By all metrics, it has been a disappointing start to the winter. The usual glimpse of early snow has been washed away by constant — sometimes torrential — rain. It’s anyone’s guess when, or if, we’ll see that familiar white stuff piling up again. There is some hope, however, thanks to one of the Reader photographers’ outdoor cats. While dropping off some sweet treats and saying hello until the talk eventually turned to the dismal start to winter, photographer Karley Coleman said, “They say the animals know, and my outdoor cat has been putting on a lot of extra weight this year.” Coleman referenced a scene from The Long Winter, one of the Little House on the Prairie books by Laura Ingalls Wilder where Pa was telling Laura it was going to be a hard winter.
“Why, how do you know?” Laura asked in surprise.
“The colder the winter will be, the thicker the muskrats build the walls of their houses,” Pa told her. “I never saw a heavier-built muskrats’ house than that one.”
Coleman said: “Shadow is our outdoor cat with the winter weight and I never saw a heavier-built Shadow than this year’s. I still have hope.”
I still have hope, too, Karley. Sometimes it’s all we have left. Here’s to a big, if not tardy, winter.
it never happened
There’s a curious phenomenon called the Mandela Effect, whereby a large group of people remember an event differently than how it actually happened. The term was coined in 2009 by Fiona Broome, after she discovered (along with a lot of others) that she believed that Nelson Mandela had died in the 1980s (he actually died in 2013). Since then, examples of the Mandela Effect have been catalogued and discussed at length on the internet, with new ones added often. Here are some of the more popular examples:
• The children’s book series The Berenstain Bears is often remembered as “Berenstein” spelled with an “e” instead of an “a.” The same goes for Oscar Mayer, which many believe is spelled “Meyer.”
• Sherlock Holmes never once said “Elementary, my dear Watson,” in any of Arthur Conan Doyle’s books about the famous sleuth.
• In the 1939 The Wizard of Oz, the Wicked Witch never said, “Fly, my pretties! Fly!” She actually said, “Fly, fly... fly.”
• The Monopoly man never wore a monocle.
• When people dress us as Tom Cruise’s character in Risky Business, they always wear sunglasses to complete the underwear-and-buttoned-shirt outfit, but Cruise didn’t wear sunglasses in the scene.
• Many remembered the Fruit of the Loom logo including a cornucopia, but the logo has never used that image.
• Darth Vader never said, “Luke, I am your father,” in Star Wars. What he actually said: “No, I am your father.”
• My favorite local Mandela Effect is using “Third Street Pier,” when the actual name is “Third Avenue Pier.”
DEAR READERS,
Well, folks, it’s been an interesting year.
Normally, our 52nd edition is the final one of the year, but this time around we’re on early deadlines for Christmas and New Year’s Eve due to the holidays falling on our usual distribution day of Thursday; so, for the first time in our history, we have a 53rd edition coming out on Dec. 31. For non-newspaper geeks, this is probably useless information, but for us ink dorks, this is like finding a living specimen of a species thought long ago extinct.
This week, we’re featuring our annual “Year in Review,” which encapsulates four pages of newsprint and almost destroys Editor-in-Chief Zach Hagadone, who has the unwanted duty of thumbing through a year of bad news stories to find out which ones stink the most. I don’t know if any of you enjoy reliving trauma, but that’s what it’s like every year when we look back on the stories we covered. If you see Zach shambling around town, buy the man a beer for crying out loud. He deserves it.
Our position as journalists means we often have to highlight the less-thanawesome parts of our world on a weekly basis. Trust me, this isn’t what I envisioned for my life — wading through toxic sludge, listening to someone lying to my face, watching people tear each other apart and reporting it on our news pages. But it’s necessary because ignorance isn’t bliss. It’s a copout. You can drive around for months not knowing something is catastrophically wrong with your car, but it won’t stop the axle from breaking or engine from seizing. It may not make you happier to know what’s wrong with the vehicle, but at least you’ll have the opportunity to fix it and avoid disaster. We all need to know what’s happening in our city, state, nation and world.
But — and this is a big but — learn how to turn off the faucet. Find ways to relieve stress that are healthy, like exercise, meditation and social connection. Embrace the magic in life instead of just focusing on the ugliness. Christmas isn’t just about buying people a bunch of gifts. It’s about connecting with the ones you love and remembering that we’re all in this together. I’m pulling for us. I’m pulling for us all.
–
Ben Olson, publisher
111 Cedar Street, Suite 9 Sandpoint, ID 83864 208-946-4368 sandpointreader.com
Contributing Artists: Ward Tollbom (cover), Ben Olson, Ron Bedford, Bill Borders
Contributing Writers: Zach Hagadone, Ben Olson, Soncirey Mitchell, Lorraine H. Marie, Brenden Bobby, Lauren Necochea, Marcia Pilgeram
Submit Stories To: stories@sandpointreader.com
Printed Weekly At: Tribune Publishing Co. Lewiston, ID
Subscription Price: $185 per year
Website Designed By: Keokee
The Sandpoint Reader is a weekly publication owned by Ben Olson and Keokee. It is devoted to the arts, entertainment, bluster, politics and lifestyle in and around Sandpoint, Idaho.
We hope to provide a quality alternative by offering honest, in-depth reporting that reflects the intelligence and interests of our diverse and growing community.
The Reader is printed on recycled paper using soy-based ink. Leftover copies are collected and recycled weekly, or burned in bonfires to appease the gods of journalism. For back issues, contact the publisher. Free to all, limit two per person, please.
Letter to the Editor Policy:
We welcome letters to the editor on all relevant topics. Please, no more than 200 words, no excessive profanity or libelous statements and no trolls. Please elevate the discussion and stay on topic. Letters will be edited to comply with the above requirements. Opinons expressed in these pages are those of the writers, not necessarily the publisher. Send to: letters@sandpointreader.com
About the Cover:
This week’s cover is a painting by Ward Tollbom of the old bridge entrance to Sandpoint City Beach. Read about Ward’s retirement from Hen’s Tooth Studio on Page 16. Merry Christmas to all!
Environmental protection groups sue over Trestle Creek adjacent marina
By Soncirey Mitchell Reader Staff
The Center for Biological Diversity and the Idaho Conservation League filed suit Dec. 18 against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Army Corps of Engineers, challenging their permit approvals for the proposed Idaho Club marina and housing development near the mouth of Trestle Creek. The Corps subsequently put a halt to construction work with a Dec. 22 letter, which alleged that the then-ongoing work violated the permit’s conditions of approval.
The organizations filed a similar lawsuit in 2022, arguing both times that the development would negatively impact the local bull trout population.
The Center further announced its intention to file an additional lawsuit against the USFW and Corps for allegedly violating the Endangered Species Act.
The Dec. 18 suit further argues that developers have violated the USFW and Corps’ conditions of approval, which stipulated that construction would take place in the offseason when the North Branch is not flowing. After reports from ICL and CBD on the construction at the site, the Corps issued a Dec. 22 letter to developers warning that the work “was not in compliance with the terms and conditions of your permit.”
As stated in the letter, signed by Chief Kelly Urbanek of the Corps Regulatory Branch, “Work occurring in the NBTC [North Branch of Trestle Creek] cannot occur until the stream has no-flow or dry conditions. Work in the marina area cannot occur until such time that the restoration of the North Branch of Trestle Creek has been completed.”
In a Dec. 23 news release from CBD and ICL, the organizations estimated that, with
current precipitation levels, the north branch will not run dry until August of 2026. Work on the adjacent housing development is not impacted by these limitations.
“We’re glad to learn the Corps took action to stop the Idaho Club’s very damaging work that is in violation of their permit conditions, and urge them to reevaluate the entire project,” said Ekstrom. “Unfortunately, significant harm has already occurred to this critical habitat. We will continue watching to ensure the stop work order is adhered to and will continue to seek repair and restoration of the damage done.”
The proposed development, currently helmed by Valiant Idaho, LLC and Valiant Idaho II, LLC, has gone through multiple iterations over the past 17 years, including a significant reduction in scope approved in November by the Bonner County board of commissioners. The current proposal includes seven single-family dwelling units with private docks, an 88-slip public marina, a breakwater, a pedestrian bridge, a boat bilge pump-out station, a 46-space
parking lot and boat storage.
Developers also plan to remove existing docks and a culvert, known as the North Branch Outlet, which they argue will help direct juvenile bull trout into the creek’s healthier main branch and away from shallow-water predators.
Despite the reduced proposal, environmental protection agencies argue that the development’s construction and future use near the mouth of Trestle Creek would negatively impact area bull trout, which are listed as threatened in all of their known habitats — including Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington — and are protected under the Endangered Species Act.
“If we want to see bull trout survive and possibly even thrive, we need to do everything we can to save them now,” stated ICL North Idaho Director Jennifer Ekstrom in a recent news release. “Protecting the critical habitat near the mouth of Trestle Creek is imperative.”
According to ICL and CBD, more than half of the Pend Oreille Basin’s bull trout
Corps temporarily halts construction
population spawns in Trestle Creek, making it “one of the Pacific Northwest’s most important spawning streams.”
The fish not only grow from eggs to fry within the stream, but also migrate between it and Lake Pend Oreille to spawn multiple times throughout their lives.
“With construction crews already plowing ahead, federal agencies need to protect threatened bull trout from this misguided zombie project once and for all,” said Sarah Brown, Northern Rockies staff attorney for CBD, in the same news release. “Carving up the North Branch of the creek could worsen polluted runoff into Lake Pend Oreille and put crosshairs on bull trout right in their critical spawning area. It’s time for the agencies to seriously consider the many threats this project poses.”
