby, Steve Klatt, Jim Mitsui, Guy Lothian, Brenda Hammond, Amy Craven, Cameron Rasmusson, Marcia Pilgeram, Ed Ohlweiler, Harrison Berry.

Submit stories to: stories@sandpointreader.com Printed weekly at: Tribune Publishing Co. Lewiston, ID Subscription Price: $115 per year Web Content: Keokee The Sandpoint Reader is a weekly publication owned and operated by Ben Olson and Keokee. It is devoted to the arts, entertainment, politics and lifestyle in and around Sandpoint, Idaho.

We hope to provide a quality alternative by offering honest, in-depth reporting that reflects the intelligence and interests of our diverse and growing community.

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Leftover copies are collected and recycled weekly, or burned in massive bonfires to appease the gods of journalism. Free to all, limit two copies per person.

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Requirements: –No more than 300 words –Letters may not contain excessive profanity or libelous material. Please elevate the discussion.

Letters will be edited to comply with the above requirements. Opinions expressed in these pages are those of the writers, not necessarily the publishers.

Email letters to: letters@sandpointreader.com Check us out on the web at: www.sandpointreader.com Like us on Facebook.

About the Cover

This week’s cover photo shows a brave snowboarder catching some big air on the slopes. Food added by Ben Olson!

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NEWS

Teachers, people 65+ could get vaccine sooner than expected

LPOSD adopts ‘tool’ to shorten quarantine time for mask-to-mask student contact

By Lyndsie Kiebert Reader Staff In an updated timeline for COVID-19 vaccine distribution in Idaho released Jan. 12, health officials are now prioritizing first responders, correctional facility staff and K-12 teachers and staff to receive their first doses of the two-dose coronavirus vaccine.

People over the age of 65 have also been moved up in the new timeline, now expected to start accessing the vaccine by Feb. 1.

In conjunction with the release of the new timeline — which stemmed from a recommendation from Idaho’s COVID-19 Vaccine Advisory Committee — Gov. Brad Little said his goal is to ramp up vaccine distribution and enhance communication about accessing doses in Idaho. He emphasized the fact that doses of the vaccine come straight from the manufacturer to regional health districts across the state.

“The state of Idaho gets the doses and the resources to the providers, and the providers get the shots in the arms of people who want it,” he said.

A large population of Idahoans that could see access to the vaccine sooner than originally anticipated are those 65 and older.

“The 65-and-older population is enormous, and there is still work actively being done to build up capacity among our providers to take on this population,” Little said. “We do not want to create a bubble or backlog. Once we get a handle on capacity, we will be able to get to the 65-and-older population.”

Several North Idahoans have already received their first dose of the vaccine through the Panhandle Health District, which opened vaccine clinic appointments last week and filled them very quickly.

“We are pleased that so many people in our community are eager to receive the COVID-19 vaccine,” said PHD Health Services 4 /

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Administrator Don Duffy. “With that being said, supply is still limited and that is why it is imperative that we stick with the phased vaccine approach.

“The Idaho COVID-19 Vaccine Advisory Committee has created the phases and as an enrolled provider, we are obligated to adhere to the guidelines in accordance with the governor’s recommendations,” he added.

“We ask that each individual wait for their specific phase to receive the vaccine.”

PHD shared in a Jan. 12 press release that current clinics “are available to those who are in the Phase 1a and the top priority groups in the Phase 1b categories of the vaccine distribution plan.”

This includes health care providers, first responders, teachers and people 65 years of age and older.

See the entire updated timeline at coronavirus.idaho.gov/covid-19vaccine.

Duffy said PHD will request proof of age or employment before administering the vaccine, and that pre-approval from a primary physician is not required.

However, do not show up to a vaccine clinic without an appointment — reach out to PHD ahead of time to be sure you won’t be turned away.

“If you are a part of the first priority groups, the health district and community partners enrolled to administer the vaccine will coordinate with your employer as the vaccine is made available,” PHD officials stated.

You can contact PHD’s COVID-19 hotline with questions Monday through Friday, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. at 877-415-5225. Also learn more about the vaccine when Kaniksu Health Services hosts a live community webinar on Thursday, Jan. 21 at 5:30 p.m. over Zoom.

Register for the event at bit. ly/3nIOV58.

As of Jan. 13, nearly 500 Bonner County residents had received the COVID-19 vaccine, with 130 of those people having received

Dr. Chase Williams receives one of the first vaccinations administered at BGH in December 2020. Photo courtesy BGH. both doses and considered fully vaccinated. Almost 4,000 people in the Panhandle Health District had received at least one dose, while nearly 700 of those had received both.

Lake Pend Oreille School District Superintendent Tom Albertson said at the Jan. 12 trustee meeting that PHD and Bonner General Health officials have been in contact with the school district to coordinate vaccinations for teachers and staff in the coming weeks.

“Everybody who wants a vaccination [will] have that opportunity,” he told the board.

LPOSD trustees also considered a new protocol recommendation from the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare and health district epidemiologists that could possibly alter quarantine requirements when contact tracing in classroom settings. Albertson said that if a student tests positive, any other student who is considered

a close contact — within six feet of the positive student for 15 minutes or more — could avoid the required isolation period and instead just monitor for symptoms if both students were properly wearing masks when they came into contact.

Trustee Lonnie Williams said he felt the recommendation was worth considering.

“I know that’s been a point of contention for some families, when they find out their kiddo needs to go home for two weeks because they sat in the same classroom as somebody that tested positive,” Williams said. “I also realize that if it’s an elementary class, the likelihood of both students being masked is pretty slim, but at the middle school and high school level, could we then rely on this if we chose to?”

Under current LPOSD COVID-19 classroom guidelines, K-6 students are only required to wear masks in transitional spaces

like hallways, while secondary students wear face coverings at all times.

Trustee Gary Suppiger noted that the district has seen no conclusive evidence of student-to-student transmission within classroom settings to date.

“That’s a positive thing,” he said, adding that the board has continued to change its close contact quarantine policy throughout the year — from the original twoweek requirement to a one-week period — as more data has come to light.

“Additional flexibility is warranted,” he said.

The board voted unanimously to adopt the new policy to be used at the discretion of contact tracers, and only in classroom scenarios — not in athletic or other extracurricular activity settings.

“I look at this as a tool for our contact tracers — which is our nursing staff and administrators — to say, ‘If it happened to be a scenario where both were masked, then maybe we don’t need to quarantine as much,’” Albertson said. “This is not meant to say that we need to change our operation protocol or what we’re doing in our classrooms.”

Albertson reported that LPOSD currently has 11 active cases of COVID-19 in school staff and students, and that there have been 117 cases in the district since the start of the school year.

PHD reported a total of 2,298 cases of COVID-19 in Bonner County since the start of the pandemic, with 687 of those active as of Jan. 13. The health district has logged 19 COVID-related deaths in the county.

Idaho reported 1,091 new cases of the virus Jan. 13, bringing the statewide total to 152,364 since March. IDHW reports that 1,564 Idahoans have lost their lives to COVID-19.

Further information about cases and vaccine distribution can be found at coronavirus.idaho.gov.

NEWS

Here we have Idaho

By Zach Hagadone Reader Staff The 2021 Idaho Legislature is off and running after gaveling into session Jan. 11, with lawmakers already lining up priorities for the state’s massive tax revenue collection, digging into bills aimed at limiting the governor’s emergency powers, and sparring over COVID-19 safety protocols at the Capitol in Boise.

According to the latest figures, Idaho’s December general fund revenue “shattered” forecasted tax receipts by $36 million, according to Alex Adams, who serves as budget director for Gov. Brad Little.

Speaking before the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee on Jan. 12, Adams said the state is 14% above on income tax, 25% above on corporate income tax and 7% above its sales tax revenue for the year. A big part of that robust revenue growth stems from income tax withholding, which has “been shattering targets,” he said.

Little outlined his proposed $4.2 billion budget for fiscal year 2022 at his recent State of the State address, which amounts to nearly 4% more spending than initial appropriations. According to Adams, those extra funds will

be critical to building “a cushion for uncertainty” as the COVID-19 pandemic continues into its 10th month in Idaho. Yet, despite the many challenges posed by the pandemic, the Gem State has been performing financially much better than anticipated, Adams said, noting that the governor remains hopeful that Idaho will come out the COVID-19 era “stronger and more resilient than we entered into it.”

Navigating COVID-19 has also figured centrally into a handful of early pieces of legislation making their way through the Statehouse — including four bills introduced Jan. 13 to the Senate State Affairs Committee, all focused on limiting the emergency powers of the governor.

According to the Idaho Press “Eye on Boise” blog, among the proposed pieces of legislation is a House resolution from Blanchard Republican Rep. Heather Scott that would end the state COVID-19 emergency as well as Idaho’s receipt of federal emergency funds due to the pandemic. Meanwhile, the paper reported, the Senate version ends the emergency but leaves intact Idaho’s share of federal aid to entities such as the Idaho National Guard, hospitals and long-term care facilities.

Senate President Pro-Tem

Winter Carnival events canceled for 2021

By Reader Staff With Idaho still being in Stage 2 and the safety of the community top of mind, the Winter Carnival Committee has decided to cancel the Winter Carnival events for 2021. Winter Carnival is typically held over Presidents Weekend with events spread around the Greater Sandpoint area.

The kick-off for Winter Carnival is the Friday night Parade of Lights and ends 10 days later with the infamous K-9 Keg Pull. Both of these events require city permitting and, being in Stage 2 of the Idaho Rebounds COVID-19 reopening

plan, no permits can be issued. All other events are typically organized and run by individual businesses in the area. When surveyed by event organizers, none of the local businesses wanted to take the chance of harming the public with exposure to COVID-19.

Although it will be missed, Winter Carnival will be back bigger and better in 2022.

Support local businesses and enjoy the vibrant downtown. For more information and additional events visit: facebook.com/sandpointshoppingdistrict or downtownsandpoint.com.

What’s happening at the Idaho Legislature this week

Chuck Winder, a Boise Republican, said the Senate version is intended to retain the governor’s emergency declaration powers in order to access federal aid, but bar the state’s chief executive from instituting the types of restrictions that have come with the Idaho Rebounds COVID-19 reopening plan.

Little’s use of emergency powers to manage a phased reopening of Idaho’s economy — including enforced closures of certain types of businesses — has rankled many Idaho lawmakers for months, including Scott, who convened unofficially at the Capitol last summer to challenge the governor’s authority.

A later extraordinary session in August 2020 included protests, some property damage and the arrest of famous anti-government activist Ammon Bundy at the Capitol, where demonstrators and some lawmakers alike pressed for limits on Little’s emergency powers and an end to the pandemic state of emergency.

Finally, the COVID-19 safety of the Statehouse itself has become a legal and political football, with Reps. Sue Chew, D-Boise, and Muffy Davis, D-Ketchum, asking a federal judge to order the Legislature to adopt more stringent coronavirus protocols. Chew and Davis named House Speaker Scott

The Idaho State Capitol in Boise. Photo courtesy Wikipedia.

Bedke in their lawsuit, claiming pandemic guidelines such as face coverings aren’t being followed to keep lawmakers, staff and visitors to the Capitol adequately safe from the virus.

A federal judge declined to grant Chew and Davis a preliminary order Jan. 12, though the case will move forward.

Meanwhile, disability rights groups have filed their own action, naming Bedke and Winder as defendants and likewise demanding more reasonable accommodations for immuno-compromised individuals to safely participate in the proceedings at the Capitol.

The Disability Action Center NW joined the suit Jan. 13, stating that it and other complainants “were hoping for a simple resolution of the issues through negotiations, etc., but Speaker Bedke and President Pro Tem

Winder have implemented a policy of denying adequate public health and safety protocols for the 2021 legislative session in light of the threat posed by COVID-19.”

According to the Associated Press, Winder and Bedke are due to submit a written response to the suit, but that response had not materialized as of press time.

“We do not want to choose between exercising our constitutional and statutory rights and our health,” stated Mark Leeper, executive director of DAC NW, which operates throughout North Idaho from offices in Post Falls, Moscow and Lewiston. “By not being able to equitably participate in the 2021 legislative session, our rights will be violated.

Those we represent are among the most vulnerable in our state.”

County procures land for new Laclede dump site Unmanned Wrenco site to be replaced

By Lyndsie Kiebert Reader Staff A long-awaited replacement for the solid waste refuse site on Wrenco Loop is officially in the works, as Bonner County commissioners on Jan. 12 unanimously approved the procurement of land in Laclede meant to host a new fully functional and manned dump for residents along Highway 2 between Sandpoint and Priest River.

