Pacific NW

President Donald Trump took action last weekend to increase domestic logging by circumventing environmental protections and to staunch the flow of imported timber and lumber products into the country, primarily from Canada.

WALLA WALLA – Farmers in Columbia County may have trouble accessing programs through the U.S. Department of Agriculture locally when the USDA’s Dayton service center closes under federal cost-cutting reforms.

Washington State University officials say the school is being squeezed by financial obstacles coming from the state and federal governments.

Idahoans elected to state or federal offices – including the Idaho Legislature – would be banned from simultaneously serving in elected city, school or highway district positions, under a bill state lawmakers advanced to the House on Friday.

Mar. 7—Since Feb. 18, Washington has seen seven earthquakes with a magnitude above 2.5, including the strongest earthquake to hit the state in five years, a magnitude 4.5 that struck Orcas Island early in the morning of Monday, March 3. Two more earthquakes, a 4.8 and a 3.7, have hit southern British Columbia since mid-February. A string of earthquakes is sometimes interpreted as a sign that a ...

Mar. 7—The temporary closure of Olympic National Park's Hoh Rain Forest area, where heavy rains partially washed out an access road in December, has lasted more than three months, with no signs of reopening. An official at Jefferson County, which maintains Upper Hoh Road adjacent to the Hoh River, said a lack of emergency federal funding for repairs is behind the lag. Eric Kuzma, assistant ...

Wildfire season is months away in Washington state, but planning efforts already have begun.It is not going smoothly.Local and state agencies told The News Tribune that federal funding freezes and layoffs have thrown a wrench into planning efforts and sown chaos at a crucial time, especially with the state seeing more severe and destructive fires.

Mar. 7—They empty trash bins at trailheads. Dig pit toilets at backcountry campsites. Cut down trees in campgrounds at risk of falling on unsuspecting campers. Carve up logs that have fallen across hiking trails — often with hand saws. They're first on the scene responding to a hiker's broken leg in a fall that happened 10 miles from the nearest road. They coordinate tens of thousands of ...

An active-duty U.S. Army soldier stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord was arrested Thursday after being indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of “conspiring to obtain and transmit national defense information” to individuals in China, the U.S. Attorney’s Office reported.

Unemployment claims from fired or laid-off federal workers in Washington state doubled from this time last year, according to new data from the state Employment Security Department.

Washington state is one of the nation's top agriculture producers, led by Eastern Washington's robust farming industry.

Two members of the Anacortes nonprofit Sunflower F.U.N.D., who are in Odesa, Ukraine, providing aid to the Ukrainian people, were sheltering in place Thursday night amid drone and missile attacks by the Russian military.

A second federal judge has blocked the Trump administration’s attempts to freeze federal funding, writing in his opinion that the plan would have “catastrophic consequences” on the country.