The Dec. 18 lawsuit filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Idaho argues that the USFW and Corps “failed to consider the various ways that the marina and houses may harm bull trout and their critical habitat, resulting in violations of the Administrative Procedure Act
and National Environmental Policy Act,” according to the release.
The 2022 lawsuit made a similar argument, though the development at the time included a 105-slip community dock, 13 townhouses, 83 condominium units and a pool, among other amenities. The Corps subsequently pulled its permit, which developers later reapplied for and received.
In addition to the aforementioned permits, the development received various permissions from the U.S. Coast Guard, the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, Idaho Department of Lands and the Idaho Department of Water Resources.
“The Fish and Wildlife Service’s original biological opinion determined that the development would harm and possibly kill bull trout. The agency recently reversed course, however, and now claims that the housing, marina and creek reroute are unlikely to harm bull trout,” continued the news release.
For more information on the proposed development, visit bonnercountyid.gov/FileMOD0003-24.
New matching gift doubles Panida donations until year’s end
By Reader Staff
There’s good news — and even better news — for fans of the Panida Theater. The good news is that with contributions made since Thanksgiving, the Panida has fulfilled the final matching donations provided by Ting since 2022 for the Panida Century Fund dedicated to theater restoration.
“We are profoundly grateful to Ting for their huge and very tangible support,” said Panida Executive Director Heather White. “Over the past three years, their match inspired $200,000 in donations from local individuals — which Ting doubled. Ting’s support has been amazing.”
And the better news: A Panida board member has just announced that they will now match, dollar for dollar, every donation made before Thursday, Jan. 1, 2026, up to a total of $10,000.
“Our board member, who wants to be anonymous, obviously hopes it will motivate others to donate in this short window we have now before the end of the year,” said White.
The funds will be earmarked specifically for theater operations, and the Panida’s operating budget could use the boost. Like virtually all nonprofit performing arts centers, the Panida relies on donations to both maintain the historic
building as well as offset operating costs for all the concerts, films, plays and events that happen there.
“Ticket sales help, but ticket sales alone can’t meet all costs. It is the community support that makes the Panida possible,” said White.
“For any who are able to donate now, just know that each dollar you contribute be-
fore Jan. 1 is being doubled by this generous commitment from our board member,” she added. Donations may be made online at panida.org, or by check sent or dropped off at the Panida Theater, 300 N. First Ave., Sandpoint, ID 83864.
Performers at the KRFY Holiday Spectacular on Dec. 5 at the Panida Theater. Courtesy photo
County approves Deerfield subdivision preliminary plat
By Soncirey Mitchell Reader Staff
After extending its Dec. 17 meeting due to high winds, the Bonner County board of commissioners met Dec. 18 to unanimously approve the preliminary plat for the proposed Deerfield subdivision off of Baldy Mountain Road. Commissioners previously denied the application in September, citing uncertainty regarding the property’s floodplain, which necessitated a Letter of Map Revision from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The proposed development — managed by outgoing Sandpoint City Councilor Rick Howarth — would create 24 residential lots on a 32.67-acre plot. The suburban-zoned property borders the Sandpoint-owned lot used by Baldfoot Disc Golf Course and intersects Syringa Creek, raising concerns about flooding, stormwater drainage and pollution.
The Bonner County Zoning Commission voted unanimously in June to recommend approval of the preliminary
plat, subject to conditions, which included a stormwater runoff and erosion control plan. The developers applied for a Letter of Map Revision in May, but FEMA had not yet established base flood elevations for the property by the time the commissioners heard the application in August.
The BOCC continued the hearing to September, at which time it denied the application — though the developers had fulfilled every requirement for the preliminary plat — because FEMA had yet to respond. County Code does not technically require such a letter for preliminary plat approval; only for building location permits, which the developers have yet to submit. Regardless, the commissioners argued that they could not confirm that the subdivision would be “reasonably safe from flooding,” as mandated by Bonner County Code, without the amended map.
“Base flood elevation is defined as the height flood waters are expected to reach during a base flood, which has a 1% chance of occurring each year. So, a common
term for that is your 100-year event,” said Dan Tadic of HMH Engineering, representing Deerfield, LLC., at the Dec. 18 meeting.
“They’re important to ensure a building site is ‘reasonably safe from flooding’ and they help establish insurance rates and premiums toward development in those areas,” he added.
Developers submitted estimates to both FEMA and the county, putting all developable land 30 feet above base flood elevation. The stormwater management plan also incorporates a pool to catch runoff, which has an outfall 1.1 feet above the BFE and berms 5 feet above the BFE.
“That’s a constructed stormwater pond that’s receiving all the runoff from the road surfacing and future lot development, driveways, rooftops, etc.,” said Tadic.
Water Resources Engineer Megan Nge of CDM Smith, representing FEMA, responded to the estimates Dec. 9, stating, “Looks great,” and advising developers to publish a notice regarding the map change. The notice in
the Bonner County Daily Bee’s Legals for Dec. 17 fulfilled FEMA’s final requirement for a LOMR, though the agency has yet to submit the official letter as of press time.
“I understand the concern of the impact of increased development that people have expressed,” said Commissioner Asia Williams. “That’s always the case when a subdivision comes around and increases the density. But there is an obligation of the county to balance the rights of both sides; and, based on this record and what this is zoned
BOCC issues additional disaster declaration
By Soncirey Mitchell Reader Staff
The Bonner County board of commissioners voted unanimously Dec. 23 to reaffirm a disaster declaration for Bonner County following recent wind storms on Dec. 17, which left thousands without power and canceled area schools. BOCC Chair Brian Domke made the verbal emergency declaration Dec. 18, adding to a previous disaster declaration issued Dec. 16 for severe flooding.
“A severe wind storm has caused widespread damage, creating power outages and an imminent threat to structures, infrastructure, public utilities, private and public property, and/or human life within
Bonner County,” said Commissioner Ron Korn, reading the proposed memorandum at the Dec. 23 meeting.
Following the disaster declaration, the county began working with the Idaho Department of Emergency Management toward a state-level declaration, to be issued by Gov. Brad Little on Bonner County’s behalf. Little gave his verbal approval Dec. 15, allowing the county to begin the application process; which, if accepted, will allow the state to match up to 50% of any county funds used for emergency repairs.
The BOCC held a brief special meeting Dec. 22, taking the next step in the application process by unanimously voting to elect Emer-
gency Management Director Bob Howard as the county’s representative to the state for the duration of the emergency. The commissioners confirmed his appointment in a letter that also estimated the total cost of damages to county infrastructure at $656,952, authorizing Howard to spend up to, but not exceeding, that amount on repairs.
“[Road and Bridge] Director [Jason] Topp has assessed the current known damage cost to Bonner County roads and associated right-of-way property, such as the shoulder of the road and adjacent embankments, and then developed a rough order of magnitude cost estimate for the repair of the damages, which he estimates to be
approximately $656,952,” said Domke at the Dec. 22 meeting. That figure does not take into account work done by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which previously worked with county officials to stabilize riverbanks and grade washed-out roads with gravel. State funds, should they be awarded, will help to return roads to their previous conditions.
for, the rights are balanced on both sides.
“They have the right to develop at this rate — it’s a suburban zone,” Williams said. “Just because it increases that density doesn’t mean that the rights of the other property owners around there are taken away.”
Commissioner Ron Korn made the motion to approve the preliminary plat, given the additional information.
their portion that they were doing on Friday, and we’ve still got over 2,000 feet of road that we’ve still got to fix shoulders on and bring them back to where they were before — a lot of asphalt to put in, gravel, so on and so forth,” said Topp. Depending on funds provided by the state, Domke warned that improvements to county infrastructure that were previously planned by Bonner County Road and Bridge may be postponed, as emergency repairs will eat into the 2026 budget.
“The Army Corps finished
The Deerfield subdivision located south of Baldy Mountain Road. Courtesy image
Idaho Supreme Court schedules arguments on private education tax credit
By Ryan Suppe IdahoEdNews.org
The Idaho Supreme Court on Dec. 19 scheduled oral arguments in a lawsuit challenging the state’s new private education tax credit.
Each side will have 30 minutes on Friday, Jan. 23, 2026 to make arguments and answer questions from the court’s five justices, according to an order from Chief Justice G. Richard Bevan.
The lawsuit seeks to block the state’s first private school choice program from taking effect. In September, a coalition that includes the Idaho Education Association, the Moscow School District and advocacy groups filed a petition asking the court to declare House Bill 93’s “Parental Choice Tax Credit” unconstitutional.
The tax credit offers non-public school students up to $5,000 — or $7,500 for students with special needs — to offset tuition and other education expenses.
The coalition of plaintiffs has argued that the program violates a provision in Idaho’s Constitution that directs the Legislature to “establish and maintain a general, uniform and thorough system of
public, free common schools.”
In a Dec. 19 statement, the coalition wrote, “We welcome the opportunity to definitively address a deeply flawed law that tries to bypass the clear constitutional mandate to establish and maintain a single, uniform system of public schools funded by taxpayers.”
Attorney General Raúl Labrador’s office is representing the Idaho State Tax Commission, the agency responsible for administering the tax credit. The Legislature also intervened in the lawsuit, hiring private attorneys to defend the legislation that Republican lawmakers passed in February.
