Valley Is One Community

Driving east out of Waitsburg you quickly reach the county line. A small sign on Highway 12 indicates that you're crossing from Walla Walla into Columbia county, but nothing else changes. The hills that mark the Touchet Valley watershed continue in the distance as the wheat fields, grain tanks and farms roll by.

For the purposes of this editorial, we'd like to use the valley's seamless landscape as a metaphor for our news coverage of the area and its community. It's in answer to a question we've had from some of our readers why we have "so many Dayton stories" in the Times. The way we look at it, we're the Times - based in Waitsburg, yes, but a news source for the entire valley from Starbuck to Dixie. We cover the news that widely because we think of the Touchet Valley as one community bound perhaps more by the distant watershed hills than by specific city limits down in the valley itself.

Consider what Waitsburg and Dayton alone have in com­mon: a river, a highway, a railroad, a hospital district, an arts council, several businesses, an agricultural industry, a can­ning history, a horse-racing circuit and so on. Waitsburgers work in Dayton and Daytonites work in Waitsburg. Daytonites worship in Waitsburg churches and Waitsburgers attend churches in Dayton. High school foot­ball

games in either town draw spectators from the other. The same for weekend events such as Dayton Days, All Wheels and the Columbia County Fair in Dayton, and Days of Real Sport, the Classic Auto Show and the Pioneer Fall Festival in Waitsburg.

The youth music group Salt Light practices in Waits­burg and performs in Dayton. Kids from both towns per­form in plays at the Liberty Theater. Similar connections exist between other towns, such the Waitsburg-Prescott sports combine. The point is that the interest in news among most Times' readers doesn't end at the county line. A story like the future of Ski Bluewood, which draws skiers on Highway 12 and 124 through Waitsburg and Day­ton as well as skiers from both towns themselves, affects the entire valley. Same for the soundness of the hospital district, which has a general hospital in Dayton and a clinic in Waitsburg, not to mention employees and patients in both communities. Even the proposed Lower Snake River Wind Energy Project for Columbia County will eventually have an im­pact on housing and jobs throughout the valley. Its GarfieldCounty portion already has. Because of these common features and interests, we believe we can be the best news source in the valley by cov­ering news from the entire valley. Many of our readers have told us they like that approach, and we seek to balance our stories accordingly. Still, the number of stories about any of the communities we cover - Waitsburg, Dayton, Prescott, Dixie and Starbuck - can vary from week to week. We don't have a mathemati­cal formula to divide our space between the towns. We go by what is newsworthy, timely and of interest to our readers. Some weeks a preponderance of space may be devoted to Waitsburg news, and other weeks there will be more stories from Dayton alongside stories from Prescott, Dixie and Starbuck.

When it comes to news from Prescott, Dixie and Star­buck, we know we must do more to cover their news and affairs. Just because their populations are smaller doesn't make them any less newsworthy. We've made a start with such coverage as the Prescott pool closure and school dis­trict

changes, the Starbuck missing person's case and the Nielsen's battle with Walla Walla to keep their husky rescue operation in Dixie.

We know we need to do more. We invite anyone from our coverage area to pick up the phone and call us or email us about stories or even just photo opportunities in their towns. This will help us to continue putting "community" into our enterprise of "community journalism."