In June 2019, the announcement that the Wrenco dump

would be closed caused controversy among those who frequented the site, as residents claimed that they were not given adequate notice of the closure.

Due to public outcry, county officials resolved to keep the site open until they could create a new dump in the area.

Solid Waste Director Bob Howard called the Wrenco site a “nuisance” back in 2019, due to the fact that the unattended site was often abused — people dumped too much, and abandoned unlawful items in the

dumpsters. Bonner County was paying an additional $12,000 annually to manage the site, on top of regular garbage hauling costs.

Howard told the Sandpoint Reader in a Jan. 12 email that the new Laclede site “will replace Wrenco and it will be staffed with a site attendant.”

He said the new dump will “use the same footprint as the Upland site” and be accessed from North Riley Creek Road near the Laclede Community Church.

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NEWS

BoCo P&Z recommends mining code changes

BOCC to vote on amendments at hearing in coming months

By Lyndsie Kiebert Reader Staff The Bonner County Planning and Zoning Commission voted Jan. 7 to recommend proposed changes to Title 12 mining code to the board of county commissioners, which is slated to consider adopting those changes at a public hearing in late February or early March, according to Planning Director Milton Ollerton.

The recommendation moved forward with a 3-1 vote: Commissioners Suzanne Glasoe, Taylor Bradish and Sheryl Reeve voted in favor, while Dave Frankenbach voted against. Commissioner Matt Linscott recused himself due to a “conflict of interest,” and Brian Bailey also did not partake in the vote due to “possible” conflict, according to Ollerton. Acting Chairman Don Davis did not vote, as there was no tie to break.

The code has undergone considerable reworking in the five months, since planning staff’s proposed changes first went before the Planning and Zoning Commission. The amendments would introduce a new permitting method called a certificate of zoning compliance, which would be issued administratively by the planning director and require no public hearing, unlike a conditional use permit.

Under the proposed amendments, existing and temporary mining stone quarries, gravel pits, stone mills and open pits

would require only the zoning certificate; new permanent mining stone quarries, gravel pits and stone mills would require a CUP; and rock blasting would be allowed in any permanent quarry.

Ollerton told the Reader in August that Bonner County “continually gets asked to move out of the way of private property owners and the way they choose to use their property,” and the certificate of zoning compliance is one idea to move toward less regulation. Opponents of the proposed code amendments are concerned that planning officials are opening up rural and residential areas to increased industrial uses, and have repeatedly expressed concern about the county moving away from public hearings for certain operations.

During the Jan. 7 hearing, planning commissioners made two edits to their proposed changes: one concerning a timeline for existing surface mines to obtain a certificate of zoning compliance, and the second regarding limits on expansion of nonconforming, natural resource-based uses beyond parcel boundaries.

Review the amended code by visiting bonnercountyid.gov and going to the “Planning” page. Click on “Current Projects’’ and select “File AM0011-20 — Bonner County — Text Amendment, Title 12.” Written comments can be submitted ahead of the BOCC hearing — which has yet to be scheduled — by emailing planning@bonnercountyid.gov.

Weight limits considered for District 1 roads

By Lyndsie Kiebert Reader Staff The Bonner County Road and Bridge Department announced Jan. 11 that weight limits on county roads in District 1 could go into effect as early as the end of week.

“So this is definitely earlier than we anticipated, however, due to the warming trend and the wet weather coming up, District 1 may be posting weight restrictions by the end of the week,” Operations Coordinator Lisa Saldana told the Reader in an email. “The other two districts are holding off for now.”

All roads in District 1 south of the Long Bridge are currently tagged with green flags, signaling that weight limits may be imminent.

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on county roads when roadbeds are unstable due to fluctuating weather in hopes of avoiding damage. Under weight limit guidelines, vehicles in Bonner County are restricted to 250 pounds per inch, or 98 pounds per centimeter of tire width, and a maximum speed of 30 miles per hour for trucks with a 16,000-pound gross vehicle weight rating.

According to County Code, it is up to the hauler to determine whether weight limits are in place, and restrictions remain in place until updates from the department are shared.

For more information, visit bonnercountyid.gov/departments/roadbridge/ weight-limits-information or call the Road and Bridge department at 208-2555681 ext. 1 between 7 a.m.-4 p.m. After hours, dial ext. 8 for weight limit details.

Bits ’n’ Pieces From east, west and beyond

East, west or beyond, sooner or later events elsewhere may have a local impact.

A recent sampling, all pivoting around the U.S. Capitol: The date Jan. 6, 2021, when Congress convened to officially count the Electoral College votes for the U.S. presidency, will be prominent in the nation’s history books. It started with an invitation Dec. 19

by President Donald Trump to his most ardent supporters to come to D.C. for a “wild” rally. In a lengthy talk to thousands of loyalists, Trump outlined his widely debunked argument that the election was being stolen from him, urged supporters to “fight” and block election certification, and concluded later with “our incredible journey is just beginning.”

Utah Republican Sen. Mitt Romney described the armed invasion of Congress that followed Trump’s talk as an insurrection incited by the U.S. president. Others called it an “attempted coup” and “sedition.”

Boiled down, it was an attempt to overthrow the U.S. government, by far-right Trump supporters, who believed his false allegations that the election was stolen. Lawmakers managed to evacuate one minute before Senate chambers were breached (a Black police officer had lured insurgents in the wrong direction, allowing the Senators’ escape, Slate said). Several lawmakers quickly began working on articles of impeachment, as well as legislation that would expel lawmakers who fueled the coup attempt. One Trump insurrectionist died of a gunshot wound; three others died from medical emergencies. One police officer died after being hit in the head with a fire extinguisher and more than 50 officers were injured during tussles with the mob.

The insurrectionists left behind a trail of destruction, the New York Post said.

Some people inside the Capitol were pictured carrying large zip ties, which, the U.K.’s Independent reported, are “often used to handcuff people.” Along with theft (including laptops with national security documents), and smashed windows, feces had been tracked around the halls of Congress by the invaders, the Orlando Sentinel reported. Outside the building a makeshift gallows with a noose was photographed.

A vast national investigation of protesters and some police is being led by top law enforcement agencies. Those charged so far include a state lawmaker from West Virginia, who resigned after being charged with illegal entry. Federal law enforcement is scouring social media posts and video footage to identify those involved. Violent

By Lorraine H. Marie Reader Columnist

intent was confirmed with the discovery of Molotov cocktails and assault rifles, and bombs planted at both Democratic and Republican National Committee offices. Videos revealed police letting protesters into restricted areas, and at least one policeman posing for a selfie with a protester.

Revealing headlines: “Trump’s former AG Bill Barr says president ‘orchestrated’ Capitol riot,” The Guardian; “Pro-Trump Capitol rioters may face up to 20 years in prison,” fortune.com; “American carnage: How Trump’s mob ran riot in the Capitol,” The Guardian; “How the QAnon Conspiracy drove the capitol mob,” axios.com; “After a day of violence and 25th Amendment chatter Trump’s allies jumping ship,” Vanity Fair; “FBI focuses on whether some Capitol rioters intended harm to lawmakers or take hostages,” Washington Post; and, “Capitol rioters planned for weeks in plain sight,” Mother Jones.

Donald Trump’s presidential legacy, from details in The Atlantic: a fifth of the world’s COVID-19 deaths occurred in the U.S.; Trump’s 2017 tax bill allows the wealthiest 400 American to pay less than every other income group; Trump withdrew the U.S. from 13 international organizations, agreements and treaties; in his first three years in office 2.3 million lost their health insurance, accounting for up to 10,000 “excess deaths;” our nation’s freedom rating dropped to below that of Greece’s, according to the Freedom House index; the number of admitted refugees fell from 85,000 annually to 12,000; 400 miles of U.S.-Mexico border wall were built; 80 environmental rules and regulations were reversed; of his 220 appointed judges, more were rated “not qualified” by the American Bar Association than under any other president in the last 50 years; the national debt went up 37%; and, taxpayers and campaign donors enriched his family business by at least $8 million. But The Atlantic said the most lasting legacy is the fallout from his pattern of routine lying.

Trump made 25,000 false or misleading statements (an average of 18 per day).

The Atlantic noted that with the possible exception of Jimmy Carter all presidents have lied to some degree, typically to cover up a scandal, “make a disaster disappear” or mislead the public “in service to a particular goal.” Trump’s falsehoods are different: they have undermined reality, with blatant statements contrary to settled facts.

Blast from the past: “A dying mule kicks the hardest.” Attributed to a saying in South Africa during the anti-Apartheid struggle.

NEWS

Little tackles COVID, budget in State of the State address Governor condemns Capitol violence, does not mention Trump

By Lyndsie Kiebert Reader Staff Idaho Gov. Brad Little delivered his third State of the State address Jan. 11, taking the opportunity to urge peace among Americans, commend health care workers and others working to keep Idahoans safe from COVID-19, and to unveil his budget goals for the upcoming year.

Little opened his half-hour speech by mentioning the “dark events” that took place at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, when thousands of supporters of outgoing President Donald Trump descended on the building as the House and Senate prepared to count the Electoral College votes of the 2020 presidential election. Several insurrectionists stormed the building, and five people died: a Capitol police officer and four Trump supporters — one was shot by police, while the other three succumbed to separate medical emergencies.

“Hostility and violence are not an expression of your rights; they are a violation of everyone else’s,” Little said.

“While we should be celebrating the openness of our government, a fence is being erected around the U.S. Capitol.

I mourn the loss of life and the loss of

access and what it means for future generations of Americans.”

Little did not mention Trump in connection with the events at the Capitol, which were spurred by the president’s belief that he did not, in fact, lose the election to President-elect Joe Biden. Despite no evidence of fraud, Little signed onto a failed lawsuit last month in which the state of Texas wished to overturn votes in several swing states.

James Dawson of Boise State Public Radio asked Little after his address whether he felt he “legitimized” the discredited claims of fraud through his support of the suit, to which the governor replied, “No.” “Each state needs to take responsibility for the sanctity of the vote in their states,” he continued.

Much of Little’s speech addressed the effect COVID-19 had on Idaho in 2020, including the lives lost and economic hardship felt throughout the state.

While the governor did put in place stay-at-home orders and staged reopening guidelines early in the pandemic, he did not enact a statewide mask mandate and instead relied on local agencies to make those decisions.

“Members of the seven public health

boards made courageous decisions in the face of heated opposition. They have my support,” Little said. “Mayors, county and city officials, and school board members also made very tough decisions. These local leaders labored late into the evening. They navigated new technologies to inform the public. They wrestled with decisions they knew would draw criticism. Thank you.”

Little rejoiced in the arrival of the COVID-19 vaccine, and said “the dark clouds of the pandemic are starting to part.” Still, the governor cautioned against letting up on practices meant to mitigate the spread of the virus, adding that “the finish line is close, but the worst part of the pandemic may not be behind us.”

The governor also unveiled his goals for the upcoming budget, including several investments stemming from the state’s $600 million dollar surplus as well as regularly projected funds. Little is calling his plan “Building Idaho’s Future,” and it includes one-time investments of $295 million in tax relief; $126 for transportation; $60 million for water infrastructure projects; $54 million for broadband and economic development; $30 million for education; $1 million for investments into the Idaho State Police; $66 million for cap-

Gov. Brad Little delivers the 2021 State of the State address Jan. 11. Screenshot from Idaho Public Television. ital construction projects; $30 million and other priorities identified during the legislative session; and $390 million to reinvest in cuts to agency spending that occurred during the FY 2020/’21 budget process.

Little is also proposing that an ongoing $80 million be invested in transportation, and $160 million be invested into tax cuts moving forward.

Chamber awards winners of 2020 holiday window decorating competition

By Reader Staff The Greater Sandpoint Chamber of Commerce is proud to announce the winners of the third annual Holiday Window Decorating Competition. The winners will receive free advertising courtesy of our generous donors, Blue Sky Broadcasting, Like Media and the Sandpoint Reader.

The Window Decorating Competition is held each year beginning the Friday after Thanksgiving until the day before Christmas Eve, and voting is open to the public. There is also a panel of secret judges composed of community members ranging in age and background. The votes are tallied by the chamber staff, who recently presented the winners with their certificates.

The Secret Judges vote winner was Azalea Handpicked Style for its birch tree-inspired paper decorations.

People’s Choice went to Finan McDonald for its twinkly light display.

Outdoor Experience was the Overall Winner for the store’s playful Santain-his-cups window featuring hand-cut snowflakes.

The theme of the 2021 competition will be Silver and Gold, calls for participation will be early November.