The application period for the tax credit is scheduled to go live Thursday, Jan. 15, eight days before the Supreme Court arguments.
A spokesperson for the Tax Commission did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Idaho Education News is a nonprofit online news outlet based in Boise and supported by grants from the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation, the Education Writers Association and the Solutions Journalism Network. Read more at idahoednews.org.
Bits ’n’ Pieces
From east, west and beyond
The Department of Veterans Affairs is expected to eliminate up to 35,000 unfilled positions, after already losing 30,000 employees this year, The Washington Post reported.
In a recent Vanity Fair interview, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles dropped several revelations, mainly that key members of the administration are dysfunctional and make haphazard decisions without regard for any sense of public duty.
Wiles said she was “misrepresented” in the two-part article, but the author said everything quoted was on tape. Wiles’ revelations included: President Donald Trump wants to keep blowing up boats until Venezuela’s president “cries uncle”; Trump has an “alcoholic’s personality”; Vice President JD Vance switched from being a never-Trumper to MAGA for political reasons; some of Elon Musk’s tweet actions have reflected his drug use; and, the Russell Vought — the director of Management and Budget and a key author of Project 2025), is a “rightwing absolute zealot.”
In his announcement of $1,776 for American troops and veterans, Trump claimed the price tag would come from tariff funds. But, various media reported, the funds will come from a military housing stipend, making it “rebranded, repackaged and redelivered.” The expected price tag: $2.6 billion.
The Department of Justice failed a Congressional mandate to release the Jeffrey Epstein files — “all unclassified records, documents, communications and investigative material,” as required by federal law. Congress had also instructed, in a bipartisan vote, that redactions have a written justification, and nothing was to be withheld on the basis “of embarrassment, reputational harm or political sensitivity.” Several Congress members said almost every condition of release was violated, and some redactions spanned pages. The DOJ said more would be revealed in the future.
According to the chair of World Without Exploitation, which works to end sexual exploitation, failure to comply with the release implies impunity for the powerful, who are prioritized over justice for survivors. Meanwhile, lawmakers are considering contempt charges against Attorney General Pam Bondi.
By Lorraine H. Marie Reader Contributor
The New York Times has explored how sex offender Epstein (who died in jail allegedly from suicide) became so rich and influential. Reporters found a volley of cons, cunning schemes and young beautiful women used as leverage. Stories were gleaned from Epstein’s former colleagues, bosses and partners who had been tricked by Epstein into handing over money that padded his increasing wealth.
Research from 2000 defending the safety of the herbicide glyphosate, used in Roundup, has been retracted because it was ghostwritten by Roundup, the Lever wrote.
ProPublica reported that Trump’s EPA is nearly doubling the amount of formaldehyde it considers safe to breathe. The chemical is used in building materials, leather goods and craft supplies, and can cause cancer, miscarriage, asthma and health issues due to altering DNA.
The Lever also reported that 79% of holiday shoppers plan to use their credit cards, and Americans have a record-high $1.2 trillion in credit card debt.
According to ProPublica, following the Trump administration’s USAID cuts, thousands of people in Kenya have starved to death and many others have died due to inability to fight off infections due to malnutrition and hunger. Anemic pregnant women have been reportedly eating mud, and parents have to choose which of their children to feed.
After the recent Bondi Beach mass shooting in Australia that killed 15 and wounded 40 during local Hanukkah celebrations, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced a program to buy back thousands of firearms. Under consideration: a cap on the number of guns a person can own.
Trump recently said he will nullify any executive order from former President Joe Biden that was signed with an autopen. But, many media outlets reported that Trump has admitted to his own use of autopen, and he has no authority to nullify Biden’s pardons.
Blast from the past: “I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.” — Charles Dickens, renowned English novelist and social critic (1812-1870), as quoted by the character Ebenezer Scrooge in his iconic work A Christmas Carol.
Bouquets:
• Here’s a Bouquet to Ward Tollbom, who is retiring from running Hen’s Tooth Studio in downtown Sandpoint after more than three decades (see Page 16 for the feature story). Ward is old-school Sandpoint, bornand-raised, and has been a fixture on First Avenue for as long as I can remember. I wish him luck finding more time to fish, hunt and paint those beautiful pieces of art. Thanks, Ward.
Barbs:
• The U.S. Department of Justice was given a legal deadline of Dec. 19 to release documents related to deceased sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. As anyone could have guessed, they failed miserably. The released documents were so heavily redacted, they showed more black bars than white spaces. What has been released, however, paints a damning portrait of President Donald Trump, along with other high-profile figures. Several sections include testimony from survivors who were underage at the time, claiming Trump engaged in sexual activities with them. One document alleges that Trump raped a 13-yearold. In another letter from Epstein to Larry Nassar (who was convicted of sexually assaulting young gymnasts), Epstein wrote: “Good luck! We shared one thing... our love and caring for young ladies and the hope they’d reach their full potential. Our president also shares our love of young, nubile girls. When a young beauty walked by he loved to ‘grab snatch,’ whereas we ended up snatching grub in the mess halls of the system. Life is unfair.”
Listen, I don’t care who is in the documents; Republican, Democrat, royalty, celebrity. Prosecute them all, every last one. Don’t get distracted by talk of invading Venezuela or Greenland. We can’t just let this go. It’s time for the ultra-wealthy monsters to finally be held to account for their actions.
Intrepid storm service…
Dear editor, Kudos and thanks to the intrepid linemen/women who faced the ferocious windstorm on Dec. 17 and restored power in most challenging conditions. Great job!
Ted Wert Sagle
Kudos to carolers…
Dear editor, We wanted to share a heartfelt thank you to the Christmas carolers downtown on the evening of the 18th. Hearing our favorite holiday songs was a welcome reminder of the season. Moments like that are why we love the Sandpoint community. With gratitude,
Jeremiah and Danna Greenfield Cocolalla
‘The
dumps’…
Dear editor,
According to Google, Bonner County has approximately 23,400 households. A household is different from the population. It is where those folks are living, and it may be a household of five or six people or a household of one.
Our current population is somewhere around 55,000 souls. Can you imagine the amount of waste we accumulate daily around here?
Several years ago, it was decided to no longer include our free tickets to the “dumps” in our tax bills. They would be mailed separately at a cost of roughly $18,252.
This year, those stickers were accompanied by a brochure. Now, “if” the county got a great deal on the brochure cost, it would have been around $30 for 25. They would have needed around 936 batches of 25 brochures, costing $28,080. Add the postage, and it means the county spent $46,332 to inform you that your refuse fee has gone up.
I have lived in rural counties long enough to know that we can again commence with throwing old tires and mattresses into any gully along with the dead TV sets. Wire, old sheet rock and the rest can just be tossed into the brush.
K.L. Huntley Sandpoint
Send letters to the editor to letters@sandpointreader. com. The word limit is 200 words. No trolls.
COMMUNITY
Local author releases final installment of TheMysteriousPendOreillePaddler
By Reader Staff
Author Whitney Rae Palmer has released The Mysterious Pend Oreille Paddler, Part 3, a conclusion to her comical series about the local water serpent set along the scenic shores of Lake Pend Oreille. The book is now available on Amazon, directly from the artist and at select locations in Sandpoint.
First introduced in 2016, The Mysterious Pend Oreille Paddler series has entranced readers of all ages with its blend of humor, local folklore and historical storytelling of the infamous lake monster of the Inland Pacific Northwest. Part 3 delivers a long-awaited conclusion while deepening the intrigue surrounding the elusive Pend Oreille Paddler with colorful, whimsical rhymes.
In this final installment, Palmer weaves together subtle morals of the story, as the Paddler’s befriended protagonist (Jillian McGhee) dives into an underwater adventure.
Longtime fans of the series will find closure, while new readers can still be drawn into the humor and playfulness that defines Palmer’s storytelling.
“This story has stayed with me for years,” Palmer said. “Illustrating Part 3 felt like finishing a journey — both for the characters and for myself. I’m excited to finally share this ending with readers. My inner child and transcendental inclinations inspired by growing up on the shores of Lake Pend Oreille are characterized in this limericky take on the legend.”
beauty of the area, giving the series a strong sense of place that resonates with regional readers and cryptozoological mystery fans alike — with a strong vein of humor that is appropriate for all ages.
Palmer’s writing and painting are inspired by the ephemeral surroundings and her experiences in the wild
The book is for sale online at amazon.com and locally at Sandpoint Books, the Bonner County History Museum, Creations and Azalea Handpicked Style.
The cover of The Mysterious Pend Oreille Paddler, Part 3 by Whitney Rae Palmer. Courtesy image
When it comes to protecting public lands, Democrats have the strong track record
By Lauren Necochea Reader Contributor
For generations, Idaho Democrats have protected the places that make this state what it is. We believe our public lands belong to all of us, not just the highest-bidding billionaires.
Idaho Democratic Sen. Frank Church led the fight to pass the Wilderness Act and the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. As Interior Secretary, former-Democratic Gov. Cecil Andrus drove the effort that secured passage of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, the largest conservation law in U.S. history.
Today, Democrats like Rep. Ilana Rubel, D-Boise, are pushing to keep access from shrinking when state
GOOD NEWS?
