Story by Rodger Nichols for Gorge Country Media
Klickitat County Commissioners met yesterday in their new workshop-in-the-morning, formal-meeting-in-the-afternoon format. Regular callers have found some advantages to the new setup, as it allows comment in the afternoon session after discussing things in the morning but before voting on them.
One of the biggest concerns from callers was a change in how the public can access the meeting agendas. Prior to this meeting, people could go directly to the county commissioners website, click on the current agenda and download it. Now, though, people who went to the same location were directed to a site that required a signup to be automatically notified when the agendas were posted, but no way to get to the agenda from there.
In order to get to the new agenda location, people need to go to the county’s main page, scroll down past the alerts and National Weather Service links to the Board of County Commissioners. Click that, then you’ll be at the portal. Once you get to the agenda page you’ll notice it’s in a broad outline and you can chose to download as little as a single agenda item at a time, rather than the whole thing, which can run for hundreds of pages.
Another advantage of the Zoomed morning workshop was that allowed the public to listen in when Washington counties lobbyist Zak Kennedy reported to the commissioners about politics in Olympia. He said Friday night, leadership in the House, with only a few hours notice, called an emergency meeting to change a House rule that’s been in effect since the 1890s. For more than a century and a quarter, on final passage, it has taken a two-thirds majority to end discussion and move directly to a vote on the bill. That was changed to a simple majority:
“Now, basically, any bill that’s on final passage, the majority party from here until that particular rule is changed, will be able to end discussion despite the minority’s opposition, and move to final passage.”
He also said the Speaker and the House majority leadership, all Democrats, have told the Democratic Governor that his staff is not allowed in the building without an invitation. Could be an interesting session.
The county meeting was unusual in one respect in that Commissioner Lori Zoller was not present, and the two newly-elected commissioners Todd Andrews and Ron Ihrig ran the show.
One of the most intriguing items came towards the end of the afternoon regular session, commissioners heard updats from Goldendale and Mt. Adams Chamber of Commerce Executive Directors Teja [TAY-juh] Finch and Tamara Tippel.
Tippel said one of the biggest thing going on in the west county, is a tourism initiative based on the paranormal:
“Margie’s Outdoor Store is the hub for that. They really turned this into a serious marketing strategy. The one true thing I think is really important to realize about this is in 2018, Scotland Tourism determined the Loch Ness Monster was dragging 54 million dollars a year, just because of the Loch Ness Monster mystery.”
The people involved have gone to the lengths of making up (or discovering, take your pick) a new cryptid. A cryptid is a creature that is said to exist but has not been proven to do, like Bigfoot or the Loch Nes Monster. Their entry for the newest member of the cryptid family is the Klickitat Ape-Cat, a black panther-like beast standing six feet tall at the shoulder, that is said to haunt the Columbia River Gorge. Come hunt for them, tourists, and bring your money.