“The chamber of commerce wants to thank all the participants and is looking forward to seeing what they come up with for next year,” Said Ricci Witte, chamber staffer. “Thank you also to Keokee Media for designing the voting cards. We couldn’t have done this event without such enthusiastic community involvement.”

Right: Overall winner Outdoor Experience staff member Hobie Hiler, left, and owner Jenny Curto, center, accepting the certificate from Chamber staffer Ricci Witte, right.

Photo by Kate McAlister.

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It’s up to us to support the health district, and each other...

Bouquets: GUEST SUBMISSION: • Bouquets to whoever spent part of their New Year’s Day plowing out the opening of our driveway after the county plow had been by.

I think I may have seen the same tracks in another cleared driveway.

Way to spread kindness!

-Susan Bates-Harbuck.

GUEST SUBMISSION: • I would like to thank Tom Chasse and Schweitzer Mountain Resort for their efforts to mitigate COVID-19 spread. I am thankful that Mr. Chasse is committed to protecting his employees and is willing to take a strong stance when people don’t respect Schweitzer’s safety requirements. Non-compliance with safety requirements is bad enough but to verbally abuse employees when they are enforcing their employer’s policies is repugnant. I am sorry for those who will miss the opportunity for twilight skiing on Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend, but I applaud Mr. Chasse’s commitment to operating the ski area in a safe manner. Thank you.

-Krista Eberle

Barbs: Some fervent supporters of President Donald Trump have attempted to revise history and avoid accountability by claiming the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6 was perpetrated by Antifa, or Black Lives Matter demonstrators in MAGA gear. This is false. After watching hours of footage taken from the incident, as well as noticing that everyone arrested so far has not been Antifa at all, but extremist Trump supporters, I can only conclude that there are some out there who are having trouble grasping reality. The FBI has made it very clear that Antifa was not involved, and that they will vigorously pursue and arrest those who stormed the Capitol.

If we’re going to make this great American experiment last, we’re going to have to start embracing the truth. That means accepting the hard truths, too. Stop deflecting blame and inventing straw men and stand up for your country, not your political party.

No more “whataboutism,” no more false equivalencies. Just stop.

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Dear editor, Deaths from COVID-19 passed 1,500 last Thursday in Idaho. Bonner County has seen three more deaths, bringing the total to 18. Our health district has the highest rate of positivity in the state: almost a quarter of people tested are positive. To control the spread, it needs to be below 5%.

We can control the positivity rate and spread with more help from the government at every level, which will begin possibly this month when President Biden plans to release nearly all available vaccine doses instead of holding second shots back.

Kudos to the Panhandle Health District for taking on this daunting task with good will and aplomb.

In the end, it is we the people who will decide whether or not to exercise our freedom to support the efforts of the health district, and to take care of each other.

Nancy Gerth Sagle

Complicity has consequences…

Dear editor, Congratulations to those congressional GOP senators and representatives that through their silence and complicity have allowed this great nation to become a banana republic. You had your chance to avoid this disaster in February 2020 but no, you chose party over country instead.

One can only wonder just why you all enabled this sociopathic serial liar, conman and charlatan for so long. Was it solely the continuation of power and control? Or, did you convince yourselves that you could limit the actual harm he could do to the country and our institutions?

If it was the former you’re just as delusional as he. If it was the latter, you completely misread the messages he was sending to his followers and the amount of control you had. You may have understood this president didn’t believe what he was preaching at his rallies. What you failed to grasp was that his followers believed every word he uttered because they wanted to believe. He told the people what they wanted to hear.

The failure by the GOP at every level will affect our politics for decades. Senators Cruz and Hawley must resign. Numerous representatives, including Fulcher, must resign. It is needed.

Gil Beyer Sandpoint

Be careful which ‘wolf’ you feed…

Dear editor, An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life: “A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.

“It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil — he has anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority and ego.”

He continued, “The other is good — he has joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith. The same fight is going on inside you — and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

I feel like this wise story rings especially true today with conspiracy theories, vilification and mistrust. I’m optimistic for a new day where we treat each other as Americans and neighbors and drop the labels of conservatives/liberals.

Don Helander Sandpoint

Incitement of violence…

Dear editor, To: Senators Risch and Crapo, and Representatives Fulcher and Simpson, I call upon you to stand up for our nation and support the impeachment, conviction and removal of President Trump from office. His behavior of inciting violence at our nation’s Capitol building, while the electoral vote counting was taking place, must have consequences. A conviction would prevent him from

ever holding any office in the U.S. government in the future. It would also proclaim to our citizens that no president is above the law.

I also urge you to call upon Vice President Pence to initiate the 25th Amendment and immediately remove President Trump from office.

This president can not be trusted to act rationally, especially with his access to the nuclear codes.

As a member of a co-equal branch of government, you must stand against the dictatorial behavior emanating from the president.

By doing so, you could remove some of the stain of silent complicity by too many members of the Republican Party, and you would remove a clear and present danger to our democracy.

Philip A. Deutchman Sandpoint

Jan. 23 Virtual Idaho Womxn’s March will Focus on Young Leaders

By Reader Staff

Young activists, advocates and leaders will take center stage at this year’s Idaho Womxn’s March, where the focus will be on the future generation of leaders in women’s advocacy.

“It’s important to amplify the voices of young people who are playing a crucial role in determining the future of our communities, our democracy and our planet,” said Sam Sandmire, who is helping organize the virtual event.

“Idaho’s first Women’s March was organized by two highschool students, so we’re going back to our roots in focusing on youth.”

The event will be livestreamed on Sat. Jan. 23 at 3:30pm on Facebook Live, Instagram Live and YouTube Live, rather than in person due to COVID-19 safety protocols.

Speakers/performers include: • Fatuma Mnongerwa — former refugee, first-generation

college graduate and coordinator for the New American Voters Campaign; • Petra Hoffman — 15-yearold activist with Extinction Rebellion Boise, Climate Justice League and BABE VOTE; • Ali Rabe — youngest serving Idaho state senator and executive director of Jesse Tree, a Treasure Valley nonprofit dedicated to preventing eviction and homelessness. Graduated from College of Idaho and William and Mary Law School, and served as asylum and refugee officer for the Department of Homeland Security; • Kaya Evans — senior political economy major serving as executive council member and in student government at College of Idaho. Academic adviser, school ambassador and captain of the Women’s Soccer Team; • Keri Steneck — U.S. Army combat veteran, vice chair of Idaho Veterans Wellness Center, VP of Idaho Female Veteran’s Network, former fire investigator and Bureau of Land Management

firefighter, founder of Independent Idaho; • Rosina Machu — former refugee from Ethiopia, firsttime voter, senior leader on Boise High cross-country team and volunteer with BABE VOTE; • Leta Neustader — arts educator, musician, actor, licensed clinical social worker and creator/host of the radio show The Lovely Afro on Radio Boise • Cherie Buckner-Webb — former Idaho state legislator, current College of Southern Idaho board member and Idaho icon.

Only speakers, performers, organizers and media are invited to join the event in person — location TBA. More information will be updated on Facebook @Idahowomxnsmarch2021, Instagram @idaho_womxns_march, YouTube: Idaho Womxn’s March and Twitter-@IDWomxnsMarch.

PERSPECTIVES

More than a few thoughts on America past, present and future

By Sandy Compton Reader Columnist I am ranging through the Great American Trail Series, 10 books edited by A.B. Guthrie, Jr. and published in the 1960s. They each have a different author, including Wallace Stegner (The Gathering of Zion) and Stewart Holbrook (The Boston Post Road). Beginning with prehistory, they are accounts of major routes of exploration, migration, trade and conquest on the North American continent, mostly within what became the United States.

In Westward Vision: The Oregon Trail, long before he writes about Lewis and Clark, author David Lavender posits, “Men can always find ‘evidence’ for believing what they wish to believe.”

Similarly, before the first emigrant wagons left Independence for South Pass and Farewell Bend, he writes, “When nothing is known, anything can be believed.”

Both statements refer to the search for an “easy” way across the continent; which finally came when the Union Pacific was finished in 1869. Railroads sealed the fate of the continent; connecting the coasts and everything in between. Until then, the West was reached by wagon, horseback or shank’s mare; or by sail around the Horn. Either took about the same amount of time, if you arrived at all. Thousands who started did not, but thousands more did. Each passage made the way a bit easier for those who followed.

The sheer size of the continent collided for centuries with the fantasy that there had to be a “practicable way” across. Lewis and Clark finally reached the Pacific, but only by heroically sustained effort. Others had even rougher times of it. It came down to trappers and traders to find routes across a landmass that seemed to grow larger with each exploration.

In their wake came missionaries, and then, thousands of Betsies and Ikes, with their “two yoke of oxen and large yeller dog,” searching for a better life.

Sandy Compton.

Chicanery, savagery and cutthroat competition accompanied Europeans across North America.

French against English against Spanish against Russians against upstart Americans against the fierce natives against the very nature of the place. Everyone fought everyone, even amongst themselves — for trade dominance, territory, furs and buffalo robes; for gold, silver, copper and water; for abolition and for slavery. They fought for the hell of it in trapper rendezvous, mining camps, cow towns and nascent cities like Butte, Lewiston, San Francisco and Denver.

Winners write history, so we have a distorted view of how the U.S. came to be. Our country contains an inordinate number of schools, cities, towns, mountains and rivers named for scoundrels, thieves, murderers and unprincipled politicians. I live in Sanders County, named for Wilbur Sanders, who, though cast as a hero in many Montana histories (his daughter wrote one), might qualify in all categories. Multiple states contain counties named for some of our great men, but honest history finds Lincoln a depressive, Grant an alcoholic, Franklin a philanderer, Jefferson and Washington slave holders, Clark a political finagler, and even the great Lewis eventually a suicide. But they all did great things, crucial to the founding and maintenance of our country.

In the meantime, ordinary men and women broke the prairie

sod, cut down the virgin forests, rushed to grub gold from Last Chance Gulch and the Klondike; built myriad shelters and hopeful towns that are dust and forgotten.

They were neither grander nor less depraved; they were just ordinary folk, some with darker secrets than others. They worked for, railed against, murdered and were murdered by, robbed and were robbed by, fell before, stood up to, preached against, admired and hated the folks things are named for.

We haven’t changed much. But still, we go on.

This brings me to the subject at hand: the riotous debacle in Washington, D.C., last week by Trump loyalists, incited and encouraged by the president himself; aided and abetted by congressional allies. We watched in awe and agony as the drama unfolded, asking ourselves and our neighbors how this was possible in the United States.

Remember Lavender’s words: “Men can always find ‘evidence’ for believing what they wish to believe.” Underlying parts of the attraction of Trump to his followers are myriad conspiracy theories about the “deep state,” which, depending on which versions you wish to believe — and there seem to be many — controls the media, is hidden in the United Nations, has secret military bases in the mountains, is trying to eliminate religion and/or plotting world domination by secret societies based in lofty offices (and cathedrals) worldwide. Trump seems to have been the great hope of believers in such things for breaking the “death grip” of these super-secret groups. In the case of Trump’s supporters so deluded, I recall, “When nothing is known, anything can be believed.”

Trump himself seeks world domination, or as much of it as he can; which seems to be shrinking rapidly. (The rats are leaving his ship of state at historic rates.) His admiration for strongman Russian President Vladimir Putin alone should alarm anybody with any care for democracy, not to mention phone calls to the Georgia election officials; examples of many such

actions taken — illegal, immoral and imperious.

It flummoxes me that self-identified Christians support Trump, especially fundamental Bible believers. Have they studied the Beatitudes? Would Jesus have showed up in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6?

Does the Savior love the AR-15 and all of its works? Do they think Christ would approve of the wall?

“Go ye into all the world,” was Jesus’ charge. He didn’t exclude Mexico. What did Christ say about how to treat your neighbor? And the only thing he had to say about any sexual matter was, “Let him without sin cast the first stone.”

People express shame at our country for the way the Trumpeteers conducted themselves during the election and the assault on the Capitol. My view of that rabble is that they are just that: exhibitionists, racists, conspiracists, science deniers and wild-eyed ultra-conservatives who wouldn’t know the Constitution if it bit ’em in the ass.

We need not be ashamed. If that happened in Russia or China or any number of other countries, the response would have included troops, truncheons, tanks and quite possibly machine guns. The live coverage we suffered would have been cut off and reporters would have faced deadly violence.

We are still living in the best country in the world. Not only do we have the ability and the right to witness our own insanity, but we still have the power to fix what’s wrong with us. We can do so by educating ourselves to the processes of law, and being involved in their making and decisions about how to enforce them. We can’t do so by believing in mythological plots to take over the world.

Those happening in plain sight are enough to keep us busy.