By Ben Olson Reader Staff
Between the cracks of all the negative stories that have flooded the news cycle in 2025 are a handful of stories that are, dare we say, good news? Here’s a quick sampling:
• In what has been described as a “hopeful trend,” deforestation has slowed in every region of the world over the past decade, according to a report published by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization in October. The FAO reported that the world has lost 10.9 million hectares of forest annually over 10 years — down significantly from the 13.6 million and 17.6 million hectares lost the previous two decades, respectively.
• A lot of statistics concerning American life began moving in the right direction. Homicides across 42 major U.S. cities fell about 17% in the first half of the year compared to 2024, and most other serious violent crimes
land is sold. Idaho voters back this work.
In contrast, Idaho Republican Rep. Russ Fulcher is trying to end that tradition with his move to put federally managed public lands into state control. Let’s call it what
were down, too. Drug overdose deaths dropped 27% — the biggest one-year decline the CDC has ever recorded. Finally, after years of upward trends, the U.S. suicide rate ticked down slightly in 2024 to about 48,800 deaths. Motor vehicle deaths have fallen for several years in a row, with another 8% decline during the first half of the year, even as Americans drive more miles.
• Americans are losing weight and drinking less. Gallup found that only 54% of Americans say they drink alcohol at all — the lowest percentage since the question was first asked in 1939. Among drinkers, frequency is down and per-capita alcohol consumption has ticked lower since the 1980s. Teen drinking has fallen even faster, with the share of high school seniors who say they drink dropping from three in four in the 1990s to roughly two in five today. Also, Gallup’s National Health and Well-Being Index shows adult obesity falling from about 40% in 2022 to 37% in 2025.
it is: a hoax. An outright selloff can’t survive public scrutiny, so he’s rebranding the same years-old scheme.
But Idaho can’t afford to take on millions of additional acres. Managing federal public lands in Idaho costs more than $500 million a year, and a severe fire season can drive costs even higher. That includes suppression, roads, enforcement and recreation sites. Without a dedicated, permanent funding stream, pressure mounts to sell land to close the gap.
This is where Idaho’s own history matters. State-owned land is not run like federal public lands. Endowment lands must maximize financial return for specific beneficiaries. That revenue-first mandate puts access at risk.
Since statehood, Idaho has sold off more than 1.7 million acres. Much of that land
moved into private ownership, where access becomes optional and the public has little leverage. Look at what happened in Teton County this year. A fifth-generation ranching family had leased and cared for a parcel. The Republican-controlled Land Board decided to sell it after a wealthy newcomer set his sights on it.
An overwhelming majority of Idahoans oppose selling public lands, but there are dissenters. A decade ago, I gave a budget presentation where a man with a far-right outlook asked why Idaho didn’t just sell land to fund basic services. He had just moved here. He didn’t value our access for hunting, fishing and recreation. He was willing to trade permanent loss for one-time dollars.
Fulcher’s congressional record lines up with that fringe view. He supported Utah
Republican Sen. Mike Lee’s amendment tied to selling off thousands of acres of federal public land earlier this year. He refuses to join bipartisan efforts that block major federal land sales or transfers.
Public lands power rural communities, keep agriculture working, provide grazing space for ranches and protect our water. Idaho Democrats will keep fighting for better management without surrendering access.
Fulcher’s takeover is a backdoor sell-off. Idaho should demand better stewardship and stronger leadership.
Lauren Necochea is chair of the Idaho Democratic Party and a former District 19 legislator. Necochea spent a decade leading nonprofit programs dedicated to research and advocacy in tax policy, health care and children’s issues.
Lauren Necochea. File photo
Science: Mad about
the solarwinds hack
By Brenden Bobby Reader Columnist
It’s important to practice good cybersecurity when you’re at home or at your job. Don’t click links you can’t verify. Don’t open emails from people you don’t recognize trying to threaten or scare you. Don’t explore your well-read friend’s post littered with bad punctuation and grammar, their account is likely compromised. It might scare you to know that you can have perfect digital hygiene and still be critically compromised by bad actors without your knowledge. This is true of anyone from a casual email user to the White House itself. How? The SolarWinds hack in 2019 is a frightening illumination of the digital vulnerability of our modern digital world.
The scope of the SolarWinds hack was massive. More than 18,000 entities were compromised, including nine U.S. agencies and numerous Fortune 500 companies. The White House itself was compromised by this hack, and the scariest part of all? The entities that were affected by this cyberattack weren’t even the ones responsible for it. No one in these companies opened a fishy email, no one gave away information to a scammer over the phone. Instead, the exploit was from a piece of support software used by all of these organizations, produced by a company in Texas called SolarWinds.
Software is a lot like any other manufactured good. Let’s compare a piece of software that manages scheduling to a hamburger. This piece of software is made up of a lot of little components — software is very rarely coded up from scratch by a single individual or entity. It’s built on preexisting programming that has to link up with
other programs created by other businesses. It’s how the world runs. After all, your hamburger isn’t just a patty, it’s beef and lettuce and tomatoes and wheat and cheese that were all grown by different people to build one product.
Occasionally, there may be a listeria outbreak in lettuce, which could compromise your burger and give you a really bad weekend. Essentially, this is exactly what happened with the SolarWinds hack; but, instead of listeria, it was a Russian hacking group using a preexisting exploit with the intention of hiding in this obscure program until it flowed downstream in the supply chain to affect much bigger entities than a software company in Texas.
This is called a supply chain hack, and it is exceedingly common and scary for consumers. An obscure vendor or subcontractor serving a very large company that serves a vast number of consumers is compromised, and suddenly the entire network is at risk. You, as a consumer, are completely powerless to deal with the consequences.
Chances are, you don’t have the legal muscle to go after the company that indirectly infected you — it’s likely you aren’t even aware of how to find the vendor or subcontractor that’s actually at fault when your personal data is stolen. Such a level of powerlessness in this age is something we aren’t used to, but it’s something we’re all at risk of at every moment.
Let’s look at what happened. SolarWinds is a company that creates IT management software. Chances are, unless you’re an IT professional, you haven’t heard of them, as they sell exclusively to other companies to improve workflows for the IT field. Though you
may not have heard of them, it’s very likely that the software they’ve built has peripherally touched your life in one way or another. Its tools were used by every U.S. telecommunications company, every branch of the U.S. military and the White House itself.
The actual nature of the attack isn’t precisely known. It’s presumed that hackers exploited a zero-day vulnerability (a loophole or exploit that is so new it hasn’t been patched yet), a brute force attack or a targeted phishing attack on SolarWinds engineers.
It was likely a mix of these tactics, with malicious software being injected through a link that appeared legitimate, exploiting a bug in Apple Safari that wouldn’t be patched for two years. Essentially, it existed to circumvent needing a user to manually log in every time they visited a webpage, but came with the added risk of also allowing malicious and harmful code to be downloaded when visiting the page. At this point, it takes information from the stored cookies, which includes critical login information for social media and internal systems. At that point, the hackers had a skeleton key for everything attached to SolarWinds’ software.
Here’s the scary part: Once the hackers had full access to SolarWinds’ systems, they did... nothing. At least not yet. They didn’t break systems worldwide with ransomware or wipers. Instead, they gained access to Orion, an important tool used by network engineers around the world, and implanted a Trojan into the software every time it updated. This gave them a backdoor into any system that used Orion.
Even scarier, the attackers disassembled a legitimate cybersecurity tool used by many of these entities, Cobalt
Strike, and reengineered it to maintain access and mask their presence in affected devices. This was an extremely high-level operation, and one revealed to be perpetrated by the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service.
It is projected that hackers had access to the highest echelons of government for more than a year. These infiltrators had to custom-build tools to siphon data for each agency once they had access, which also meant they couldn’t just take all of the data in one massive download. They had
to sneak bits and pieces out at a time, which may have worked to mitigate the damage of the attack.
Wondering how they were finally exposed? A cybersecurity engineer, Stephen Eckels, working for the company FireEye (now part of Trellix), noticed Cobalt Strike was being used on their system seemingly on its own. From there, they were able to trace injected code to a server extracting data, and expose the breach to customers affected by the exploit.
Stay curious, 7B.
Random Corner
• Decorated trees date back to Germany during the Middle Ages, with German and European settlers popularizing Christmas trees in America by the early 19th century.
A New York woodsman named Mark Carr is credited as the first person to open a Christmas tree lot in the U.S. in 1851.
• Now a beloved Christmas tradition, the TV special A Charlie Brown Christmas — inspired by Charles Schulz’s Peanuts comic strip — was first rejected by CBS executives. When it finally aired in 1965, almost half of all TV sets in the U.S. were tuned to the broadcast. The show went on to win an Emmy, a Peabody and gave birth to the “Charlie Brown Christmas tree,” a reference to a small, skinny tree that still showed spirit.
• The origins of the “Christmas pickle” are a bit murky (or shall I say briny?), but the practice of hiding a green pickle among the ornaments on a tree so that the first child who finds it gets to open the first gift grew from a Woolworths marketing gimmick from the late 1800s, when a retailer received
imported German ornaments shaped like pickles and needed a sales pitch to offload them.
• Relatively new to the tradition is “Elf on the Shelf,” which became popular in 2005 when Carol Aebersold and her daughter Chanda Bell published the book Elf on the Shelf: A Christmas Tradition that was sold with the creepy toy.
• Yule logs were part of the ancient winter solstice celebrations that date back to at least 1184 C.E., when Europeans burned a special log on the hearth as a winter tradition. It was Americans who turned the tradition into a TV spectacle when, in 1966, WPIX-TV aired a continuous 17-second loop of a fireplace for three hours along with holiday music.
