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Over 100 years ago, the United States was dealing with another pandemic, the Spanish Influenza Epidemic. By October 3, 1918 this disease arrived in Seattle with 700 cases and one death at the University of Washington Naval Training Station.

Lewis County has been approved by the Washington State Department of Health to enter Phase 2 on May 22, 2020. This is the start of the "Safe Start Washington" plan that is allowing more businesses to open up, including restaurants, hair and nail salons along with dog grooming places.

Lewis County submitted the application on Thursday to the State of Washington, Director of Health. The Lewis County Commissioners along with Lewis County Public Health were part of the plan that was sent to the state. Commissioner Edna Fund was the chairperson, she stated "We had to get the approval for our businesses to reopen. I was very proud of the team that put the 100-page request together."

Lewis County has been very busy the last few weeks developing and getting ready to reopen. Commissioner Fund stated "We have the website 'Lewis County Together' which has a lot of resource information including the Business Reopening Toolkit. This helps businesses with the steps necessary to reopen. Lewis County is open for business."

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife have announced there will be no razor clam digging for this year. On their website, they state due to the Covid 19 Stay Home Stay Healthy order they have closed the beaches.

Their website states, "Large razor clam crowds constitute a gathering under the Stay Home-Stay Healthy order. This order has been extended to May 31, so razor clam and similar large gathers are not allowed at this time.

The Winolequa Garden Club has chosen Coleson Richendollar as their recipient for this year's $3000 scholarship award. Coleson is a 2020 graduate of Winlock High School.

Coleson, who plans to attend Centralia College in the fall, will be majoring in Natural Resource Science with a back up plan of Electrical Engineering. When he found out he was awarded the scholarship, Coleson stated "I thanked them a lot, I think it's awesome."

Dayton Channell, age 6 from Raymond, spent part of Memorial Day Weekend cleaning and decorating veterans graves at Fern Hill in Menlo.

With Pacific County beach access reopened on Monday, May 18, the question of when are hotels and camping reopening pops up. The desire to get out and go to the beach is building with people still restricted to their homes, and Pacific County is preparing for the visitors that will not be able to resist the drive to the beach.

Pacific County Deputy Health Officer Dr. Steven Krager and the Emergency Operations Center have been working on a phased reopening of the county that aligns with the state's reopening plan. The plan calls for entering phase 2 starting June 1 along with the rest of Washington, but Pacific County has been officially moved to phase 2 on Saturday May 23.

Borden's Auto Parts was vandalized early Sunday morning when someone smashed in several huge windows. Borden's is located at 580 Commercial St. in downtown Raymond.

Raymond Police "responded to an alarm at Borden's and Officer Coma found several windows broken out," Raymond Police Chief Chuck Spoor told the Herald Sunday morning. "She checked the area and located a suspect within a block of the incident.