Dave Hal­lo­ran from San Juan Coun­ty Depart­ment of Emer­gency Man­age­ment shares this notice with you… Good morn­ing, in the news today is a vol­canic erup­tion near the Ton­ga Islands. The Tsuna­mi Warn­ing cen­ter (tsunami.gov) has issued an Advi­so­ry for the out­er coast of WA and the coast along the Strait of Juan De Fuca. The State  Con­tin­ue Reading

Edi­tor’s Note, Jan. 2, 2022 — We may not be out of the woods just yet — see this mes­sage from Dun­can Wil­son on San Juan Islander. (Fri­day Har­bor, WA) – Decem­ber 31, 2021 – The San Juan Island Library Dis­trict was noti­fied by the Town of a major leak at the for­mer Life Care  Con­tin­ue Reading

Here’s a let­ter to you from SJI Fire & Res­cue… San Juan Island Fire and Res­cue (SJIF&R) remains com­mit­ted to con­tin­u­ous improve­ment in our ser­vice to our islands’ com­mu­ni­ties to ensure pro­fes­sion­al, qual­i­ty, and com­pas­sion­ate emer­gency response and ser­vice. Why does SJIF&R respond to med­ical calls? First: SJIF&R’s guid­ing prin­ci­ple is do what is right for  Con­tin­ue Reading

To Town Water Cus­tomers: The recent cold snap has caused pipes to freeze in hous­es and build­ings that have nev­er had that issue before.  Due to increased water usage, we know there are more leaks in the sys­tem.  We ask every­one to check their hous­es, inside and out, to make sure they don’t have burst  Con­tin­ue Reading

Steve Roberts shot this pho­to on First Street last night. It sure is a thing of beau­ty, but if you don’t need to go out, con­sid­er stay­ing home. Now’s a good time to binge on Net­flix or read that book you keep putting off. Also a good time to avoid giv­ing EMS and the ER  Con­tin­ue Reading

In the Mail­bag today we have this let­ter from Nathan But­ler, Super­in­ten­dent and EMS Admin­is­tra­tor… We have seen the recent let­ter from Fire Chief Norvin Collins regard­ing our agency and merg­er talks. He bad­ly mis­rep­re­sent­ed our agency, and his let­ter is an object les­son in why we have opt­ed not to try again at merg­ing  Con­tin­ue Reading

Snow is cur­rent­ly in the fore­cast for this week­end. If you would like to learn more about how the Coun­ty pri­or­i­tizes and responds to snow events on Coun­ty Roads please vis­it Map Gallery | San Juan Coun­ty, WA see where you can view our pri­or­i­ty maps and plans for snow removal. Please remem­ber, win­ter weath­er  Con­tin­ue Reading

In the SJ Update mail­bag today we find this let­ter from Norvin Collins… As the year comes to a close, your San Juan Island Fire and Res­cue (SJIF&R) respon­ders and I wished to take a moment to reflect where we are today and what the future holds. There are three points to address that are  Con­tin­ue Reading

UPDATE — Kille­brew Lake Road on Orcas Island is now open. Pub­lic Works com­plet­ed their assess­ment Thurs­day morn­ing and have deter­mined that the road is safe to open. Laporte Road remains closed just past the inter­sec­tion with John Jones Road.

A blocked cul­vert has cre­at­ed a dan­ger­ous sit­u­a­tion on Laporte Road on Orcas Island. A large amount of water has built up on the uphill side of the road, and the road­way is in dan­ger of fail­ure, in par­tic­u­lar with more rain in the fore­cast. The clo­sure is on Laporte Road, just up from the  Con­tin­ue Reading

On Novem­ber 2, 2021, res­i­dents vot­ed for San Juan Island EMS to remain under the juris­dic­tion of San Juan Coun­ty Pub­lic Hos­pi­tal Dis­trict No. 1. The Dis­trict will seek to renew its San Juan Island EMS levy in the upcom­ing Feb­ru­ary 8, 2022, elec­tion. Cur­rent­ly, San Juan Island EMS is at the end of a six-year  Con­tin­ue Reading

The fol­low­ing was shared with you by North­west Work­force Coun­cil… The Depart­ment of Social and Health Ser­vices has acti­vat­ed the Dis­as­ter Cash Assis­tance Pro­gram, or DCAP, to serve peo­ple affect­ed by severe weath­er events. House­holds impact­ed by floods, land­slides, mud­slides and oth­er haz­ardous events in the 14 coun­ties includ­ed in Gov­er­nor Inslee’s Novem­ber 15, 2021,  Con­tin­ue Reading

The mas­sive rain event last week caused a wide range of impacts in the coun­ty and caught many islanders off-guard. The severe weath­er was caused by an atmos­pher­ic riv­er: a long, nar­row band of water vapor that often is released as rain or snow when it makes land­fall. While the scope and dam­age may be  Con­tin­ue Reading

On Novem­ber 10th, 2021, San Juan Island Emer­gency Med­ical Ser­vices cel­e­brat­ed the addi­tion of a new ambu­lance to their fleet by host­ing a push-in cer­e­mo­ny. Mem­bers of the pub­lic, press, and Hos­pi­tal Dis­trict Board were invit­ed to assist EMS employ­ees and vol­un­teers in a tra­di­tion­al “push-in” cer­e­mo­ny and cel­e­brate the ben­e­fits the new ambu­lance will  Con­tin­ue Reading

This is from the SJC Dept. of Emer­gency Man­age­ment… Things are look­ing good for a poten­tial open­ing tomor­row (Tues­day — knock on wood). Pub­lic Works is await­ing deliv­ery of bar­ri­ers for the road edge that are due to arrive on the 5:30am fer­ry on Tues­day from Ana­cortes. Once those are placed and final site work  Con­tin­ue Reading

San Juan Coun­ty, WA, USA. – The recent­ly updat­ed Sal­ish Sea Ves­sel Traf­fic Pro­jec­tions (PDF — Nov. 2021) pro­vid­ed by Friends of the San Juans shows that at least a 25% increase in large, ocean-going com­mer­cial ves­sel traf­fic could occur if all of the pro­posed new and expand­ing ter­mi­nal and refin­ery projects are per­mit­ted and  Con­tin­ue Reading