• Early versions of advent calendars started in 1903 in Germany, when a publisher offered a way for children to count down to Christmas by opening one “door” a day to reveal a Bible passage, poem or small gift. Modern calendars have evolved to include gifts like small bottles of wine, chocolates or even action figures.
On the blessings we enjoy
By Sandy Compton Reader Columnist
As we approach the new year, we might remember that in spite of the craziness of politics — or maybe because of it — we who live in the United States and most of the “First World” are still the luckiest of generations. I was reminded of this when the power went out at home last week. After four hours of wondering when it would return, it did. Thank you, Northern Lights! We made some big mistakes when building hydroelectric dams and coal-fired power plants, but the benefits are still tremendous. And they are spread across our continent in relatively affordable form.
My grandparents lived without power for the majority of their lives; including 30-plus years on a hardscrabble farm in Montana. In the 1920s, Grandpa and his neighbors attempted a generating plant in a nearby creek, but, as Grandpa explained, “a spring freshet washed it away.”
Once the REA strung power to their farmstead, their lives got easier. They never had a refrigerator, relying instead on a root cellar and a “cool cupboard.” They did buy a freezer — a huge Kelvinator that sat on the back porch and died about 10 years after Grandma did.
We’ve had some fall “freshets” of late — an understatement, for sure — which caused big damage to Pacific Northwest infrastructure. Still, we had the infrastructure in the first place. Some roads washed away with the arrival of the atmospheric river. All of our snow washed away. Ski areas are not open as I write this. But they will be again. (In fact, a bit of snow is falling outside the window right now.) We have the machines to fix the roads, and the crews that run them are already good at it. When a road washes out in Bolivia or parts of Africa, it might be out for a year or more. Much more. A few hours or even days without power may be inconvenient, but if we put it in perspective of the larger world, our blessings far outweigh the problem. And many of us have backup systems large and small that will help us get through that, if necessary. The technology alone is a huge
blessing. This morning, as I wondered how far the effects of the outage went and when the power would be on again, my cell phone still worked. A nearby cell tower is running on auxiliary. If you or I fall over for some medical reason while the power’s out, the lights are still on in the emergency room. In many places on the planet, there are no cell towers or emergency rooms, much less ways to keep the lights on and communications available.
We get whiny when the produce section is short of crimini mushrooms. But we still have produce sections and a transportation network that delivers the criminis. And romaine. And croutons. And hamburger. And bread. And ketchup. And milk. And cheese. And chicken breasts. And broccoli. And beer. (Very important, that.)
(I once lost an entire newspaper business as a result of mentioning beer in an opinion piece. I was pissed at the time, but it turned out to be a big blessing. Blessings come in many forms.)
In spite of the plethora of violence we witness via our newsfeeds, we still live in one of the safest places and eras in history. No Mongol hordes or Viking raiders are coming to visit. The Third Reich is not gathering families to ship to Auschwitz. No tanks are ranging through our towns and cities.
In my opinion, $900 billion for “defense” is excessive, especially when much of it is spent on “offense” and we have hungry and homeless people at home. But the net effect is a majority of a population that can sleep well at night; one that doesn’t react to the sound of an approaching helicopter or jet with abject terror.
Though Donnie Trump seems intent on starting something, no massive wars are surging across the Western Hemisphere (I find it amazing how much damage the poophead-in-chief has done in less than a year in office, and heartening to see resistance rising on both sides of the aisle). Another blessing we still have — one of our greatest, I think — is the ability to remove poopheads-in-chief via the vote.
We might be living in the “interesting times” as they say, but where we live and when we are living are still some of the best in the history of the planet.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Count your blessings.
Sandy Compton. File photo
FEATURE
By Zach Hagadone Reader Staff
At the end of the introductory paragraph in the 2024 “Year in Review,” we congratulated Reader readers on “making it through 2024” and extended “best wishes for 2025.” As usual, we didn’t know what we were in for with the turn of the calendar page.
It’s hard to identify a single word to describe the overall experience of persevering through the past 12-ish months — “nightmarish,” “soul-sucking,” “infuriating” and “garbage” all come to mind — though the Oxford University Press decided that the “word of the year” should actually be a phrase: “rage bait.” (It was “brain rot” in 2024.) That tracks.
As has become our custom, we again present a rundown of some (but of course not all) of the stories that we felt made for the biggest headlines this year. Read it and weep, like we did.
The Trump defect
As with many things that “trickle down” — like, say, leaky diapers and burst pipes — the noisome seepage of the Trump administration over the past 11 months has befouled almost everything below it, from federal to state to local goings on.
At the risk of staring too long into the abyss, we’re going to make this a quick rundown of how the torrent of fast-food-and-bile loaded effluent flowing from the White House has dribbled into state and local affairs.
Immediately upon his Jan. 20 inauguration, President Donald Trump shotgunned the republic with 26 executive orders — more than any president on their first day in office — including one pardoning every convicted Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol insurrectionist, emboldening fascists around the nation and maybe even the world.
Before the month was out, he froze the federal budget so tech-bronster and trillionaire Elon Musk could chainsaw the government in the name of “efficiency.” That played out most visibly
2025 YEAR IN Recapping some of the biggest headlines
in Idaho with the U.S. Forest Service closing offices both here and elsewhere in the state, as well as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers shuttering the popular Springy Point Recreation Area in May for lack of staff (services were also reduced at other Corps-managed sites throughout the area).
Meanwhile, Trump’s smoothbrained tariff scheme triggered a trade war with Canada — exacerbated by his saber rattling about turning our neighbors to the north into the 51st state. Predictably, the number of Canadian visitors, as well as freight shipments, southbound into Idaho plummeted.
That prompted a rare foray into politics by the International Selkirk Loop Board of Directors, normally focused on tourism, which wrote in June: “Trade disputes and travel restrictions threaten not only our businesses but also the generations of good-neighborly trust and collaboration that have existed here for centuries.”
Otherwise, Trump’s Chaos Agenda has made life objectively crappier on every level for Idahoans who pay more; make the same or less; can’t afford food or shelter; fear for their access to and ability to pay for health care, reproductive and otherwise; look with dismay at “trickle-down” effects on reduced federal support for, well, everything they rely on; and generally feel a justifiable sense that there’s a madman steering the ship of state.
Down with The Don
Following all that, millions of upright citizens around the nation have been protesting their asses off since the inauguration. Here in Sandpoint, we had a “Not My President” demonstration in February, followed by a “Hands Off” protest in April — that was, “Hands Off” the Constitution, as Trump has and continues to shred the nation’s guiding document daily — then two “No Kings” rallies in June and October. The latter drew an estimated 1,200 people to First Avenue, lining both sides of the street from Superior to Pine and making it among
the largest such demonstrations in the state — behind only the capital city of Boise, Coeur d’Alene, Pocatello and Idaho Falls (all far larger than little ol’ Sandpoint). Was anyone listening? Who knows, but it was a good look.
Poop plant politics
Sandpoint City Hall started the year by taking the first significant step in what Mayor Jeremy Grimm has repeatedly called his “No. 1 priority” in office, and rightly described among the biggest projects ever undertaken by the community: reconstructing the wastewater treatment plant.
Things kicked off in January with a letter of interest to the state seeking funding for the $130 million project — which resulted in a $3.5 million award, and nothing from the feds (surprise, surprise). Undaunted, City Hall pressed on with public outreach including open houses, presentations
and a survey through the spring and summer, resulting in a ballot measure in the November election that passed with almost 90% in favor. Now comes the effort to raise enough outside money so sewer rates don’t double over five years.
Park and deride
In the 2024 “Year in Preview,” we foresaw that the “word of the year” at City Hall would be “water.” That was kind of true, but it really turned out to be “parking.” Starting in January, the Planning and Zoning Commission and City Council were dominated by discussions surrounding instituting a paid parking program at several city-owned lots, including City Beach (more on that later).
Given that getting pissed off about stuff is the municipal sport of Bonner County, it came as no surprise that many people’s heads exploded when
IN REVIEW
headlines of the year... pray for us
faced with the notion that they’d have to shell out or walk a few blocks to their destination. The city spent the next few months tweaking the fees, fast-tracking a reconstruction of the city lot between Church and Oak streets, and trying to calm tempers — especially among county residents who didn’t think it was fair that they had to contribute to the use of infrastructure that they don’t pay taxes to support.
And if that wasn’t enough of a head-exploder, the city floated the idea of reintroducing parking meters on downtown core streets, where they’d stood from the 1920s until the late-’80s or early-’90s. That idea “was not received well, you could say,” Planning and Community Development Director Jason Welker said in September, following a presentation on the concept to downtown merchants.
While the idea of parking meters isn’t off the table, it isn’t front-and-
center as the city continues to refine its parking management policy, which from April to present has shifted from downtown to how to regulate parking requirements in residential areas — specifically as they relate to multi-family developments and shortterm rentals.
Life’s (not) a City Beach
For generations of area residents, City Beach has been a place for fun, sun (part of the year) and general free, public recreation (also goose poop, though mercifully that local debate seems to have calmed for now). In 2025, however, it became a bit of a political battleground as more details emerged about plans for Whitefish, Mont.-based Averill Hospitality Group’s luxury resort hotel on the site of the current Best Western Edgewater. Straight out of the gate in early January, the Bonner County Republican
Women sent a shot over City Hall’s bow with a widely read op-ed claiming City Beach was being “privatized” following a decision in late 2024 to reduce the number of parking spaces required of Averill’s development at the same time as the lot at the beach was being primed to move to a paid system.