We still suffer from scoundrels, thieves, murderers and unprincipled politicians. And, people will always look for something easy to believe in, especially if it allows them to shed their responsibility to think for themselves; especially if it riles up emotions and shuts out reason. It’s easier than trying to parse out the right thing to do.

Even in that, we can still be wrong. I give you the 18th Amendment as a good example.

But being blindly wrong is inexcusable, and being intentionally misleading is as well. One of our greatest freedoms is the freedom of speech, but alternative “truths” spouted by hate radio and webbased conspiracy theorists are based in fear and blaming others.

Inciting “believers” against others and spreading fear of ambiguous — and nonexistent — enemies is a method used by Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and the Inquisition to assume and hold power and consequently kill many millions who didn’t meet their “standards.”

We will be blessed to be rid of Donald Trump — and we will be next week. What Biden and Harris will be able to accomplish is yet to be seen. But, whatever it is, we citizens need to give them as much fact-based feedback as possible, and that means we need to take on the work and responsibility of staying informed and thinking for ourselves. Let us not assume or mythologize how wide the metaphorical continent of national healing is, because, “When nothing is known, anything can be believed.”

We need to talk and listen to each other now. We may never be able to come to national consensus about certain things, but we need to find the common ground we do have. We also need to tell those who would drive wedges between us for their own enrichment or to flesh out their own delusions to sit down and be quiet. We need to turn them off, tune them out and call them on their B.S. There will always be those who can “find ‘evidence’ for believing what they wish to believe.” We need to be brave enough to ask why they believe what they do. And listen to the answer.

Sandy Compton is a political moderate and a student of American history. His latest book, The Dog With His Head On Sideways, is available at local bookstores and at bluecreekpress.com.

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Mad about Science:

By Brenden Bobby Reader Columnist Have you ever washed your hands and stopped to wonder what makes soap so special?

How does this slippery bar of soap sitting in a tiny puddle of lukewarm water all day make your hands clean? Most things sitting in warm water for extended periods of time are conduits for disease, but not soap!

Soap does a phenomenal job at destroying bacteria and other microbial life on contact, but it won’t keep that surface sanitary forever. Once the soap is gone, bacteria is free to move back in.

Soap performs this destructive action on bacteria by breaking down or disrupting the lipid bilayer of cells it contacts — this bilayer is essentially the “skin” that keeps everything inside of a cell in place. When soap and water wash over the cells they contact, it’s like the Kool-aid man bursting through the wall of the cell, which is awesome for us, but not so awesome for the cell as its innards are scattered all over the place and it is effectively destroyed.

If soap is so destructive for cells, why doesn’t it harm our skin cells?

Put simply: It does. We also have an incalculably large number of skin cells that are constantly regenerating — far too many to severely damage with soap unless you spend hours upon hours lathering every day. The outermost layer of your skin, the epidermis, will actually completely die and regenerate over the course of about 27 days. In actuality, there is a layer of bacteria all 10 /

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soap

over your skin at all times.

Washing yourself with soap will actively clear this layer of bacteria before the soap will deal any serious damage to your skin. If the thought of having a microscopic ecosystem crawling all over you makes you feel the need to douse your whole body in hand sanitizer, don’t worry: It’s perfectly natural to be covered in all manner of microbial life. It’s everywhere, especially on your skin.

That being said, what is soap made of? It’s not a naturally occurring mineral like salt, and we don’t have whole fields of soap plants ready to sprout.

Soap is made by mixing three substances: fats, oils and alkalis. Fats and oils come in many different forms, from butchering animals to coconuts, avocados, and other fatty fruits and vegetables. Vegetable oil is frequently used in soapmaking because of the low cost associated with obtaining it as opposed to something like pig fat, which requires a substantial investment of time and food to develop and is considerably messier when factoring in butchering the animal, as opposed to harvesting vegetables and extracting their oils.

Alkalis come in a number of different forms, but one of the most common forms used throughout human history is wood ash. There is a historical record of people using wood ash to make soap as far back in time as 2800 BCE, in ancient Babylon. Wood ash was frequently used, perhaps accidentally, throughout the Middle Ages as well. Medieval workers would tend to fires, covering their hands in ash and

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soot. The workers would then go to wash their hands in water, which would cause a reaction between the ash and the oils naturally present on their hands that would create a basic soap that would solubilize the gunk on their hands, allowing the water to wash it away.

As simple as this sounds, washing everything with wood ash is wildly impractical. Creating huge volumes of soap in the ages preceding the Industrial Revolution was a laborious and costly task — one of the many reasons that hygiene throughout most of human history has never been viewed as a crowning accomplishment by our species.

Because of these costs associated with the production of soap, soap was generally not used to wash oneself, but instead to clean things like cookware and occasionally clothing. It doesn’t take a professor of microbiology to understand that if you didn’t clean your cooking pot between uses, eventually you’d start getting sick — even people with no understanding of microbiology understood this to varying degrees throughout history.

We are fortunate enough to live in a time where mass-production of sanitary products like soap is commonplace and inexpensive, especially as the role of soap has rapidly evolved in the past 150 years.

Industrial degreasers act like hand soap on steroids, emulsifying heavier oils derived from petroleum fossil fuels, and allowing for water to break them up and wash them away without seriously harming us in the process. The compounds responsible for this reaction

are called surfactants. Surfactants in dish soap are one of the reasons that people will tell you never to use dish soap on a cast iron pan, as the dish soap is designed to break the surface tension between the water and the oil, allowing the water to wash away the oil. This isn’t completely accurate when talking about the seasoning on your cast iron cookware, though, as the frequent oiling

and heating of the cast iron creates a layer of polymer that isn’t broken up and carried away by dish soap. Your pan will be damaged if you allow it to soak for extended periods of time, regardless of whether or not you use soap on it.

Water: It’s the most powerful and destructive force on planet Earth.

Stay curious, 7B.

Random Corner Don’t know much about riots?

• During the London riots of 2011, looting and vandalism, which took place throughout the city, was almost totally spared of bookshops.

One man said his store would probably stay open during the unrest, stating: “If they steal some books, they might actually learn something.”

• During the 1980 New Mexico prison riot, prisoners in protective custody waited for five hours, while prison gangs cut their way into the cell block with blow torches and then tortured and killed them. They could have escaped through a rear door, but the guards refused to open it.

• The first “mooning” in recorded history happened in 66 ADE, where a Roman soldier mooned and farted at the Jewish pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem. This caused a riot, an over-response by the Roman military and the death of thousands.

• In 1355 in Oxford, England a dispute between two students from Oxford University and a pub landlord over the quality of their pints resulted in a two-day riot, which left

We can help!

63 scholars and 30 locals dead. The dispute was eventually settled in favor of the university, when a special charter was created. Annually thereafter, on Feb. 10, the mayor and councilors had to march bareheaded through the streets and pay to the university a fine of one penny for every scholar killed. The penance ended 470 years later, in 1825 when the mayor refused to take part.

• In 1922, people rioted over whether it was OK to wear a straw hat past the “socially acceptable” date of Sept. 15 in New York. The riot lasted eight days and led to multiple arrests.

• Tulsa, Okla., used to have a “Black Wall Street” that was once the most economically prosperous Black community in America. The community’s wealth was greater than that of surrounding white neighborhoods and was destroyed by envious whites on June 1, 1921 in just 12 hours during a race riot.

The incident started and snowballed after a black man accidentally stepped on the foot of a white woman.

COMMUNITY

Road reflections

Winter 2021: potholes and speed, mailboxes and garbage cans

By Steve Klatt Reader Contributor Once again, the Bonner County Road Department is confronting a peculiar phenomenon — we are having some unusual winter weather. I hope that observation did not knock the wind out of you, much as the potholes on our county roads are likely to do. Especially if you are one of the many drivers driving too fast on our gravel roads and compounding the very problem they are calling our office to complain about.

A brief explanation on the structural challenges of gravel road maintenance we are facing: The roads were frozen and snow-covered on New Year’s Eve; and, after four days of rain, were only partially thawed on the surface. People were then driving over muddy spots in an otherwise rockhard road and creating potholes wherever any thawing had occurred.

There seems to be absolutely no recognition among a large portion of our local drivers that excessive speed on gravel roads guarantees the failure of existing road surfaces and any repairs we may try to accomplish. Folks, if you are driv-

ing gravel roads this time of year, you can choose to slow down or the potholes you create will slow you down eventually.

A couple of other things to keep in mind when the snow does return to Bonner County this winter are: 1. If you can wiggle your mailbox on its post and frame, the weight of the snow wave we create as we plow will almost certainly knock your mailbox into the ditch; 2. Garbage cans cannot be placed in the plowed road surface for pickup. I have told our drivers they do not have to alter their plow routes to get around a garbage can in the road, they only have to slow down for the can. These cans will also end up in the ditch if they are in the plowed county roads.

Folks, we are trying to keep our roads safely maintained and in drivable condition under some trying conditions, but please keep in mind, these are your roads, too, and we all need your cooperation.

Steve Klatt is the director of the Bonner County Road and Bridge Department.

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FEATURE

At the top of the hill

Remembering good times at Pine Street Sledding Hill, now closed to the public

By Ben Olson Reader Staff When the owners of the property known locally as “The Pine Street Sledding Hill” announced it would no longer be open to the public, many longtime locals acknowledged it was the end of an era in Sandpoint.

Sandpoint has been known as a “ski town” for generations, with Schweitzer Mountain Resort providing some of the best alpine adventures for skiers and snowboarders. What many don’t realize is the birth of this winter sport didn’t begin on the mountain, but closer to town on this small hill located on Pine Street.

The open glade of terrain has a storied history in Sandpoint.

Ross Hall, the famed photographer who documented so much of Sandpoint’s early history, snapped several photos from the hill years before Schweitzer existed. The photos show smiling locals with enormous wooden skis strapped to their feet, bracing up for courage before barreling down the hill.

The hill has held a place in Sandpoint’s past as far back as the 1920s, when the Northern Idaho News ran a story about local D.J. McInaney and three friends who wanted to prove the pulling power of their new 1929 Ford Tudor sedan by climbing up the hill.

“From a standing start at the foot of the hill … it made the hill in second gear,” the news article read. “Several cars have attempted to climb this hill in second gear but few have made it.”

In 1949, the Sandpoint News Bulletin advertised that “ski enthusiasts” were meeting to plan for further development of the “Pine Street ski run,” which it described as “the focal point for local skiers during the holiday period.”

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At one point there was even a tow rope installed at the hill, ferrying skiers up to the top thanks to the local Roundtop Ski Club, installed and operated by Thad Lowary. Discussions were also in the works to install lights on the run to provide nighttime skiing, but those plans never came to fruition.

“The hill offers a good variety of skiing,” the article continued. “It has been made more accessible by the cooperation of Ralph Samson, University of Idaho experiment farm superintendent, who took a tractor with a bulldozer blade and made a good parking place for a fair sized number of cars.”

Gary Weisz, whose parents Joe and Lois purchased the 20acre parcel in 1964 from friend and neighbor Anna Roe, said the decision to close off the sledding hill did not come lightly.

“It brought tears to my eyes to close the Pine Street Sledding Hill down,” Weisz wrote to the Reader. “So much heartfelt regret in doing so, but I guess it is just the end of an era and another part of Bonner County history that silently slips through our fingers.”

Weisz said he and his family have always been “very community minded and shared the property without hesitation for many years.”

The decision to close comes out of “liability issues to consider in this ever-changing world,” Weisz said, but pointed to the fact that his parents offered and sold the top 160 acres, which includes the large meadow and surrounding timber land to Kaniksu Land Trust to help establish the Pine Street Woods.

“That is something we are proud of, something for future generations to enjoy to the fullest,” he said.

The family had mulled closing the hill for the past year after

Weisz’s parents became disabled and their health began to decline.

“The liability issue was definitely the main determining factor, although we had no instances that I am aware of that resulted in serious injuries,” he said. “I have nothing but praise for all those who chose to frequent our property. I cannot think of a single instance where

trash was a problem — the adults who were present took it upon themselves to safeguard the youngsters and remove any little that might have been left behind by the younger folks.

I could have never asked for a more responsible and thoughtful group of individuals.”

Over the years, the Weisz family always made it available

Two local Sandpointian skiers of the past stand atop the Pine St. hill, circa 1943. Photo used by permission from the Ross Hall Collection. for locals to use free in winter months, never collecting any user fees.

“We have never had any issues with the wonderful people

< see SLEDDING, page 13 >

< SLEDDING, con’t from page 12 >

who would bring their children and grandchildren for a day’s sledding,” he said. “Everyone was so friendly and courteous. … We never advertised the sledding hill, but did encourage folks to invite their friends and even allowed family pets to accompany them.”

