More than one in five job vacancies in Washington in April were in the health-care industry, according to the newest job-vacancy report published by the Employment Security Department.
Department spokesperson Caitlin Cormier says the Spring 2008 Washington Job Vacancy Survey report found that there were more than 16,000 health-care job openings out of an estimated 74,700 unfilled jobs statewide.
Caitlin Cormier, spokesperson, comments
Among the health-care vacancies, 4,300 were for registered nurses. There also were a lot of openings for licensed practical and vocational nurses, nursing aides, orderlies and attendants.
Retail sales ranked second in the number of job openings, with 2,800 vacancies, followed by food preparers and servers.
Statewide, the number of job openings across all professions was about fifteen percent lower this spring than it was a year earlier.
State biologists say one or more packs of gray wolves may be living in north-central Washington’s Methow Valley, which would make them the first resident population of the endangered species in the state in nearly 80 years.
According to the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, packers have made numerous reports of wolves in the high country in the past couple of years, and residents have made increasing reports in lower elevations. The agency is reviewing two photographs and hopes to gather hair samples or feces to confirm through genetic analysis that the animals seen in areas between the Twisp River and Libby Creek are gray wolves.
Officials say photographs have confirmed the presence of gray wolves in northeastern Washington, but those wolves would not be endangered. In March, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service removed the gray wolf from the endangered list in Washington east of Highway 97 because recovered populations in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming are expected to repopulate that area of the state. They are still considered endangered in north-central Washington.
By 1930, wolves were completely killed off in the state through shooting, trapping, poisoning and government bounties. There have been reliable wolf sightings in the Methow dating back to the early 1990s, but only sporadic, unconfirmed reports of wolf packs. (AP)
Central Ferry Park, a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers-owned recreation area located along the Snake River near Pomeroy, Washington, recently earned a place on the list of the Top 100 Family Campgrounds in the United States.
The selection was made last month by ReserveAmerica - a leading recreation reservation and campground management service for thousands of campgrounds across the country. Central Ferry was nominated for the award by Northwest Land Management, a private company that operates the campground as well as Chief Timothy Park for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers under a commercial concession lease.
Almost 4,000 campgrounds were reviewed before the final list of 100 was determined. The selection process was based on “family friendly” criteria such as educational programs, visitor centers, campground amenities, and natural beauty and scenery.
Central Ferry has long been a popular destination in Eastern Washington. Located on an unusually level property for the Snake River canyon, the park features a long freshwater shoreline and two protected bays, a swimming area, shower facilities, launch ramp with a marine pump-out, picnic facilities, full hook-up campground, RV dump station and a concession building.
In 2007, visitation at Central Ferry Park was 26,200.
A conservative group has filed a complaint with Washington’s top election official, saying it has found more than 16,000 cases of teenagers registering to vote before they were legally eligible.
In a small number of those cases, the Evergreen Freedom Foundation says the teens voted illegally before they turned 18. In the past eight years, the group’s search of voter data suggests that 108 young people wrongly voted on 127 ballots - four which were in this year’s presidential primary.
Under Washington law, 17-year-olds can register to vote if they’ll be 18 by the next election. But while most voters focus mainly on November, the “next election” could be sooner - it’s common for school levies, for example, to go to the ballot in springtime.
A spokesman for Secretary of State Sam Reed says a screening system enacted by county election officials in 2006 has dramatically reduced the problem, and state election workers found no evidence of underage voting last year.
The state did find 31 registrations of 17-year-olds who will not be 18 by the August primary, although all will be legal age by the general election on Nov. 4.
Washington’s sophomores and juniors are passing the reading and writing tests of the Washington Assessment of Student Learning at about the same pace as this year’s seniors, except for those students who are learning English as their second language.
In results released Monday, about 85 percent of the class of 2009 have passed both the reading and writing parts of the WASL as of the spring 2008 tests, and 60 percent have also passed the math test or an approved alternative. Among those juniors learning English as a second language, only about 47 percent have passed both the reading and writing tests.
About 75 percent of this year’s sophomore class have passed both the reading and writing tests and nearly 47 percent have also passed the math WASL. Sophomores and juniors still have numerous chances to pass the WASL or an approved alternative, including the August test, but only if they register by the end of June to take those exams.
After 15 months in Iraq, the homecoming for Fort Lewis’s 4th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division will be nearly completed Tuesday when a main body of troops arrives.
At least 800 soldiers of the brigade’s contingent of nearly 4,000 troops will return in three flights throughout the day. After their arrival, all the brigade’s soldiers will be home except for 400 serving with the “trail party,” who are expected to return by the end of June.
The brigade is returning from its first combat deployment and left for Iraq in April 2007 as part of an escalation of U.S. troops ordered by President Bush last year.
The average price of a gallon of gas in Washington has hit $4.22, while Idaho has reached the $4.00 mark.
According to the Triple-A, the national average for regular unleaded is a record-high $4.02 a gallon.
Washington tops Northwest states, while Idaho ranks in the middle of neighboring states, with Wyoming at $3.86, Montana at $3.96 and Utah at $3.97. Oregon drivers are paying $4.18 a gallon.
California has the highest average gas price at $4.44 a gallon, while Missouri and South Carolina tie for the lowest price at $3.83 a gallon.
A new report from Washington State University shows that home sales are continuing to slide in Washington, and while home prices go down, housing affordability is improving.
During the first quarter of 2008, homes sold at a level 3.4 percent lower than the previous quarter, and nearly 30 percent below a year ago. Washington’s annual sales decline is slightly greater than the national rate, but markets in the state remained more robust than in many areas of the Western U. S.
While home sales compared to last year declined in 36 of the state’s 39 counties, three counties showed significant increases, and 12 counties posted increases from the first quarter of this year compared to the previous three months.
The statewide median price of a home sold during the first quarter was nearly $294,000, a 2.4 percent decline from the same period a year ago. However, a total of 20 counties reported higher median prices than in 2007, and nine of those had increases in excess of 10 percent.
Median prices in urban markets ranged from $435,000 in King County to $150,000 in Asotin County.
