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Newspaper Archive of
Shelton Mason County Journal
Shelton, Washington
June 14, 2012     Shelton Mason County Journal
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June 14, 2012
 
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JOURNALEDITORIAL KOMENCOMMENT 1; news The great exciting days of daily newspa- pering are gone. What was once a thriv- ing and profitable enterprise in most of America's cities is over. The Internet is the culprit. The younger generations -- most every one under 40 -- have abandoned newspapers• Instead, they peruse their computers, their tablets, their smart phones, their BlackBerrys, their Kindles, their...well, you get the idea. These young Americans get their news, scant though it may be, from devices we never dreamed of in our newspapering days. It al- ways was difficult to attract new, young read- ers. But today, competing with Facebook and Twitter, it is impossible to sell a newspaper subscription to an 18-year-old, let alone those in their 20s, 30s and 40s. Where once America's cities had at least two daily newspapers (New York City once had a dozen dailies), you will now find only one daily newspaper per town. And some of America's greatest cities don't even have one, having their daily newspaper reduced from seven-day delivery to three or four or none. Seattle lost its greatly loved and equally LETTE R STOTH E E DITORTM hated Post-Intelligencer some years ago; it survives in name only as an Internet website. The once highly ad- mired Rocky Mountain News of Denver no longer publish- es, not even on the web. The Detroit News, once a powerful print product, now By JOHN publishes only three days a week and refers its readers to KOMEN an Internet address. And just this last month, the highly respected and much loved The Times-Picayune declared it will deliver a print edition to its New Orleans subscribers only on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays. The Times-Picayune will revert to the web. The company that owns the paper said the same schedule would be im- posed on three other newspapers, including one in Birmingham, Ala. Birmingham, diminished. Detroit, reduced. The Seattle P-I and the Rocky Mountain News, gone. The Times-Pic down to three print edi- tion days a week. These are Pulitzer Prize newspapers, award winners in news coverage that kept their read- ers informed and enlightened. One cannot bewail these losses enough• Without these vig- orous news-reporting er~deavors our cities and our nation is less informed; the electorate has less knowledge of government at all levels, fed- eral, state, county and city. If it weren't for the big national newspapers, The New York Times especially, readers would be bereft of national and world news. And even The New York Times has given indications it is suffering financial woes. Many city daily newspapers trying to sur- vive have adopted an emphasis on local cov- erage. They figure, and correctly so. that no other medium is better able to concentrate and report on news within their own community. Moreover, no one else (Twitter, Facebook, et al) really cares. So the local newspaper steps in to cover school board meetings, the Lions Club, city council zone hearings, planning commis- slon meetings and such. It is just this up-close local look at the local community that is the strong suit of weekly newspapers. An example is The Shelton-Mason County Journal. The minutiae of local doings are the meat and potatoes of weeklies like the Journal. They seem to be prospering on that diet. even to the point that some city dailies are emulating the weeklies. A case in point is The News Tribune of Tacoma. Slimmed down to the point of often providing only two slim sections, The News Tribune's front page all but ignores world and national news. Instead, it offers such fare as a recent full-length feature on a local school bus driver, or supplies daily front-page coverage of a drawn-out relatively minor criminal trial. How it is playing out for the dailies isn't pretty. And it bodes ill for our democratic way of governing ourselves. Without newspapers' watchdog role over government, there's an open field for mismanagement, waste, fraud and corruption. • John Komen, who lives on Mason Lake, was for 40 years a reporter and editor, TV an- chorman, national TV network correspondent, producer, columnist, editorial writer and com- mentator. His column, Komen Comment, ap- pears each week in the Shelton-Mason County Journal. ,: SheltoniMason County USPS 492-800 Effort to spur economic development refreshing espite the hubbub at the most Irecent city council meetings about various problems with communi- cation between the city and area busi- nesses, it is nice to see our local govern- ment coming together with the SAVER committee to work on the historic district sign on First and Railroad streets and the recommendations the SAVER com- mittee made to improve city relations. City Administrator Dave O'Leary as- sured the Shelton-Mason County Jour- nal editorial board that this summer he will begin the process of completing the city's draft comprehensive plan "in order to facilitate better economic development opportunities." POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Shelton-Mason County Journal P.O. Box 430, Shelton, WA 98584. Published weekly by Shelton-Mason County JoL~rnal. at 227 West Cota Street, Shelton, Washington Mailing address: RO. Box 430, Shelton, WA 98584 Telephone (360) 426-4412 • www.masoncounty.com Periodicals postage paid at Shelton, Washington Inc. Explanation needed for state restrictions Editor, the Journal We local