OLYMPIA–The Wash­ing­ton State Salmon Recov­ery Fund­ing Board today announced the award of $21 mil­lion in grants across the state to aid in salmon recov­ery. The grants, giv­en annu­al­ly, went to 105 projects in 29 of the state’s 39 coun­ties. The grants will pay for work to restore salmon habi­tat, includ­ing repair­ing degrad­ed habi­tat in rivers,  Con­tin­ue Reading

The San Juan Island Cham­ber of Com­merce and the Friends of the Library are spon­sor­ing the 2nd annu­al Scare­crow Con­test for the month of Octo­ber. The scare­crows are to be reg­is­tered with the Cham­ber and in place between Octo­ber 8th and 15th. Please click here for the reg­is­tra­tion form. The scare­crows will be dis­played around Fri­day  Con­tin­ue Reading

At their Sep­tem­ber 21, 2021 meet­ing the San Juan Coun­ty Coun­cil offi­cial­ly released a Request for Pro­pos­als (RFP) to pur­chase 5 acres of land on Lopez Island for the devel­op­ment of afford­able hous­ing. San Juan Coun­ty seeks an expe­ri­enced devel­op­er to pur­chase the par­cel locat­ed on Fish­er­man Bay Road just out­side of Lopez Vil­lage. The  Con­tin­ue Reading

Peo­ple who want to make a liv­ing work­ing with trees or forests are invit­ed to a free, hands-on, out­door course offered by the Eco­nom­ic Devel­op­ment Coun­cil of San Juan Coun­ty (EDC).  The course will be taught by Car­son Sprenger, pro­pri­etor of Rain Shad­ow Con­sult­ing at their Orcas Island facil­i­ties, Sat­ur­days Oct. 30th – Nov. 20th,  Con­tin­ue Reading

In the SJ Update Mail­bag today we have this let­ter from the SJC Repub­li­can Par­ty Chair, Daniel Schwartz… State­ment on Vac­cine Man­dates San Juan Coun­ty Repub­li­can Par­tyThe Repub­li­can Par­ty is not anti-vac­cine:  it is for the right of a free and informed cit­i­zen­ry to make its own health choices.Never in our 245-year his­to­ry have fed­er­al,  Con­tin­ue Reading

Local fish­er­man and fish-sel­l­­er, Matt Marinkovich, is once again offer­ing a pound-to-pound match of fish to the food bank. On Sat­ur­day, Sep­tem­ber 25, 10am to 1pm, Marinkovich will be sell­ing fish through his busi­ness, Matt’s Fresh Fish, at the Port prop­er­ty next to the Bak­ery San Juan park­ing lot. “We did this last year and donat­ed  Con­tin­ue Reading

Fri­day Har­bor, WA – On Sep­tem­ber 4, 2021 unknown indi­vid­u­als dam­aged pub­lic lands and destroyed pub­lic prop­er­ty at the Amer­i­can Camp Unit of San Juan Island Nation­al His­tor­i­cal Park. The park needs your help to iden­ti­fy and appre­hend these law­break­ers. Any tips will be treat­ed as con­fi­den­tial. The dam­age to the park was exten­sive includ­ing  Con­tin­ue Reading

From the begin­ning to the end… always Momo. Momo was a unique kit­ty. Momo was born wear­ing a tuxe­do, raised on San Juan Island, and was lucky enough to be loved by mul­ti­ple fam­i­lies. Although a lit­tle aloof and arro­gant some adjec­tives to describe him would include dap­per, con­fi­dent, and well-dressed. His first own­ers, Rina  Con­tin­ue Reading

FRIDAY HARBOR, Wash. — Peace­Health hos­pi­tals, clin­ics, doc­tors and nurs­es in North­west Wash­ing­ton need the community’s help to make sure they can con­tin­ue to safe­ly pro­vide care – not only to those suf­fer­ing from severe ill­ness from COVID-19 but to those requir­ing care for the full range of ill­ness and injuries that its doc­tors and  Con­tin­ue Reading

Local shore­line habi­tat restora­tion actions sup­port marine food webs  It was an excit­ing week for local for­age fish and out-migrat­ing juve­nile salmon as Friends of the San Juans and the Salmon Point Com­mu­ni­ty have suc­cess­ful­ly restored pri­or­i­ty shore­line habi­tat along their local beach. At the south end of Lopez Island, two areas of failed rock armor­ing and  Con­tin­ue Reading