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Last week, both chambers of the Legislature approved governor-requested legislation SB 5061, which would increase minimum unemployment benefits for workers and provide $1.7 billion in unemployment tax relief for businesses. The bill received strong bipartisan support, and the governor expects to sign it next week.

This week, the Legislature is set to take action on a number of other governor-request bills. Today, the Labor and Workplace Standards Committee is scheduled to vote on HB 1097, which would help ensure safer working conditions and better protections for workers.

Thursday, the House Appropriations Committee will hear HB1091, which would establish a clean fuels program in Washington. They're also scheduled to take executive action on HB 1016, which would establish Juneteenth as a Washington state holiday.

HB 1267, governor-request legislation sponsored by Rep. Debra Entenman, is also scheduled for executive action that day in the House Public Safety Committee. The legislation would create an Office of Independent Investigations to conduct investigations into police use of excessive force.

The 105-day legislative session is set to run through the end of April.

During a press conference last week, Governor Jay Inslee announced that the West and Puget Sound Regions have moved to Phase 2 on Monday, February 1. These two regions include Pacific, Grays Harbor, Lewis, Thurston, Snohomish, King, and Pierce counties. Each of these counties have met the metrics that Inslee put into place at the beginning of January.

Farmers Markets are now a part of Winlock and Toledo for most of the year. The Winlock Farmers Market is open year-round and the Toledo Farmers Market is set to reopen on February 11.

Winlock's Farmers Market is open on Wednesday and Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. at 202 N.E. First Street, next to Sahara Pizza. They offer a range of arts, crafts, crochet, alpaca knitted items, canned goods, fresh eggs, and farm products. It's a shop with a little of everything for everyone.

Bonita Aadland is the manager over the Winlock Farmers Market, she stated, "We offer many items that are from local vendors, it's a great way to showcase local talent. It gives the community a place to buy a birthday gift or even a baby shower gift, we offer a wide variety of vendors and products."

Taylor Ruiz, Junior at Winlock High School, has always had a passion for literature and decided to bring her own vision of being a published author into action.

Taylor is responsible for resurrecting one of the greatest novels and detectives of all time. Ruiz, an avid mystery enthusiast, is the self-published author of Sherlock Holmes and the Spider's Web.

Taylor found her love for writing around the age of six. One of the fondest memories she has was using her imagination to construct a book about dolphins in 1st grade. Her first-grade teacher read her story out loud to the class and this experience made a large and positive impact on her. At that point she had found her calling. "After that moment all I wanted to do was write," said Taylor. Over the next few years, Taylor discovered more short stories from her ancestry and used them as inspiration for her first published book Porter Dowle.

Last week, 24 more positive COVID-19 cases were reported to the Pacific County Health and Human Services and 2 more deaths. The total number of deaths among Pacific County residents that have been attributed to COVID-19 is now 9. The death rate due to coronavirus is 1.3% of all COVID-19 cases.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, there have been 697 cases with 22 hospitalizations. There are 30 cases currently active. The current case rate per 100k over 14 days is 198.7.

"We are kinda in a plateau right now in terms of cases, not really going up or down at this point," said PCDOH Director Katie Lindstrom. "It is still a high rate. Anything over 200 cases per 100k is high risk." So the county is close to slipping into the high risk category again.

SOUTH BEND - Don Cox has celebrated many milestones during his life - including turning 100 on January 7 when he and his family got together to commemorate a century of life from South Bend with a Zoom birthday call.

Don was born January 7th, 1921 in Portland, Oregon, to Delvin Albion Cox and Katherine Mae (McLaughlin) Cox. He had two older brothers, Delvin and Howard.

Don Cox achieved many milestones during his, now more than a century on earth, including his 75-year marriage to his wife, Marge (who passed away Feb. 24, 2020), his service in the military, his education at Washington State University, and of course his three-generation family business.

Don started South Bend Pharmacy in South Bend back in 1958, and the store is now into its third generation. Don Cox is currently living in South Bend with son David Cox.