Weisz said he remembers skiers using the hill in the past, and also remembers the tow rope installed at the hill.

“Steel automobile wheels used to suspend and guide the rope for the rope tow [that was] hung from trees and poles to the top of the ski hill,” Weisz said. “A number of those wheels still remain on the ground in different locations on the west side of the cleared hillside at the location of the old rope tow.”

Weisz said he recalls folks using the hill as far back as he can remember — for more than 50 years — and noticed it became quite popular after he moved his mobile home to the base of the hill about 20 years ago.

“Throughout the last 20-odd years I have kept a path cleared to the base of the hill for easy access and allowed free parking in my driveway for sledding en-

thusiasts,” he said. “This led me to plowing a large parking area to accommodate the increasing number of vehicles that would arrive.”

After moving to the base of the hill, Weisz said he established a policy whereby anyone could sled during daylight hours without asking permission: “It was always about making your family and friends feel welcome and at home during your visit.”

Weisz said his years are filled with fond memories of the ski hill. He said more than 200 people were there on New Year’s Day 2019, sledding until dark. He also remembers a time when some young folks arrived after dark and set up some lights.

“They set up floodlights on the hill and built a snow ramp,” he recalled.

“One fellow on a snowboard would come shooting down the hill, hit the ramp and turn somersaults in midair while another fellow filmed the whole thing with what appeared to be a small movie camera mounted on a tripod. I was very impressed with such outstanding ability.

Young people are so awesome and the future is in good hands as far as I am

A photo of the Pine St. hill from below in 1943, as skiers barrel down the slope. On the photo, a handwritten note reads: “The Pine Street Hill, granddaddy of successful skiing slopes at Sandpoint, Idaho in the forties and early fifties. Rates were 10¢ for use of the hill, any age and an additional 25¢ juniors and 50¢ seniors for use of the cable lift.”

Photo used by permission from the Ross Hall Collection. concerned!”

Weisz said he hopes the community understands the decision to close the hill and said he is honored to have had the property be so celebrated in Sandpoint’s history.

“I have such fond memories of past winter seasons that brought such joy to my life and not seeing all the children and smiling adults is like losing part of my extended family,” Weisz said. “I hope everyone understands and holds no hard feelings towards us and all I can say is that I love them all and appreciate having had the opportunity to share a little joy and a little kindness with our Bonner County neighbors. God bless them all.”

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ARTS & CULTURE

A mom on a mission

By Lyndsie Kiebert Reader Staff Jessica Rachels is no stranger to educating people on the lasting effects of a virus — in her case, cytomegalovirus, which she contracted while pregnant with now nearly 15-year-old daughter Natalie, who was born with cerebral palsy and other disabilities due to CMV. Rachels believes she contracted CMV while working in child care, but her doctor never made her aware of the risks associated with working with kids — the primary spreader of the virus — while pregnant. To help keep future Idaho mothers from experiencing the same difficulties, Rachels worked with the Idaho Legislature, Idaho Department of Health and Welfare and the Idaho Council on Developmental Disabilities in 2017 to pass a bill allocating funds for more CMV awareness materials to be distributed to pregnant women across the state.

The latest project on Rachels’ advocacy journey is a children’s

book titled Natalie Bug: My Life With Cytomegalovirus — written by Rachels from Natalie’s perspective, and illustrated by her other daughter, 13-yearold Makala. Rachels said the book has been two years in the making.

“There are some books out there and those are from the parents’ point of view,” she said, “but I thought this would be a unique way to look at life with this virus from the child’s point of view.”

Natalie is nonverbal, but expressive in her own way. Rachels said that by giving Natalie a voice, she hoped to create a greater connection with the reader. Rachels said “it wasn’t too difficult” to empathize and channel her daughter’s experiences into written words.

“Especially with children, they would connect more reading this through Natalie’s voice, hearing it through her voice — seeing what her life is like through her eyes,” she said.

Natalie Bug, titled after the Rachels family’s affectionate

nickname for Natalie, features Makala’s vibrant paintings alongside commentary from Natalie’s perspective about her lifestyle, the effects of CMV and what people can do to both avoid the virus and make those with lasting disabilities feel respected and loved.

“Some people — kids, even adults — will see someone in a wheelchair with disabilities and they kind of ignore them or don’t know how to interact,” she said. “[The book] touches on that, [saying], ‘We may not say hi, but a smile means a lot to us.’”

Local mother authors children’s book about her disabled daughter to further CMV awareness

Aside from making expectant mothers aware of CMV, bringing attention to how people view and treat those with disabilities is a huge part of Rachels’ advocacy work.

“It’s something that definitely needs to be addressed — that they’re people, too,” she said.

“They’re different, they have different abilities, [but] versus focusing on the disability, they just have different abilities.”

Rachels will donate a dollar from every book sale to the National CMV Foundation.

“God took us down this other

Left: Author Jessica Rachels and her daughter, Natalie. Courtesy photo. Right: The cover of Rachels’ book, Natalie Bug: My Life With Cytomegalovirus.

path for a reason,” she said, “and Natalie has inspired us to advocate for her and others.”

Find Natalie Bug: My Life With Cytomegalovirus at Vanderford’s Books and Office Products, The Corner Bookstore, Sandpoint Superdrug and on Amazon. To learn more about CMV, visit idahocmv.com.

What would Martin Luther King say?

Reflections on the freedom struggle in 2021

By Brenda Hammond Special to the Reader What if Martin Luther King was here today — and asked to appear on one of the day-long news channels to comment on the events of Jan. 6?

I suspect he might comment on the reaction of police to the mob that stormed the Capitol Building, and compare it to the way law enforcement has countered Black Lives Matter protests in cities all over our nation.

He might make mention of the number of symbols of hate and white supremacy visible on the clothing of the Capitol protesters.

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He might compare their armed, angry presence and violent threats with the prayerful and peaceful marches he helped to lead during the Civil Rights Movement.

As the radio broadcasts news about the search for so many of the Jan. 6 protesters who have been absorbed back into the populace, he might well recall the hundreds of students who were arrested in 1960 for peacefully occupying seats at lunch counters in “five and dime stores.” He might mention the freedom riders, who faced violent opposition for challenging racially segregated seating on buses. One bus was bombed and burned in Alabama.

A white mob beat the riders when

they arrived in Birmingham, then the same freedom riders were arrested in Mississippi and spent two months in the penitentiary.

What would Martin Luther King say about news footage that showed a policeman taking a “selfie” with one of the Capitol protesters? Or when it showed congressmen and women putting up barricades and arming themselves with pens and broken furniture as the mob tried to beat down their doors. Where were the fire hoses and the dogs that were brought out in the ’60s when little Black children tried to enter their schools?

Martin Luther King sat in the Birmingham jail for his part in

organizing peaceful protests. What would he say about a president of the United States sitting in the White House after he emboldened the protestors on Jan. 6 and incited their attack on this nation’s Capitol?

I wonder — would he still be able to say, “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed.” Or, “It is time for all people of conscience to call upon America to return to her true home of brotherhood and peaceful pursuits.”

He said those words in 1963.

What would he say about where we are now?

We also wonder what you

are thinking about the events of Jan. 6. We, as the BCHRTF feel the need to commit ourselves to reflecting on the racism that exists both around us, and within us — and continuing down the road opened up by Martin Luther King, John Lewis and other courageous “freedom fighters” until the dream of equity, inclusion and mutual respect can become a reality in this great nation.

We will be providing some resources on our website to further that reflection. If you’re interested, visit bchrtf.org.

Brenda Hammond is president of the Bonner County Human Rights Task Force.

LITERATURE

This open Window

Vol. 6 No.1 poetry and prose by local writers edited by Jim mitsui

Some comments from the editor of This Open Window: I am in need of submissions from you all, especially those of you who have never sent me your work, poetry or short prose — especially personal memoirs. Now as we endure the changes that COVID-19 has imposed on us it is an opportune time to do some personal writing. Please attach a brief biographical piece. Thanks, – James Masao Mitsui.

sandpoint imbiber A catered police interceptor From last week, Someone Asking about The next train out of Town.

At the bottle shop Illustrious beers Release us from this Lake of myth And from the Mountain’s pull.

Our desires are lined Up At the darkened bar As the talk-over Band takes the stage Night falls early And stays late, asks Us what we really Want and gives Us time To figure it out.

One more Drink before Bogart prowls the Fog. Fog means nothing to Me. Just fog is all.

You could think Straight before the Brewery.

Then sidewalks softened And music spilled on The street.

Banjo seeped thru Windows and American jazz oozed Under doors.

On the idaho edge of the coronavirus — May 25, 2020 I started an online meditation course a few days ago Each day a petite lecture is given along with a specific mantra and a task regarding abundance

In the Beer garden, The fire pit spits Orange embers. Radiant drinkers Huddle for warmth While out on the Avenue, consequence Leans against the Lamppost Menace simmers at The whisky bar A bouncer guards Against the boil.

No matter.

You’re the Sandpoint imbiber With glass half Empty and Imagination run Amok

Candy coated tap Handles spiral Off to autumn mist.

Colors blur and Pulse We’re blending into Cedar street.

We’re blending with The night The evening is a Precipice, The evening is a Dance.

– Guy Lothian

Guy majored in English at the University of Southern Illinois before going on the earn an MBA at DePaul University. He spent thirty years in the financial services industry before retiring to Sandpoint. During the winter you can find him on the slopes of Schweitzer and in the summer he spends his time fly fishing.

I’m not wishing for money necessarily, but I’m curious to recognize what true abundance is Last night I dreamt I was with an old friend

Send poems to: jim3wells@aol.com

from New York a fellow singer She was surrounded by people whom I didn’t know

May we never again see slave ships rotting with the stench of months of excrement and death.

No more lines of people chained and shackled, driven by others with whips and guns — robbed of their loved ones, even their names, stolen from their homes, traded for fabric, trinkets and rum — sold and branded for the value of their labor.

Worst of all — robbed of their freedom, their love, their dreams — robbed of their humanity.

brightness of their mind, the depth of their soul — no matter their skin color, the language they speak — no matter who they love — the politics they choose, or how their view of the world may differ from our own.

May we learn to love, instead of fear, our differences.

May we never again see pogroms, families driven from their homes, snatched from their beds at night — no more people identified by tattooed numbers and yellow stars. No more railroad cars packed like cattle, driven to camps, to ovens — to death.

Smoke rising above fields left unplanted because of the smell of burning flesh.

Please God that we may find the common bonds we share with all humanity — the love of family, of sunshine, of good food!

She was asking them for money I said I’d be happy to let her have 30 dollars She laughed and asked if I couldn’t deposit 500 in her Venmo account I was shocked, I thought she had learned her lesson about debt years ago I must have reacted poorly for she collapsed on the floor with her eyes closed and one of her friends gestured shh I said such a sum would have to be discussed with my husband That’s when she sighed — My friend named Hope, sighed — Amy Craven Amy is a welcome transplant to Sandpoint from the East Coast. She is a talented writer with a background in music. What I find appealing in her poetry is her humanity as well as the range of subjects that she chooses to write about — poems that speak to all of us.

this is my dream

No more limp bodies hanging from trees, no more hunting people with hounds and guns through swampy nights.

No more angry crowds shouting at little girls in starched dresses, carrying books to school. No more fire hoses and lunging dogs.

No more internment camps casting long shadows of shame and fear. No more bombs.

No more deals in the dark for other people’s bodies.

No man should ever own another, or steal from them their future.

We must honor the spark in each person’s eyes, the

We are all sovereign beings, roaming this earth in search of our better selves.

May we — never again! — assume superiority in order to strip another human being of their dignity and their right to walk on this earth without fearing others’ assumptions about who they are.

May we all be free to walk with heads up, faces tipped to the sun, hands outstretched to other hands.

— Brenda Hammond, Sept. 30, 2017 Brenda is the director of the Bonner County Human Rights Commission. Her words speak for her — and we should listen.

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events January 14-21, 2021

THURSDAY, January 14

Live Music w/ Maya Goldbloom & Alex Cope Live Trivia!