fishermen, Hood Canal property owners and residents of Mason, Jef- ferson and Kitsap counties, would like an explanation for the state fisheries re- strictions in Hood Canal and what their long range plan encompasses. If anyone out there has an opimon or fact, please pass the word in a letter to the editor. The bottom fishing has been closed from 2002 to 2003. This is difficult to un- derstand as the canal has the cleanest water in all of Puget Sound and we have the only bottom fish closure in the entire state. The reasoning for the closure was an oxygen problem in the lower canal. The upper 40 miles of the canal have never had an oxygen prob- lem or a fish kill but the fish kill problem is not a new problem in the lower canal. Michael Fredson in his book of the History of Hood Ca- nal, tells of fish kills in the lower canal and documented as a natural occurrence as early as 1925 and other fish kills as outlined on page 123. Many requests have been submitted to re-open the bottom fishery with all requests begin denied. The only reason for denial was that "the surplus fish being produced in the north canal will migrate to the lower canal when the oxygen prob- lem has been resolved and repopulate the lower canal." I have been unable to find any information on migra- tory habits of bottom fish and have my doubts that the oxygen problem will never be resolved. When I first bought at Hood Canal, I had the delightful experience of teaching my three kids the joy of fishing, rigging gear. cleaning and preparing fish for the table and the great taste. We also reviewed the rules and regulations of tak- ing care of the wonderful gift we had. This continued through their spouses and 10 grandkids. I now have 16 great-grandkids and have never taken one fishing. This is a common complaint among friends and neigh- bors. The salmon season in the canal has been limited to a Coho snagging season in the Quilicene river, sec- ond snagging season at the Hoodsport hatchery and a third snagging season in the lower Skok. None of these fisheries appeal to me or most fisherman I know Shelton-Mason County Journal is a member of Washington Newspaper Publishers' Association. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: $37 per year for Mason County addresses, $51 per year in state of Washington but outside Mason County, $61 per year out of state. Owned and published by Shelton-Mason County Journal, Inc The document, O'Leary said, will We are happy to see the city recog- be an entirely new section in Shelton's nizes the importance of maintaining an Comprehensive Plan, and is scheduled to updated policy and that it is in the pro- be adopted by the end of the year. cess of doing so. Ol:,eary pointed out key areas of the new document that state: "An economic Hot off the press development effort should include re- Some community members may have view, prioritization and modification of noticed family and friends from the past policies that discourage priority develop- popping up on Google recently. That's be- ment. In the past four years, the city and cause the Journal has uploaded another county governments have lost tax rev- set of our archived editions to the web. enue along with the recession, and have Fifteen of our 126 year history is now cut the jobs of people performing policy available at smc.stparchive.com. While analysis in order to protect programs 2010, 2011 and some of 2012 are online, such as police and fire. This has under- we also have years from the '40s, 50s, 60s mined the city's ability to manage the and 70s up to read. Current issues are policy process." usually uploaded on a six-week delay. and definitely not a place to take a great grandchild to teach him or her to fish. We do have a summer troll season south of Ayock Point but that is a nine mile run from Triton Cove State Park, the only public ramp to this open area. We do have a fall Coho fishery and winter blackmouth but the kids are back in school at this time. The WDFW fishery pamphlet stresses the importance of teaching these upcoming generations the joy of fishing but seems to be mostly talk, no action. The upper canal has always been a good salmon fishery and should be opened for the entire length for the summer salmon fishery and releasing all unmarked fish. These un- marked fish are heading for the mid-canal rivers, basi- cally for the Quilicene. Dose- wallips and the Duckabush and protected in an attempt to rebuild the wild king run. This opening would also al- low the pink salmon fishery which has been closed in the upper canal. The Ham- ma Hamma river has always been included in the mid- canal rivers but has never had a wild king salmon run. The king run in the Hamma Hamma is from a private hatchery for marking and release with the Hoodsport hatch. As a last resort, the north boundary for the sum- mer salmon fishery could be moved to Hood Point giv- ing another 12 miles north of Ayock Point for a troll fishery. This would result in many more licenses sold. give a lot of business to Triton Cove State Park and show a better fish to those caught. Another item is the Hood Canal crab fishery. This opens in early July for an eight or nine week fishery with four or five days per week. This has been a good fishery for many years. The 2010 winter fishery was ex- ceptional with very plentiful large crab. The local crab- bers and WDFG Shellfish personnel were amazed and assumed these crab migrat- ed in from the deeper water to the shallows. Our summer 2011 season again was ex- cellent and again we looked forward to the winter season for a low-pressure fishery. When the winter season for the state was announced, a small portion of area nine