In a minor miracle, the Bonner County Democrats agreed with the Republicans, writing in part, “reducing the number of parking spaces makes City Beach less accessible to people, and that the people who will be affected the most are our residents.”
For its part, City Hall argued that like any other developer, Averill was entitled to seek a reduction in required parking stalls in exchange for an in lieu fee, and the company promised the community that its guests would not be using the beach parking lot, thus pushing out locals.
News then circulated that Averill would be reducing the number of hotel rooms and adding condos to the development. In late February, the Republican Women again weighed in, decrying an approved reduction in the fee to be paid by Averill for its foregone parking spaces. The argument from critics was that the city was acquiescing to the developer to the detriment of public access at City Beach.
That perception ramped up further in September, when the City Council voted to delay the implementation of increased development impact fees until after the new year, even as Averill warned that paying the higher fees would make the $100 million development “unviable.”
While city officials said the decision had nothing to do with that, many citizens were unconvinced. Tensions rose even higher in early November, when Averill came to the city again saying that its resort hotel would be “unviable” unless the RV park across Bridge Street was either leased or sold to the company and turned into something more aesthetically palatable for its future guests and condo-dwellers.
That was the final straw for a lot of
people — including some councilors — who expressed the opinion that “we’re being played” by the developer, which kept asking for (and receiving) concessions underpinned by the not-so-veiled insinuation that it would take its ball and go home, or else.
Recognizing the bad optics, Averill officials openly apologized for the tone of the communication. However, the council voted to reject the company’s “request” for the purchase or lease option.
At the same time, the state cleared the way for a nearly $1 million grant for the city to redevelop the RV park, with plans to fix up the site, add some bathroom facilities and provide access for non-motorized watercraft.
Following the November mea culpa from Averill, the city posted a public survey seeking input on future plans for the site and hosted a mid-December workshop that drew a standing-room-only crowd to the James E. Russell Sports Center — on a Saturday morning, no less.
The overwhelming majority of about 1,000 survey respondents (as of press time) preferred a renovated RV park, regardless of Averill’s desires. That also seemed to be the consensus at the December workshop, but some advocated for a multi-use space and others worried that taking the grant dollars would unduly obligate the city to retain the RV park for 25 years. Averill representatives in attendance said they were “here to help” and offered to donate an unspecified amount of money to offset the grant money, if only the RV park could be “something else.”
What happens next will be up to the Parks and Rec. Commission and the incoming City Council, with new members Joe Tate and Joshua Torrez. Hopefully no one promised them life’s a beach.
Budgets go bust
It’s no secret that the Idaho Legislature jumped the track at least 15 < see 2025 REVIEW, Page 14 >
Looking east from the War Memorial Field parking lot. Photo by Ron Bedford
years ago, as the Wackadoodle Wing of the Republican Party has calcified its monstrous supermajority in the Statehouse, aided and abetted by the perfidious closed primary system and fueled by torrents of dark money laundered through a constellation of political action committees, lobbies and ideological canker sores like the Idaho Freedom Foundation and its cancerous ilk.
We’re really reaping the whirlwind now, though, as following the general chaos at the federal level, basic functions of government in Idaho teetered into “failed state” territory in 2025.
Very, very long story short: In the rush to see who could debase themselves the most before Trump’s altar of “cupidity, stupidity and the positive power of lying” (to borrow a phrase from Hunter S. Thompson), a large majority of Idaho GOP lawmakers sold us all out by stripping upward of half a billion dollars in tax revenue while throwing all manner of gimmies to right-wing policy hobbyhorses — most notably a “tax credit” (a.k.a. “vouchers,” a.k.a. “unaccountable handouts”) to private, religious education using public dollars in a sinister circumvention of Idaho’s Blaine Amendment to the state Constitution.
Trumpian lickspittles like Gov. Brad Little got some super-cool shoutouts from Trump on social media for this betrayal, and we’re sure they bathed in that glory for a few weeks in February and March; but, by midspring, it became clear that a budget doesn’t balance if you spend more than you make. Who knew?
The “school choice” baksheesh amounting to about $50 million — which will all but certainly benefit right-wing affiliated online “education” providers and also all but certainly increase — destabilized Idaho’s checkbook, resulting in a cascade of headlines that whipsawed from the “triumph” of “conservative” budgeting to “holy-shit-we-have-to-cut-everything.”
Credit must be given to two of our local legislators — Dist. 1 Sen. Jim Woodward, R-Sagle, and Dist. 1A Rep. Mark Sauter, R-Sandpoint — who sounded the alarm loud, early and often that we were on a collision course with reality. Dist. 1B Rep. Cornel Rasor, R-Sagle, appears to be MIA in all this, but he’s spent decades buzzing around loony libertarian circles as a mosquito pretending to be a hornet.
Meanwhile, estimates have varied wildly between an unconstitutional budget deficit in the tens of millions to hundreds of millions of dollars, as
(apparently) our Little Trumps didn’t realize that DOGE-ing the federal government would also affect state revenue, as on top of all the cuts and spends “we” approved in the 2025 legislative session would be compounded by complying with federal spending reductions.
That is, unless there’s been a concerted effort to destroy the functioning of civil government at the federal and state levels over the past year in order to replace it with a variety of privately contracted “services” that just so happen to enrich certain organizations, institutions and individuals. It would be even worse if that whole system was overseen by an authoritarian executive with total police and military power and no legislative or judicial check.
Jeez, that would be a weird and kind of conspiratorial idea.
Regardless, as the kids say, “FAFO.” Don’t forget to vote in 2026.
Public lands, not grubby hands
Oh hey! Here’s another shitty thing that happened this year: We started talking seriously about transferring all of our public lands from federal stewardship to state control, which would literally be a devolution of our physical country, and fitting to occur next year, on the 250th anniversary of our revolution actually putting us together (well, sort of).
But that’s what we do, apparently. And by “that,” we mean, being as stupid as possible at all times and always for money.
No matter, the federal govern-
ment owns about 32.8 million acres of Idaho’s land — accounting for a skosh below 62% of the total area — which ranks the Gem State ahead of Alaska though behind Utah, according to congress.gov. These are lands that we, the people, own together because we’re a federal republic. Duh.
Let’s be clear: The states have never “owned” these public lands, therefore there’s no such thing as “giving them back” to the individual states. The U.S. Constitution (that pesky document) states plainly in the Property Clause: “The Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States.”
Yet, the grift goes on, with gobs of Western right-wing politicos peddling the timeworn Sagebrush Rebellion myth of state supremacy over land and thereby the property therein, which is really shorthand for the anti-federal animus of the freakin’ Civil War. (You know, the one that the South lost on the question of “states’ rights”... to do what? Own “property.” Yeah.)
As the American Constitution Society puts it: “Under state ownership, state governments could restrict public access, authorize commercial development or even divide lands for private sale. Current federal environmental law effectively forecloses these possibilities, limiting privatization and preventing environmental degradation.”
And that’s exactly what over-cologned, too-coiffed, meathead lawmakers like Idaho Republican Rep.
Russ Fulcher are angling for.
Trailing after Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee, Fulcher has been the poster boy for the selloff, claiming that there’s no appetite among states in the East to subsidize us in the West. Rep. Mike Simpson, R-Idaho, split with that idea in April, joining a bipartisan Public Lands in Public Hands Act. Despite the fact that fellow Idaho Republican Sens. Mike Crapo and Jim Risch eventually joined Simpson in opposing this latter-day deconstruction of the nation’s surface area for private profit (we’re sure after seeing the polling that indicates a massive majority of Idahoans want public lands to stay public), Fulcher still shills. He was back on the stump in early December, and it won’t be the last we hear of this attempted burglary. We reckon there are easier, though more embarrassing, ways to get Trump’s attention. Don’t forget to vote.
City Hall monitor
Yeesh, we’re getting tired, so here’s a little lightning round of other City Hall stuff: the James E. Russell Center’s revenue delivery vs. projections were way off, by, like, a lot. That seemed to justify many area residents’ opinion that razing Travers Park for a specialty court sports barn just because we got a “gift” (fun fact: the word gift in German means “poison”) wasn’t in the overall best interest of the community.
The city’s been tinkering around
Averill Hospitality Group representativres Ben McGrann, left, and Brian Averill, right, speak at the Nov. 6 Sandpoint City Council meeting. Photo by Ben Olson
throughout the year on how to make that thing make sense, and they might be getting there — it remains to be seen, as the numbers are looking a little better — but we have it on good authority that it’s proved to be an albatross, siphoning funds from other, more generally used and accessible public park facilities. That’s a “gift” indeed.
We had other drama at the city, when Mayor Jeremy Grimm told the City Council that he wasn’t getting paid enough and notified them that he’d be acting his wage by cutting back hours in City Hall to essential duties (including meetings) unless a raise was in the offing. So far, it hasn’t been. Meanwhile, there’s serious talk of bringing back the city administrator position, which a good chunk of the current council — and the mayor — ran on eliminating.
That whole thing seems to have triggered a bunch of other internal politics getting aired in public, with a frankly bizarre fracas over whether or not City Attorney Fonda Jovick actually worked for the city, as she has for several years. Regardless, Grimm tried to replace her with longtime former-City Attorney Will Herrington, but that didn’t fly with councilors, enough of whom walked out of a mid-October session to break quorum and extend the drama until later in the month, when Jovick was “officially” sworn in. However, she’s been a rare sight in the chambers ever since.