6:30-8:30pm @ The Back Door 5:30-7:30pm @ Pend d’Oreille Winery Wine specials and prizes as well

FriDAY, January 15

Live Music w/ Kevin Dorin 7:30-9:30pm @ The Back Door

Live Music w/ Berx Records Duo 5-8pm @ Pend d’Oreille Winery Family friendly acoustic music

SATURDAY, January 16 Live Music w/ Bright Moments Jazz 7:30-9:30pm @ The Back Door

Suzuki String Academy Open House 11am-1pm @ 102 S. Euclid, Suite #106 Try a stringed instrument, check out the instrument petting zoo, and learn more about the Suzuki philosophy and method

Live Music w/ Berx Sara Brown 5-8pm @ Pend d’Oreille Winery Montana-based vocalist

SunDAY, January 17

Sandpoint Chess Club 9am @ Evans Brothers Coffee Meets every Sunday at 9am

Live Music w/ Peter Lucht 3-5pm @ Pend d’Oreille Winery A local favorite pianist

monDAY, January 18

Outdoor Experience Monday Night Group Run – All levels welcome 6pm @ Outdoor Experience Lifetree Cafe • 2pm @ Jalapeño’s Restaurant “Will we ever live in a colorblind world?”

Monday Night Blues Jam w/ Truck Mills 7pm @ Eichardt’s Pub

tuesDAY, January 19

Paint and Sip with Lisa Maus • 5:30pm @ Pend d’Oreille Winery Create a wintery scene painted on canvas. $35/person, includes supplies, instruction and a glass of house red or white wine. 208-263-8545 for more info. POWine.com

wednesDAY, January 20 ThursDAY, January 21

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COMMUNITY HUD designates Sandpoint Resource Center as ‘EnVision Center’ Feds move to enhance services available to vulnerable residents in Bonner, Boundary counties

By Reader Staff On behalf of U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, HUD Northwest Regional Administrator Jeff McMorris announced that the newly-opened Sandpoint Community Resource Center has been designated as a HUD EnVision Center, serving residents of Bonner and Boundary counties in Idaho.

Since Carson launched the EnVision Center initiative in 2018, HUD has designated about 90 EnVision Centers across the country, including the one operated by St. Vincent de Paul of North Idaho in Coeur d’Alene.

Just as supermarkets offer “onestop” shopping to consumers, HUD EnVision Centers serve as “one stop” service hubs for individuals and households who need a range of social, health, educational and other services that can help them become self-sufficient. With a demonstrated record of actively partnering with many providers in North Idaho, including Community Action Partners, Panhandle Health, The Salvation Army, Helping Hands and Helping Hearts, Idahope Families, Bonner County Housing Agency, NAMI Far North, local food banks, local schools, and numerous county and state agencies, McMorris noted in the letter of designation, the Sandpoint Community Resource Center “aligns with the EnVision Center demonstration’s goal of empowering households towards self-sufficiency.”

While no HUD funding is directly tied to designation as an EnVision Center, HUD’s role is to establish and enhance the links EnVision centers have with other federal and state agencies that can help centers better

serve their communities. In its application to become an EnVision Center, the Sandpoint Community Resource Center identified four “gaps” it believes HUD’s assistance in expanding existing and establishing new partnerships could help the center address: transportation, permanent and transitional housing, emergency mental health and substance use disorder services and food instability.

“This is a great day for residents of Bonner and Boundary counties and a great day for HUD,” McMorris stated in a news release, “that we hope will open doors to new services and resources for the Sandpoint Community Resource Center to serve North Idaho’s most vulnerable citizens.

“When Secretary Carson first launched HUD’s EnVision Center initiative some two years ago,” McMorris added, “he saw them as offering a holistic approach to advancing the four pillars of self-sufficiency, economic empowerment, educational advancement, health and wellness, and character and leadership. In both its philosophy and its practices, the Sandpoint Community Resource Center fully embraces the same approach.”

“We are honored that SCRC has received this designation,” said Linnis Jellinek, the center’s executive director. “Our community is enthusiastic about a ‘onestop hub’ for resources and services. The EnVision Center will not only serve as a safety net for many, but it will be a place of hope as we empower households to achieve self-sufficiency. Economic empowerment is a pillar of the EnVision Center concept and we believe that sustainable self-sufficiency is the foundation for success.”

SASi names new E.D.

Coldwell has served as receptionist, executive assistant and grant writer since May, and will take over The board of the from Interim Executive Director Sandpoint Area Senior Alice Wallace, who guided the Center recently announced Senior Center through a very difficult the appointment of Cherie time. Coldwell is currently SASi’s Coldwell as executive grant writer/executive assistant and, director effective Feb. 1. according to the organization, her exColdwell is an Air perience has brought in much-needed Courtesy photo. funding.

Force veteran who served 10 years on active duty as a medical techMeanwhile, Coldwell has been working nician. After exiting the Air Force, she closely with Wallace and Meal Program went on to work as a pediatric nurse before Coordinator Mary McGinnis to understand switching careers. Coldwell then became the SASi processes and commitments to the program director for the after-school proSandpoint senior community. gram at Priest River Lamanna High School, “Cherie Coldwell has fostered great where she organized educational and inspirelationships with our clients, and will be rational activities for her students as well as a worthy successor to Alice,” SASi wrote writing grants for the program. At the end in a statement. “We’re all looking forward of her tenure there, Sandpoint Area Seniors to continued success in 2021. We welcome reached out to see if she would be interested Cherie, and look forward to her tenure.” in becoming the grant writer for SASi.

By Reader Staff

FEATURE

The most fun you’ll have in a parking lot Schweitzer’s Gateway Grub slope-side food trucks offer food,camaraderie and a unique après ski experience

By Ben Olson Reader Staff

As a born-and-raised Sandpointian, I’m always on the lookout for the next big “locals’ hangout” to remind me what this place is all about. I think I may have found it in the most unlikely of places: a parking lot on top of a mountain.

It’s been a good season at Schweitzer Mountain Resort so far, with some decent dumps of snow and even a couple of bluebird powder days. What’s made this season even better is a new scene that has developed at the Gateway parking lot at Schweitzer, where I’ve run into so many locals enjoying après ski beverages and responsibly distanced socialization.

In the past, the Gateway lot at Schweitzer — the lower of the upper lots with access directly to the Musical Chairs run — has been used as a spillover lot where RVs have parked. It was one of the only “ski-up” RV parks in North Idaho, actually.

But this year, due to COVID-19 restrictions causing more people to drive up to the mountain, Schweitzer decided to do a little switcheroo, moving the RV lot over to the fire station lot and utilizing Gateway for a new purpose: food and fun.

Now, a trio of food trucks dominate the north side of the lot, where skiers can literally ski up and order a meal. Whether it was the addition of food trucks, or the lack of socialization from COVID-19, somehow this humble little parking lot has become a locals’ hot spot. Hatchbacks are opened, lawn chairs set up six feet apart, some even huddling around portable fire pits. Groups of locals share tall boys with one another to discuss their day on the mountain, steam still rising from their bare heads after removing their helmets. Kids play in the snowbanks, sliding down on their bums and tossing snowballs at one another. It’s a great way to end the day on the mountain.

Of course, it’s not the first time that people have tailgated after an awesome ski

day, but there’s something a little more local to this experience that makes my heart feel good when trudging to the car after the last run.

“People have always used Gateway as convenient parking in the past, but we really encouraged that even more this winter in response to COVID,” Schweitzer Marketing Manager Dig Chrismer told the Reader. “It’s been so fun seeing people get creative about their après ski experience.

Being outside and enjoying the mountain is key for all of us right now, and après (or lunch) is a big part of that, too.”

With three different options to choose from, lunch is now a highlight of the ski day. Skiers can choose from Jupiter Jane’s Traveling Cafe, The Burger Dock or Felkers Northern Smoke BBQ. Jupiter Jane’s features an eclectic menu with ingredients that bring little to no guilt.

Think of it as health-conscious comfort food, with a speciality on Mexican items like tacos and wraps, but also including a diverse selection of sandwiches. There’s always a daily special, too.

Aside from hot food, Jupiter Jane’s also offers convenient grab-and-go items like hot and cold drinks, baked goods, yogurt and granola, cereal and more.

Jupiter Jane’s owner Laurali CalvertPeitz said her time serving food at the mountain this year “has been a fun new experience. I’m super excited to be there. I see a lot more people at the lot tailgating.”

Calvert-Peitz said her hottest selling items are “definitely my famous tacos.”

Local’s tip: Ask for the JJ’s Rockin’ Tacos in burrito form. It’s not on the menu, but Calvert-Peitz is always happy to make it happen. It’s the best burrito in Sandpoint, especially when you’re still wearing your snowboarding boots. The breakfast tacos and fish tacos are also divine.

Burger Dock goes back to its roots as the Old Tin Can food truck for its Schweitzer service, offering mouth-watering burgers loaded with crispy lettuce, juicy

tomatoes and coma-inducing cheese with a bag of chips on the side. The food truck menu is slightly reduced from the storefront’s options, offering favorites like The Old Tin Can burger, along with the popper burger, veggie burger, the sticky burger with peanut butter and grilled cheese for the kiddos. All burgers come with a bag of chips on the side.

Owner Savannah Clark said customers have loved the addition of food trucks at Schweitzer, but the cold alpine conditions have created their own difficulties.

“It’s a lot harder to operate out of a trailer with conditions on the mountain,” Clark told the Reader. “With propane freezing and snow removal, we’re definitely experiencing all the elements.”

Clark said the future of the lot will hopefully include beer and live music, but COVID-19 restrictions have put that on hold for Schweitzer.

“I do see this in the future becoming more trendy with music and drinks,” she said. “With COVID, that makes gathering a bit harder. But there’s a lot of potential for being a bigger tailgating crowd.”

Chrismer said currently there is no plan to add beer sales to the food trucks.

“You can purchase beers to go from any Schweitzer F&B [food and beverage] outlet and enjoy them down in the lot,” she said. “Gourmandie actually has a nice little selection to choose from.”

Local’s tip: Burger Dock is quite popular at the Gateway lot, so don’t be afraid to make your order and then stow your gear in the car. The timing usually works out that you can drop the gear at the car and return to the food trucks to pick up your burger right after it comes off the grill. We recommend their classic Old Tin Can burger, which is among the best in North Idaho.

Felkers Northern Smoke BBQ rounds out the choices with some of the greatest down-home barbecue fixings this side of the Mississippi. Expect all your favorites: pulled pork, homemade chicken and dump-

Schweitzer’s food trucks (from left to right): Jupiter Jane’s, The Burger Dock and Felker’s Northern Smoke BBQ. Photos by Ben Olson. lings, ribs and side dishes to warm up that cold belly.

Morgan MacKaben — who co-owns and operates Felkers with her husband, Scott — said that while “it’s been a bit of a slow start to the Gateway Grub adventure,” she acknowledges that with any new venture there comes an opportunity to increase their following.

“We are grateful for the opportunity for new and creative avenues to introduce people to our family recipes, and are hopeful that the Gateway Grub slope-side food trucks will gain momentum as the season progresses,” MacKaben said. “We are excited to be along for the journey and hope that Felkers will be a part of the new traditions for skiers at Schweitzer, hometown folks and visitors to our area.

Local’s tip: Some fan favorites include the baked potato piled with pulled pork, homemade chicken and dumplings and brisket mac and cheese. MacKaben said the brisket has been so popular that Felkers is going to start offering brisket at its Ponderay location every day. Speaking from experience, this is a wise move.

Whether enjoying fare from one of the three aforementioned food trucks or munching on a PBJ on your tailgate, the Gateway lot is definitely the coolest place to end the ski day at Schweitzer — especially when the sun is out and the view overlooking Lake Pend Oreille seems taken out of a picture book. Just be sure to show up early, as this lot fills quickly on busy days.

“Our [skiers] are creating their own little slice of Heaven and enjoying the proximity to the lifts,” Chrismer said. “The whole vibe is a little retro in a sense — back to the basics of what skiing is, really.

Play outside all day, then hang with your bubble over a drink and snacks talking about the day. Can’t beat it.”

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GAMING

The Last of Us Part II and the dimensions of hatred How one of 2020’s best games — and works of art — explores moral ambiguity

By Cameron Rasmusson Reader Contributor

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Hate is a hell of a thing.

It’s a destructive force, one that hurts the hater even as it does the hated. To paraphrase Prince Ashitaka in Princess Mononoke, it eats a person alive and can be fatal if left untreated.

That raises the question: If hatred is so universally destructive, what does it take to excise it?

The Last of Us Part II is a post-apocalyptic survival game that takes that question seriously. To its credit, it avoids simple answers and banal truisms. Instead, it portrays hatred as a morass. Once you’re in it, there’s no easy way to escape it.

It doesn’t take long for that theme to strike home in TLOU2. Ellie, the muchloved co-protagonist of The Last of Us, is living happily in the Jackson, Colo., settlement following the events of the first game.

