Driving my wife to a routine medical appointment in Olympia last week, I was struck as I often am with how poor U.S. Highway 101 is in places between Raymond and the Montesano cutoff. It’s obviously partly a topographical issue — it’s quite a tangle of hills and valleys, the geological equivalent of a crumpled-up piece of wrapping paper. But it also reflects a lack of state attention, with numerous landslides roughly patched with more asphalt instead of being permanently repaired or re-engineered.

There have been many serious wrecks between Raymond and Cosmopolis, most recently a tragic collision involving a state legislator’s wife. In the overall scheme of things, these 22 miles of highway are undoubtedly a minor concern to the Washington State Department of Transportation, which has many bigger fish to fry. And as our friend State Senate Majority Leader Sid Snyder used to observe, Pacific County gets much more back in state spending than we contribute in taxes.

Nevertheless, with a new legislative session right around the corner, serious work on U.S. 101 will once again be on the Chinook Observer’s “squeaky wheel” list for an appropriation. Not only is the highway a risk to we who live in this corner of the state, it is a hazard for the hundreds of thousands of tourists who visit Pacific County beaches for summer fun, storm watching, clam digging and countless other activities. Their safety is a moral and economic imperative for an area that struggles with one of the highest jobless rates in the state. We need high-quality links to the rest of the state.

Advocacy on behalf of local people is among the Observer’s highest purposes. Our family-owned Pacific Northwest company adamantly believes that strengthening our communities is essential for our own success. At a time when big corporations are engaged in a race to the bottom by cutting staff and the attention they devote to local news, we are investing more in our reporters. By highlighting the issues we all care about, we can realistically hope to improve local lives.

In this vein, we’re working now on a story about what plans the state may come up with for the surplus Naselle Youth Camp. It’s an asset that could be put to good use. We’re determined that it not be neglected.

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