Arguably the biggest City Hall controversy of the year, however, was in November and surrounded the debate over Sandpoint’s groundbreaking
non-discrimination ordinance. That is, the “amendment” of the NDO into oblivion by removing anything related to gender identity and aligning city policy with state human rights law that, of course, famously excludes anyone who actually needs protection.
There aren’t enough showers that a thinking person could take — regardless of who’s in the shower with them — to wash off the stench of the treacherous, intellectually dishonest, bigoted, mean-spirited and craven vote taken by council to essentially strike down the NDO because of a speculation based on a rumor of an apparently “biologically male” using the women’s washroom at the Litehouse YMCA sometime in October.
No actual evidence was ever produced of any wrongdoing nor policy or law violation, no firsthand testimony given, nothing. Just hearsay feeding moral panic meant to benefit a specific band of politics. And it all came from a Facebook post, resulting in Sandpoint overturning its pioneering non-discrimination ordinance, which had served as the template for similar protective pieces of code around the state, including Boise. That’s where we are now, folks. It’s not a good place.
The votes: Councilors Joel Aispuro, Justin Dick and Rick Howarth in favor (of “amending”); Council President Deb Ruehle and Councilors Pam Duquette and Kyle Schreiber against. Grimm broke the tie and later pretended to have taken the high ground in some kind of brave stance to “protect our women and girls,” which was the
the Panhandle Bike Ranch, which in June saw its conditional use permit vacated. Area neighbors opposed the potential traffic, noise and dust generated by the facility, and went to the First Judicial Court of Idaho, which nixed the permit due to a lack of reasoning presented by the county.
Owners Scott and Jennifer Kalbach operated PBR over the summer, accepting donations rather than selling tickets, to apparently skirt the lack of CUP — though this didn’t stop neighbors from reporting their actions to the county Planning Department in an attempt to get them fined.
The issue is now in the hands of the Kalbachs — who are supported by biking enthusiasts across the U.S. and Canada — to reapply for the CUP or switch gears.
On top of all that, after inadvertently violating Idaho Open Meeting Law and incurring an investigation from the Attorney General’s Office, the county finally revised its minor land division policy. That sounds super unsexy, but really it affects how, where and when this area turns into the suburban-strip mall monstrosity that’s become of the Rathdrum Prairie.
perverse mantra of the trauma-ghoul dramatists who testified in droves at that particular meeting like it was a snake-handling swamp church service. How quickly this social media frenzy turned into a torches-and-pitchfork set of council meetings speaks ill of the community at large, though was oh-so-convenient for the skidmark branch of the local Witchfinder General Party of outrage-chancers like Scott Herndon, who (of course) is challenging Woodward for the Dist. 1 Idaho Senate seat in the 2026 election. Don’t forget to vote.
Roundup at the BoCo Corral
At this point, we’re so incensed by the rank idiocy and corruption (or corrupt idiocy) infecting every aspect of American life — from the nation’s capitol to down the street — that it’s a real suffering to even contemplate the county. Yet we must, and that beat began in the New Year with Bonner County Sheriff Daryl Wheeler “retiring” for 30 days so he could collect his benefits under the Public Employee Retirement System of Idaho and his regular salary when he “returned.” Slick move.
Around the same time, inveterate gadfly Rick Cramer won his lawfare jackpot with a $275,000 settlement (your tax dollars) and an official apology letter that brought an end to a yearlong issue stemming from his trespassing and citizen’s arrest by former-Commissioner Luke Omodt.
Then there’s the ongoing drama of
Crickey! There’s also the interminable dysfunction of the Bonner County Fair Board, which a former bookkeeper in late November revealed has been operating with incompetent accounting procedures ranking as a Bush League Enron. It was (and might still be) as bad as accidentally paying their own accountant so much money that she gave back part of the money and resigned.
Bonner County can’t even have a fair without screwing it up.
And, finally, it’s looking like the Idaho Club’s gentrification of Trestle Creek is going to happen, with a December approval of amendments to the existing CUP. Who cares that multiple environmental protection groups and hundreds of residents have opposed the development on the grounds (or waters) that it will wreck the ecosystem, going so far as to file multiple lawsuits. Oh, and Sandpoint Mayor Jeremy Grimm represents the developers in his private practice. He says he’s not running again.
End of Days?
We ended this garbage heap of a year with a bunch of terrible weather in mid-December, adding high winds and major flooding to the famine of skyhigh prices for food, health care and everything else (what other plagues are next?). Folks, it’s a suffering.
Additional reporting by Soncirey Mitchell.
As estimated 1,200 people showed up for the “No Kings” protest on Oct. 18 in Sandpoint. Photo by Ben Olson
FEATURE
‘A tremendous blessing’
After 30 years, Ward Tollbom announces retirement from Hen’s Tooth Studio in downtown Sandpoint
By Ben Olson Reader Staff
Every small town has its characters that make it more than just a collection of buildings and street signs. It’s these individuals who make a town unique — who imbue it with color and light, who make it the special place it is.
For Sandpoint, Ward Tollbom is one of those characters.
The proprietor of Hen’s Tooth Studio on First Avenue for the past 30 years announced he was hanging up his watercolor brushes and closing the studio at the end of the year.
“I’m 75 years old,” he told the Reader. “My body doesn’t want to do the six-day-week thing anymore.”
Tollbom’s Hen’s Tooth Studio has been both a showcase for his meticulous, lifelike paintings of birds and a framing shop, which he said helped him continue creating the pieces he loves to paint.
His introduction to art was a Christmas present of oil paints he received when he was 17 years old — and that he initially scoffed at.
“They sat in a closet and I ignored them,” Tollbom said. “After I went to U of I, I was bored to death on weekends. No mountains, no lake, no transportation. My friend and I decided we needed to get back home so we started hitchhiking back to Sandpoint and got a ride late in the day from some kids from WSU taking a loop through Idaho to buy beer on the way back to Spokane. They stopped at every roadside stop, picked up six-packs, threw bottles out the windows ... and finally dropped us in Coeur d’Alene where we got a ride from a traveling salesman into Sandpoint.”
Tollbom arrived in Sandpoint after midnight and, after a short sleep, got up in the morning just in time to hitchhike all the way back to Moscow.
“I said, ‘I gotta find something to kill my time over the weekends,’ so I took those paints to college,” he said.
Tollbom’s first creation impressed his friends, who said he should take an art class. He then studied watercolor painting from Alf Dunn, a professor who Tollbom said could do a demonstration painting in an hour that would impress the fiercest critic.
“He never did approve of the way I painted because I spent too much time on things,” Tollbom said. “With my personality, I wanted to nitpick and get all the details right. You know, I finally went down and found him in Moscow when he was 91 years old and visited with him. I finally got his approval.”
Anyone who has visited Tollbom’s studio has seen the dichotomy between his intricate paintings, produced with flawless watercolor strokes, versus the chaotic mess of a busy framing studio.
“I’m kind of a messy person,” he said, looking around at the collection of framing tools, matte boards and endless tools piled haphazardly around tables where he finishes the pieces that adorn the walls. “Someone once said, ‘Art breeds filth,’ and you look at my shop in here, it’s kind of true. It’s a mess in here. The paintings are meticulous because that’s what’s hanging on someone’s wall. ... It takes me three days to clean this place up and a half day to get it right back to where it was. Seems counterproductive.”
Along with framed artwork of various birds and knickknacks, a curious item also hangs high on the exposed brick wall: a prosthetic leg.
“That was my dad’s prosthetic leg,” Tollbom said, looking up at it with a smile. “He wore it from his 20s until he was almost 90. When he died, we had this leg. What do
you do with it? Cremate it? I said, I’m going to hang this up on my wall and if I’m having a bad day, I’ll look up at it and think, ‘It could be worse.’”
In fact, Tollbom sold his first painting at his dad’s place of work.
“He was a meat cutter and I worked for him at the Economy Grocery and Stewart’s Market on Second and Pine,” Tollbom said. “When it sold, I thought, ‘Wow, I have enough money to pay for my materials.’ I was never smart. I was never athletic. I was never handsome. I didn’t have money and when I painted something that someone said was good and actually wanted to buy it, that was something I wanted to repeat.”
Thirty years and more than a thousand sold paintings later, Tollbom looks back at his time on First Avenue in the studio with gratitude.
“It’s been a tremendous blessing,” he said. “Where else can you go out fishing after work at night, bring home dinner, go on the back of Baldy and get a moose or elk or find huckleberries? I can do all these things and still sleep in my own bed at night. The lake is just unbelievable. You can be
by yourself pretty quick out there and it’s a feast for the eyes every time you go out there.”
Along with the countless cherished customers over the years — which include notable names like Viggo Mortensen, Ben Stein and Per-Ingvar Brånemark (a Swedish doctor who developed the surgical technique to replace a missing jaw bone) — Tollbom also wanted to thank his landlord at the studio.
“One of the things that’s made it possible is that I’ve had an incredible landlord, Charlie Parrish, who has been beyond awesome,” he said.
Born just two blocks from his First Avenue shop, Tollbom said he has no regrets choosing to spend his time in North Idaho, close to nature, where he truly feels at home.