Her life is something close to normal, routine zombie-slaying patrols notwithstanding. She has friends, a crush on the girl next door and is a part of a community, though an unspecified tension lingers between her and Joel, the first game’s other protagonist.

Then some visitors come to Jackson. And they burn that peaceful life to the ground.

Be warned of SPOILERS for The Last of Us ahead: The first game ends with Joel successfully delivering Ellie, by now his surrogate daughter, to the Fireflies militia group, as he was hired to do. The Fireflies believe they can use Ellie’s natural immunity to develop a cure for the zombie outbreak triggered by the cordyceps fungus. But when Joel learns that the Fireflies must kill Ellie to potentially save millions, he murders them and whisks her back to the Jackson settlement.

Give TLOU2’s writers credit. They understand the moral ambiguity of the characters they’ve created. And they knew that failing to reckon seriously with Joel’s climactic decision would be dramatic malpractice. Instead of brushing it aside, it forms the backbone of the sequel’s plot.

It’s easy to become invested in Ellie’s quest for revenge. We’ve already spent a whole game developing an empathy for her and her plight. But what makes The Last of Us: Part II truly special is the bold choice to turn our empathy against us halfway through the game.

I’ll never forget the night I experienced TLOU2’s startling structural 180. At first, I was angry and annoyed. Then slowly, I grew to appreciate, even admire, the creative team’s intentions. / January 14, 2021

Courtesy image from The Last of Us Part II. The gameplay does a serviceable job supporting its dark themes. A refinement of its predecessor’s formula, it retains the beautifully balanced survival mechanics, where careful players are rewarded for efficient resource use. The combat, meanwhile, is remarkably more fluid. Encounters are far more expansive, and each weapon in the arsenal is an irreplaceable tool to complete them. Weaving in and out of stealth gives the player an edge, but differing enemy types prevent an over-reliance on a single tactical approach.

Tying it all together are enemies with clever AI, who mourn their murdered companions and die gruesome, brutal deaths.

The game goes out of its way to humanize its cannon fodder, which would have landed as trite window dressing if not for that dramatic narrative shift.

It’s easy to see why TLOU2 sent the internet into a tizzy. A large percentage of its toxic discourse can be disregarded

as fanboy whinging. Others have reasonable criticisms of the gameplay, story and character choices. Still others have valid misgivings about the game’s LGBTQ+ representation and game developer Naughty Dog’s exploitative work culture.

But for me, TLOU2 was one of 2020’s most powerful works of art. When the credits rolled, I sat for a long while in contemplative silence.

Perhaps just as important, it was a game that met the moment. Because I, too, have spent the past several years mired in hatred.

I hate the discord and dysfunction of modern politics. I hate that hundreds of thousands of Americans are dead for no good reason. I hate that basic dignity and justice are still so elusive for so many. And I hate the feeling of powerlessness that feeling instills.

Just like Ellie, that hate will be with me for a long time. I can’t just let it go.

But there’s a way to live with it and not be consumed.

STAGE & SCREEN

A Regency treat

By Lyndsie Kiebert Reader Staff As a child of the Shonda Rhimes era of network television, I am always willing to give anything she puts her name to a try.

The woman behind instant classics like Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal now runs her own production company, Shondaland, which recently released its first deal with Netflix: Bridgerton. The eight-episode series, which is based on novels by Julia Quinn and written by Chris Van Dusen, dropped on Christmas and has since sent viewers on a whirlwind journey through the high-stakes game of “entering society” in early 19th-century London.

Daphne Bridgerton, eldest daughter of the famed and fortuned Bridgerton family, has officially begun to seek courtship — dubbed “flawless” by Queen Charlotte herself. A series of missteps early in the social season leave her without suitors just as the handsome and extremely unavailable duke of Hastings, Simon, arrives in town. They hatch a plan to pretend to court in an effort to keep eager mothers away from Simon and attract bachelors to the now untouchable Daphne. Despite their apparent dislike of one another, the two have undeniable chemistry, and anyone who understands the Hallmark formula knows where this one is headed.

There are plenty of subplots, too, most regarding forbidden love, familial honor and finding one’s way in the world. Perhaps most compelling is the effort to unmask the anonymous narrator of Bridgerton, Lady Whistledown (ever-so-satisfyingly voiced

by Julie Andrews), who authors a widely distributed scandal sheet and seems to know all of the characters’ secrets Bridgerton is, without a doubt, visually stunning. From the incredible gowns of velvet and tulle, to the iconic sprawling and sparkling ballrooms and courtyards of the Regency era, the show’s crew and special effects team delivered a feast for the viewer’s eyes. Not a scene goes by that some ornate detail doesn’t linger in the mind for a moment longer than it appears on screen.

Bravo.

The show’s ability to build investment in multiple plotlines in a short amount of time is also impressive. In fact, that ability had me screaming by episode four — the tension between the characters had become too much, and something had to give. Thank the heavens that things moved forward, because I was starting to think that they’d drag me into Season 2 before giving me what I want-

Netflix’s Bridgerton is a visually stunning look at love, lust and duty in upscale 1813 London

ed — no — needed.

Bridgerton does manage to fall flat in some areas. The cast selection, in terms of screen delivery, is a crapshoot. Phoebe Dynevor shines as Daphne, showcasing the perfect combination of class, sass and humanity to be a convincing “diamond of the season,” as Lady Whistledown reports. She creates a stark contrast to her love interest, Simon, played by Regé-Jean Page. I never bought into his storyline or motivations, which seemed strange, considering he is the character to which Bridgerton dedicates its only montage of flashbacks. His performance felt monochrome and forced — not the “Prince Charming” that we romance buffs crave in a leading man.

Adjoa Andoh steals the show as Lady Danbury, serving as a compassionate mother figure to Simon and an unrelenting, no-nonsense voice of reason among the chaos of society. The mother of the Bridgerton gang, played by Ruth Gemmell, also stood out as a strong, funny female character.

In short, the female performances in Bridgerton felt reminiscent of the muchloved female characters of past Shondaland productions: complex but sure, vibrant but completely human. The men left something to be desired — innuendo not intended.

Another aspect of Bridgerton that left me with mixed feelings was the show’s nearly palpable lust. Bridgerton is not for the faint (or prude) of heart, and certainly not for casual family viewing. I must have missed the “mature” rating when I reached for the play button, because the abruptness of the first naked butt left me clutching my pearls.

The sex in this show is romantic, adventuerous and plentiful, but the narrative surrounding “the marital act” — and how little the young women in the show know about it — is cringey and unbecoming to the characters whose innocence comes off as more of the joke than a legtimate aspect of courting during the time period.

Season 1 of Bridgerton left me craving Season 2, despite a few clumsily tied up plotlines and an abrupt change of heart in one of the main characters. I am enraged about the Lady Whistledown reveal, and hanging on to the idea that it’s a deliberate attempt to throw the viewer off the real authors’ scent.

But when the screen went dark and my heart sank at the conclusion of another wild Netflix ride, I realized I would miss the glitz, glam and outrageously tense exchanges characteristic of high-class courtship. Bridgerton does a superb job of tightening the corset strings until the viewer is gasping for air, and

then pulling the delicate lacing loose with a satisfying scene. Let’s hope there’s more in store for this posh and popular show.

A still frame from Netflix’s Bridgerton.

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FOOD

The Sandpoint Eater Gypsy spirit

By Marcia Pilgeram Reader Columnist I’m so grateful that everyone in my family has thus far dodged the COVID-19 bullet.

It’s challenging to stay healthy and relevant in these lockdown days, though most of us have established rituals for ourselves and our families. We have also found some fairly unique “coping in quarantine” skills. I had a super plan in place.

For many years, I’ve dreamed of “snow birding” somewhere warm, and this year my house-swapping stars aligned! Last fall, I made grandiose plans to spend a month in San Diego while a fourthyear medical student who could administer twice-a-day insulin injection to my threelegged kitty, Laurel, (and who wanted to return to our region to ski for a month) would occupy my home.

I planned on driving to California and with great anticipation began to fill totes with all the things needed for my sunfilled getaway. One was loaded with light and breezy apparel: flip flops, beach towels, a yoga mat and blocks, and lots of sunscreen. I filled another one with culinary apparatus and esoteric spices so I could both take and teach Zoom cooking classes.

The totes were filled with essential supplies, and I was filled with visions of take-away tacos that I would eat on warm and sunny walks along the sandy beaches of La Jolla.

It was the perfect house-swapping set up; until Laurel got sick. So sick, I 20 /

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honestly did not think he was long for our world. Fortunately, through the wonders of modern veterinary medicine, he pulled though.

There was no way I could leave him at home, with even the most caring of strangers.

In 15 years, Laurel had never spent a night away from home, but we had three days to vacate our home before our eager young skiers arrived. As usual, Ryanne came up with a plan: I could come to Moscow and stay in the home of good friends who had left for an extended stay with family in Canada.

I stowed away the California totes and packed winter gear for me. For Laurel, I brought blankets, food dishes

and everything else I could think that would bring him comfort. We arrived in Moscow, met by my masked daughter who gave me a quick tour of the home we would inhabit for the next month. We made plans to spend time together after I completed the last five days of my 10-day isolation period (due to a Christmas flight home from Chicago).

Turns out Laurel does not share his cat-mother’s wanderlust, and, after a week of his pitifully weak cries, I knew he would not heal and I would not sleep until we were settled back into our worn leather chair by the fireplace in our cozy, familiar home. Thanks to angel-friends in Sandpoint, the skiers have new digs, and

Laurel and I, feeling like Toto and Dorothy, agree, “there’s no place like home.”

It’s hard to think of Laurel’s sickness as a blessing in disguise, but if he had not gotten sick, I don’t know where I would have ended up (and I would have missed my firstborn Ryanne’s 40th birthday.)

New California travel restrictions were imposed on Jan. 6, and I may have not even gotten all the way down there.

The pandemic is so out of control and dangerous everywhere, but it seems especially so in Southern California. And their over-burdened hospitals certainly don’t need any non-essential, sun-seeking travelers (me).

My travel days are over for now. It’s exhausting to plan and

postpone and then pause them again. For now, until I’ve had my double dose of vaccine, I am terra firma in Sandpoint.

The gypsy in me has been quelled for now, but it’s not going to stop my gypsy-soul from living my best life, right here at home, in my treasured kitchen, preparing foods that fill my belly and my travel spirit. This thick soup, Gypsy Stew (Olla Gitana), which I first tasted at a sidewalk café in Seville, in the shadow of the Cathedral of Seville, is high on my list of memorable foods.

The almonds and breadcrumbs in the recipe come from ancient Moorish influence. I’ll dream of The Alcazar palace and exotic Flamenco dancers with every bite.

Andalusian Gypsy Stew (Olla Gitana) Serve this hearty stew, popular in Southern Spain, with crusty bread, for a perfect après ski supper.

INGREDIENTS: • 2 tablespoons olive oil • 1 lb. pork, cut in 1/2 inch chunks • 2 medium yellow onions, diced • 2 cloves garlic, minced • 2 carrots, peeled and diced • 2 celery stalks, diced • 32 oz. chicken stock • 1 tbs. smoked paprika • 1 tsp. chipotle chili powder • 1 tsp. cinnamon • 2 (15 oz.) cans garbanzo beans • 1 can (15 oz.) petite diced tomatoes, or 2 fresh tomatoes, diced • 1/2 lb green beans, cut into 1-inch pieces • 1 bunch kale, chopped • 1/4 cup of almonds, ground and toasted (preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit (spread ground almonds on a baking sheet and toast for 1 minute) • 2 tablespoons bread crumbs • 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar • Salt to taste

DIRECTIONS: Heat the olive oil on medium-high heat. Pat the pork cubes with paper towels to dry. Add the cubes to the hot pan and sauté on all sides until browned. Remove and set aside.

Add the onions and sauté until translucent. Add the garlic, stir and sauté for another minute.

Return the pork to the Dutch oven and fill with chicken stock.

Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for one hour.

Add the yams, beans, tomatoes, return to a boil, reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer for an hour or so. Add the almonds, bread crumbs, and red wine vinegar, stir. Add the Swiss chard and continue to simmer for 10-15 minutes. Add salt to tas

Serves 4-6

STAGE & SCREEN

Playing with the possibilities of Zoom

Panida ‘virtual theater production’ Coffee Shop brings the stage into viewers’ homes

By Zach Hagadone Reader Staff

Everyday life for the past 10 months or so has often felt like a constant, awkward series of adaptations and negotiations as we navigate the many discomforts and inconveniences posed by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. No aspect of our daily routines has gone untouched — from work and school to shopping and everything between. That includes the creation and consumption of all manner of artistic media.