was closed to adjoining all of area 12. Again the only area not getting a winter sea- son was Hood Canal. I am certain the closure was not due to low crab availability based on the summer season output. Lastly is the shrimp sea- son for Area 12. We have shrimp populations show- ing steady increase over the last 20 to 30 years. We now get 16 hours to catch our yearly quota. That is if you are retired or take two days off work. Every year Urban we see more shrimpers pull MS. out of the fishery when you figure the costs of licenses, rL~ra I bait, launch fees, gasoline, motor tune-ups, etc. It is so much cheaper to buy a $100 Editor, the Journal to$150 bucket from the na- Today we are less Demo- tive fishery. Comes about crat vs. Republican and $4 to $6 a pound. Many of more urban vs. rural. Urban the sport fishermen buy a dwellers in Seattle want to bucket to add to their sport wall off nature from us pred- catch, atory humans to prevent us If you total up the finan- from enjoying our rural life- cial impact of the above style. Their chicken little en- items for closed stores, vironmental policies include reduced businesses, sport- a one-size-fits-all policy filled ing goods related sales and~ with wishful thinking. equipment maintenance, Chicken little activists motels, real estate and lost come from Seattle to block license fees to the state, progress, then return to state park income, etc., it- their high paying Microsoft seems something could be and Boeing jobs, leaving us done to resolve a bunch of unemployed. these problems and make a Chicken little once argued lot of fishermen happy. Why that if we did not save the is it that Hood Canal is get- spotted owl, the sky would ting squeezed so badly when fall. Does anyone remember the rest of Puget Sound, the how many jobs chicken little straits and ocean are getting and the spotted owl cost us? along pretty well? Now we have chicken little What is the answer? two and the wild Olympics. Twenty five years ago, then Chicken little environmental- Senator Brad Owen, started ists believe species first, hu- a push for the canal fish- mans second. The novel, "Ani- ery to be divided between mal Farm." said it best -- An- the native fishery which is imals good, people bad! Wild controlled by the Boldt deci- Olympics will kill family-wage sion and the sport fishery jobs, but will provide a new with elimination of the non- career path: restaurant work- native commercial fishery, ers. motel maids, gas station The fisheries department attendants and bartenders. stated that they had an Chicken little three will ambitious plan to improve prevent jobs from being the spor~ fishery and would born. It will shut down the show results in a few years, fledging coal trains, prevent Needless to say, the plan the keystone pipeline from did not help as the fishery being built and eliminate continued downhill. Senator biomass electricity produc- Owen again pushed for the ers. But chicken little advo- division of the fishery in his cates do make bad invest- next two terms and again ments in questionable tech- his legislation was rejected, nology using public funds. This division was only Following the recall elec- south of the Hood Canal tion in Wisconsin. Mr. Ed bridge. Senator Owen was from MSNBC displayed convinced that Hood Canal a Wisconsin map to show would become the sport fish- which counties voted for ing capitol of the nation, if and against the recall. His the fishery was divided as comment on the failure of stated. Recreational fishing the recall was the rural vs. groups eagerly supported urban argument. He sug- the proposal. The one fish- gested progressives ought to ing proposal that was ac- concentrate on urban issues cepted was for the elimina- and let rural folks go back to tion of the drag fishery in their guns and religion. This Hood Canal. shows the lack of respect ur- The Owen proposal seems ban progressives have for our to be a great way back to rural lifestyle and beliefs. the health of Hood Canal. Chicken little policies will The only loss would be for prevail unless we defeat chick- the non-native commercial en little politicians. Many de- fishery south of the floating structive policies of the Envi- bridge. This fishery will not ronmental Protection Agency be pleased. The sport fisher- and Washington Department men will be pleased along of Ecology must be reversed. with businesses in Mason, Federal, state and local politi- Jefferson and Kitsap coun- clans and bureaucrats must ties. The state of Washing- respect individual property ton should be happy with rights. the increased income to li- It is freedom of choice. censes, parking and launch- Either vote your rural job ing and state parks use. and your rural lifestyle or let The tribal fisheries should Washington, D.C. and Olym- welcome the change with pia politicians and bureau- the growth of their seafood crats plan your future. Good market. The benefits swing luck with that. heavily for the change. Let's go. Ardean A. Anvik Elma William Aker Lilliwaup See Letters on page A-5 Kari Sleight, publisher Newsroom: Jesse Mullen, editor Natalie Johnson, reporter Kevin Spradlin, reporter Emily Hanson, sports reporter Adam Rudnick, copy editor Advertising: Dave Pierik, Sr. Acct. Executive Sharee Miller, ad representative Maggie Burich ad representative Kel[i Alexander, ad representat ve Front office: Donna Kinnaird, bookkeeper Margot Brand, circulation Cricket Carter, mailroom supervisor Composing room: William Adams, graphics Pressroom: Kelly Riordan, production manager Travis Miller, Dress operator Mary Northove~ press operator Page A-4 - Shelton-Mason County Journal - Thursday, June 14, 2012