In keeping with necessity being the mother of invention, the Panida Theater is premiering its first-ever “virtual theater production” with the comedy short Coffee Shop, which will stream at panida.org and be posted to the theater’s Facebook page from Friday, Jan. 15 to Sunday, Jan. 31.

“Because in the sequestered

circumstances our community can’t come to the Panida, we are bringing the Panida to them,” said Panida Executive Director Patricia Walker.

The play — written and directed by Teresa Pesce — is a light-hearted, clever ensemble piece starring some familiar local stage actors: Scott Johnson, Tim Martin, Andrew Sorg, Alex Cope, Steve Neuder and Walker.

Where it breaks new ground is with its use of Zoom — the actors filmed their parts sitting in their own homes, having a series of conversations that add up to a collection of small skits, all performed in “their own little box,” as Pesce described it.

“It reminds me of the Brady Bunch, with everybody in their squares on a Zoom call,” added Walker.

As people host virtual happy hours and watch parties, it was perhaps only natural that the next step might be a virtual play set in a virtual coffee shop.

Of course, as with any Zoom call, the technology platform itself presents some unique challenges — especially for actors.

For one thing, only one person can speak at a time, lest things devolve into a gabble of

discordant voices. There’s also a built in lag between speakers — intended to avoid the aforementioned cacophony — which is something comedic actors in particular have to plan for when delivering their lines.

“Comedy is all about speed, so the last thing you want is a big dip in energy between lines,” Pesce said.

There’s also the foreignness of performing for a computer screen, rather than feeding on the energy of a real-life audience.

“It’s different from the actor’s side of it to get into character; you’re talking to your computer,” said Walker, who plays a marriage counselor whose own marital problems provide much of the comedic motive force in the eponymous coffee shop. “I had to go through the motions of putting on makeup and costume because I had to get into character to do this.”

Finally, and this is something any Zoom user can sympathize with, there’s the minor distraction of looking at yourself as you participate in the call.

“That’s the last thing any actor should ever do,” said Andrew Sorg, who lent his technical expertise to the essential videography and editing components of the production.

Despite those challenges, and maybe in part because of them, Coffee Shop is a truly unique artistic effort that Pesce, Walker and Sorg agreed is not only new territory but exciting. Among the actors in the production is Zachary Sabbah, whom local theater fans will recognize from Pesce’s many other plays, who is calling in his performance from Portland, Ore. Though Zoom has its own

peculiar strictures, it also opens up a lot of possibilities not only for incorporating actors from outside the area but the use of computer-generated backgrounds — bringing elements of filmmaking and special effects to stage acting, where under traditional circumstances they may not have been possible. It also opens the way for a robust musical component.

Regardless of the newness of the format, Walker said “all the veteran stage actors adapted effortlessly,” and both Pesce and Walker are excited to turn virtual theater productions like Coffee Shop into a series.

Pesce has already penned the script for the second Coffee Shop, which features a Valentine’s Day theme and is slated to screen in February.

“I’d write one of these every dang week, if they wanted me to,” Pesce said.

The experiment in virtual theater will be free to view, sponsored by Evans Brothers Coffee, though donations are greatly needed and appreciated.

The big hope for Pesce and Walker is simply that audiences get a laugh and remember that the Panida is still here, offering entertainment and connection for the community no matter what else might be happening in the world.

“We’re doing the best that we can to keep the presence going; to give them something fun and bring a little laughter into their lives,” Pesce said.

“Even though we’ll be popping our own popcorn, we can all watch it together and just pass the laughter around,” she added. “I want to give the community some hope.”

This week’s RLW by Ed Ohlweiler

READ

In this period of home learning there’s no better time to explore The Best American Nonrequired Reading, an annual anthology started by Dave Eggers in 2002. This series is a collaboration of editor/ founder Eggers, The 826 Network for student writers and The Best American Series. It features fiction and nonfiction selected by students and, though I’ve yet to find the 2020 edition, there is much to spark your interest in all of the previous incarnations.

LISTEN

I fell in love with Dee Dee Bridgewater‘s commanding voice before I ever learned about her jazz show on NPR or her work as a philanthropist, activist and goodwill ambassador. Red Earth — A Malian Journey, while still rooted in jazz, is mostly recorded in Mali, explores her African ancestry and is just a gem of an album from an artist whose long career also includes Tony and Grammy nods.

WATCH

If you’re a fan of improv or sketch comedy, check out the old episodes of The Upright Citizen’s Brigade. Going back to 1990 in Chicago and branching to NYC, it spawned a dynamic style of theater comedy and a generation of comedians that are both still alive today.

Like other highly experimental art forms, not every bit hits home, but you’ll witness some hilarity and see stars like Amy Poehler first cutting their teeth.

January 14, 2021 /

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BACK OF THE BOOK

About that Boise-area man who occupied VP Pence’s Senate seat, then disappeared From Northern Idaho News, Jan. 20, 1914

MATTHEW ERTLE IS DECLARED INSANE Matt Ertle, for the past year employed by the Star Market company, was arrested yesterday afternoon on a warrant sworn to by his wife. This morning Eartle was examined by Drs. Jackson and Stackhouse and pronounced insane. Ertle bears an excellent reputation, and the Star Market company who employed him give him the best of recommendation for faithfulness in his work.

His friends assert that he is not insane though he may be temporarily queer. He is a “Dutchman,” is excitable and is very apt to use words that do not exactly convey his meaning to the hearer. He has been greatly worried by domestic troubles. He also has a strong religious tendency.

Among his hallucinations is one that a prominent local attorney has exerted a powerful hypnotic influence over himself and his wife last year. Ertle’s father has been telegraphed for and will be allowed to take Ertle home to Milwaukie, with the expectation that a change of conditions with freedom from irritating circumstances here will restore his mental balance.

There are a great many sensational rumors flying around the streets respecting Ertle’s domestic infelicity, and some profess that his troubles are not entirely delusions, but the truthfulness of these rumors could not be traced down.

The general belief is that there may be some developments.

22 /

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/ January 14, 2021

By Harrison Berry Special to the Reader In the now-notorious photo, a man in a black jacket and stocking cap with a red stripe sits in the seat usually reserved for the vice president of the United States. His right arm is raised in a fist-pump. One member of an insurrectionary mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, his name is Josiah Colt, and he is from the Boise area, according to the Idaho Statesman.

“I’m in downtown D.C. I’m all over the news now. But, like, I’m just like every single one of those people that was marching.

A peaceful protest. We’re here to represent America,” he said in a video posted to his social media accounts. “Yeah, I did sit in Nancy Pelosi’s seat.” [He was incorrect, of course; he was actually invading the U.S. Senate, where Vice President Mike Pence presides.]

A slew of photos and videos attest to Colt’s presence in the Capitol Building and his reckoning of events that day. In one photo, he is shown hanging from the balcony above the Senate floor. In another, he’s sitting in the seat normally reserved by Vice President Mike Pence. But soon after releasing that video, he went dark on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube, though previous posts show him espousing conspiracy theories about the pandemic and the COVID-19 vaccine.

In one Facebook post showing a picture of Boise Mayor Lauren McLean, he wrote “Somebody needs to put this lady in a box and send her to China where she belongs.” He appears again in another Facebook post from user Ronnie Sandlin: “My fellow patriot Josiah Colt sleeping ready for the boogaloo on Jan 6th.” In it, a man wearing what looks like a Trump face mask is in a hotel bed, his eyes closed and with a pistol in his hand. A comment attributed to Colt reads “Ready for any battle.”

“Boogaloo” is slang for violent insurrection or civil war.

Despite his personal social media blackout, many of the photos and videos ascribed to Colt or depicting him have gone viral, in part

STR8TS Solution

because of Tyson Quick, who told Boise Weekly he knew Colt from high school and church.

When Quick began to see photos of Colt appear online, he sent a message to him over social media. That, he said, is when Colt began deleting his social media accounts. Quick then made an initial post on social media asking if anyone had information about the event and Colt, and a friend shared the videos Colt posted just after leaving the Capitol, which Quick posted on YouTube. As of this story, his video has been viewed more than 50,000 times.

“I posted on Facebook to see if anyone had any information, and a bunch of former friends and current friends in Idaho started sharing information, which included a video he posted, expressing that he was one of the first to jump into the Senate chambers and sit in the chair, which he thought was Nancy Pelosi’s chair,” he said.

Hours later, Quick posted a second video of Colt being interviewed. In it, Colt wears a helmet that he brought with him to the insurrection.

“If violence happens, like, it happens; but we’re not going to start it,” he tells the interviewer.

Few have had contact with Colt since he stopped responding over social media. Channel 2, however, received a statement from him in which he apologizes for his actions, described the Senate chamber as a “sacred place” and said he felt he brought shame to his country and his state. According to Boise news Channel 2, he has sought legal counsel.

It is currently unclear what kind of legal situation Colt might face as a result of his activities on Jan. 6. Dozens of people were arrested the day of the insurrection according to NPR, and while he may face charges in Washington, D.C., over his activities, U.S. Attorney for the District of Idaho Bart Davis released a statement saying that his office “will prosecute any crimes if in the course of the investigation there’s a lawful nexus to Idaho jurisdiction.”

Left: Josiah Colt livestreams immediately after the insurrection. Right: Josiah Colt occupies VP Mike Pence’s chair in the U.S. Senate chambers. Photo from screenshot, CNN. Harrison Berry is managing editor of the Boise Weekly. This story originally appeared on boiseweekly.com.

Update: As of Jan. 12, news sources in southern Idaho as well as the Ada County Sheriff’s Office confirmed that Josiah Colt voluntarily surrendered himself to authorities. He is currently being held by U.S. Marshals at the Ada County Jail. It was immediately unclear what charges he may face after his participation in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, which included widespread damage and the loss of five lives.

Crossword Solution

Sudoku Solution

The land that had nourished him and had borne him fruit now turned against him and called him a fruit. Man, I hate land like that.

Solution on page 22

Solution on page 22

prolixity

Woorf tdhe Week

By Bill Borders

/proh-LIK-si-tee/ [noun] 1. a tendency to speak or write at great or tedious length.

“She showed great prolixity, churning out a new novel every six months.”

Corrections: In our Stage and Screen piece, “End of Days: Netflix mockumentary Death to 2020 is as hilarious as it is desperately dark,” Jan. 7, we incorrectly spelled George Floyd’s name. We regret the error – ZH

Copyright www.mirroreyes.com

Laughing Matter

CROSSWORD ACROSS 1. Open, as a jacket 6. Fragrant oil 11. Nigerian monetary unit 12. Philosophy of duality 15. Objective 16. Milieu 17. Mistake 18. Ancient timepiece 20. Petrol 21. Nanny 23. Paddles 24. L L L L 25. Bristle 26. Fully developed 27. Tall woody plant 28. Biblical garden 29. Eastern Standard Time 30. Weight loss plans 31. Expectation of failure 34. Thaws 36. Little bit 37. Frosts 41. Type of sword 42. Large luxurious car 43. Anagram of “Note” 44. Gave money 45. A rigid circular band 46. Feudal worker 47. It comes from a hen 48. Dispute 51. Not bottom 52. Domestics 54. Close 56. Gallivant

Solution on page 22 57. Artist’s workstand 58. Cheapskate 59. Cetacean mammal

DOWN 1. Without a weapon 2. Provide commentary 3. ___-zag 4. Angers 5. A Maori club 6. Revere 7. Bass horns 8. A dog wags one 9. Beer

10. Curl 13. Balances 14. Untidyness 15. Make fun of 16. Alterations 19. Clamor 22. Managed 24. A Christian recluse 26. Umpires 27. “___ the season to be jolly” 30. Prank 32. French for “Summer” 33. Presses down 34. Scanty

35. A witty saying 38. An earthenware flask 39. Dignify 40. Leaky 42. Hang around 44. Annoyance 45. A German medieval guild 48. Openings 49. Again 50. “Sure” 53. 7 in Roman numerals 55. An Old Testament king January 14, 2021 /

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CONNECTING NORTH IDAHO

TO THE GLOBAL MARKETPLACE For nearly 150 years, BNSF Railway has been connecting this region's farmers, manufacturers, and businesses to customers around the world.

And as America's largest mover of intermodal freight, we're proud to move millions of carloads of freight each year that help feed, supply, and power homes and businesses across North America.

AGRICULTURAL 335,494 -----,

INDUSTRIAL ---

459,836

ENERGY 41,125

-------1

1,174,285

lntermodal Units & Carloads Shipped to and from Idaho and Washington in 2019

CONSUMER -----...

337,830

RA/LWAY

Connecting the Pacific Northwest since 1873