“Financially, it’s always a struggle if you want to stay in a small town [as an artist] and not go somewhere to seek your fortune,” he said. “You make sacrifices to be able to do what you love doing and live where you love living. It’s like Sandy Compton once said: ‘Sometimes you have
to learn to live on air.’ I get around that knowing how to hunt and fish and pick huckleberries. ... I like being outdoors and that’s my home.
That’s what I’m familiar with.
I’ve held those birds in my hand. I’m more familiar with them than anything else.”
A celebration of Ward Tollbom’s career will take place Saturday, Dec. 27 at 3 p.m. in the Hen’s Tooth Studio (323 N. First Ave.), with a special cake built by Abby Stolfo, proprietor of The Cakery on First, which will move into the First Avenue location after the first of the year.
Top: Ward Tollbom in his Hen’s Tooth Studio.
Above: One of Tollbom’s many intricate watercolor paintings, this one of a heron.
Photos by Ben Olson. Artwork by Ward Tollbom.
MUSIC FEATURE
The best albums of 2025
A totally biased opinion from a musical office
By Soncirey Mitchell Reader Staff
Lucy Dacus, Forever is a Feeling
This year was a horrible, no good, very bad page of the calendar; yet, despite the pain — or perhaps because of it — music flourished. Heavy hitters like Lady Gaga and Tyler, the Creator dominated the music scene from TikTok to radio, and new and old faces came out of the woodwork with enough indie-rock, shoegaze and sad girl music to counteract the onslaught of bad news (at least a little).
Folks at The New Yorker and Rolling Stone published their lists of 2025’s best albums, taking input from dozens of musical experts with diverse tastes. The Reader, however, has a staff of three. The following, then, is less of a “2025’s best albums” list and more of a collection of the albums that helped set the vibe of this paper’s office and the stories produced therein. In a way, that makes them the best.
Wet Leg, moisturizer
English indie-rock band Wet Leg conquered the Reader — and the world — in 2022 with the group’s first self-titled album, leaving us to wait until this last summer for moisturizer — and it was well worth it. With their usual British charm and subversive approach to music, Wet Leg delivered a bouquet of love songs that ran the gamut from questioning their emotional health in the pop-adjacent “CPR” to encapsulating quiet devotion in lines like, “It’s kinda cold on earth anyway when you’re not around” from “davina mccall.” Each song sits at indie’s cutting edge and is easy to listen to on repeat.
This year was especially good for sad girl music — a subgenre of indie-alt that focuses on heartache and existential angst from the perspective of women. Dacus’ Forever is a Feeling represented the genre well, blending her singer-songwriter style with an often symphonic background. Just when audiences get comfortable with her soft stories of ill-fated love, she digs deeper with lo-fi beats and a dash of grit, taking her songs from ethereal to dark and brooding.
CMAT, EURO-COUNTRY
This Irish indie-pop album is about as “country” as it gets on this list, which is to say, there’s an occasional fiddle meandering between retro dance and slow, melancholy numbers. Singer Ciara Thompson — a.k.a. CMAT — has a soulful voice that sounds like it should float out of a ’60s radio, which she usually pairs with a modern driving beat. Even when lamenting the death of a lover or aging bodies, EURO-COUNTRY’s lyrics are always full of humorous jabs and pop culture references like “Lord, let that Tesla crash,” which give the album an added absurdity and authenticity at the same time.
Florence and the Machine, Everybody Scream
Florence Welch’s creative genius and sheer talent never disappoint, which is why any album she releases instantly becomes one of the year’s best. Everybody Scream continues the streak with complex meditations on womanhood, largely inspired by her 2023 near-death experience caused by a ruptured ectopic pregnancy. Welch delivers her intricate storytelling in her traditional dark indie-rock, baroque pop fashion, sometimes belting,
then switching to angelic high notes before descending into a deep growl. No matter the song, the music is bewitching, and listeners can’t help but feel her rage and passion in every note.
Hayley Williams, Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party
Most people recognize Williams as the lead singer of Paramore, but her 2025 tour de force solidifies her as a unique powerhouse. The multi-instrumentalist pushed the boundaries of ’90s shoegaze and synth-pop with Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party, often using bitter humor to deal with personal and social issues. As she sings in the titular song, “I’ll be the biggest star / At this racist country singer’s bar.” Williams’ style often dips into the familiar sound of Y2K emo bands, but can just as easily jump to ’80s alt-rock — either way, each song is written and performed perfectly to reward both casual and active listening.
The Beaches, No Hard Feelings
The ’80s were also in for queer pop-rock group The Beaches, whose 2025 tracks have a distinct glam rock flair that feels nostalgic in all the right ways. The band’s driving, modern beats enhance the retro dance tunes, creating a somewhat camp homage to the past while remaining relevant. Most of these songs are vehicles for addictive one-liners like this description of a toxic relationship in “Takes One to Know One:” “Anti-social, maladjusted / noncommittal, can’t be
Album covers, from left to right, clockwise: moisturizer by Wet Leg; Forever is a Feeling by Lucy Dacus; EURO-COUNTRY by CMAT; Everybody Scream by Florence and the Machine; Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party by Hayley Williams; Getting Killing by Geese; No Hard Feelings by The Beaches; . Courtesy images
trusted / that’s so us.” It isn’t all pop hits, though, and the group shows its depth in songs like “Lesbian of the Year,” where the singer comes to a late realization about her sexuality.
Geese, Getting Killed
Unlike the rest of these albums, Getting Killed isn’t necessarily easy to listen to — it engages the audience’s brains from beginning to end. Why? Because they need to figure out what the hell they’re actually listening to. Are these songs folk or metal, funk or punk? Yes. Vocalist Cameron Winter has a voice that would have put him on stage with Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young if he were born earlier, but instead he’s a stoned ’70s folk-rocker trapped in the body of a 23-year-old man. Take that mental image and introduce grunge into the equation, and you’re halfway to understanding Getting Killed.
Send event listings to calendar@sandpointreader.com
Live Music w/ Snacks at Midnight 9pm-midnight @ 219 Lounge
Indie rockers from Spokane
Live Music w/ Spool Effect 9pm-midnight @ 219 Lounge Reggae, improv jam rock and more
Live Music w/ Hogwire
7pm (doors) @ The Hive
Line dancing lessons at 7:30pm ($5), Country rock show starts at 8pm ($10)
Live Music w/ Kevin Dorin 6-8pm @ Baxters on Cedar
SATURDAY, december 27
Live Music w/ Champions Under Pressure 7pm (doors) @ The Hive
Queen tribute band from CDA with SHS grad Aaron Birdsall as Freddie Mercury. Kevin Dorin opening at 7:30pm, show starts at 8:30pm ($25)
Live Music w/ Sydney Dawn 5:30-8:30pm @ Barrel 33
Live Music w/ Mason Van Stone 6-8pm @ Baxters on Cedar
SunDAY, december 28
Magic with Star Alexander 5-8pm @ Jalapeño’s
Live Music w/ Fiddlin’ Red 1-4pm @ Barrel 33
monDAY, december 29
Outdoor Experience Group Run 6pm @ Outdoor Experience 3-5 miles, all levels welcome
tuesDAY, december 30
wednesDAY, december 31
Live Jazz w/ Bright Moments 6-9pm @ Baxters on Cedar
Live Music w/ Bakerwood Brothers 5-8pm @ Pend d’Oreille Winery
Lively rock and country
New Year’s Eve party 9pm-1am @ Roxy’s Lounge DJ Sterling spinning tunes. Complimentary champagne toast at midnight
Live Music w/ Chris Paradis 6:30-9:30pm @ MickDuffs Beer Hall
Live Music w/ John Firshi
6-8pm @ Smokesmith BBQ Blues, bluegrass and improv jams
Music w/ DJ No. 1
6-8pm @ Idaho Pour Authority
Music w/ DJ Sterling 9pm-midnight @ Roxy’s Lounge
Live Music w/ Right Front Burner 9pm-midnight @ 219 Lounge Funk/soul ass-shaking music
Live Music w/ Carli Osika
6pm @ Connie’s Lounge
Live Music w/ Zach Simms 6-9pm @ MickDuffs Beer Hall
Live Music w/ Kerry and Bill 3-5pm @ Idaho Pour Authority
Open Irish jam
6pm @ Connie’s Lounge Open jam with Seamus
New York New Year’s Eve 4-10pm @ Matchwood Brewing Co. Featuring DJ Michael Aerni from 6:30-9:30pm with an annual livestream of New York’s NYE ball drop and free pour and toast at 9pm
Taps New Year’s Eve and family friendly tubing party
Tickets and info at schweitzer.com
Wake Up Dead Man is the best Knives Out since the original
By Zach Hagadone Reader Staff
Rian Johnson’s mini-franchise Knives Out has been billed as breathing new life into “the British drawing room murder mystery,” with its titular first installment in 2019, followed by Glass Onion in 2022 and now Wake Up Dead Man, which came to theaters in late November and started streaming Dec. 12 on Netflix.
Whereas the first and second films planted the ever-stylish, razor-sharp sleuth Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) in the center of the action, Wake Up Dead Man makes room for another core personality in the shape of Father Jud Duplenticy (Josh O’Connor), which makes this Knives Out entry a much deeper and fully realized ensemble that its predecessors.
In fact, Blanc doesn’t even feature in the film until well into the first half, as Johnson’s script gives time and space to develop Father Jud’s complex
history and even more complex relationship with his religious faith — both being major themes throughout.
When we meet the priest, he’s being sort of reprimanded for punching a deacon, and will sort of be punished with a reassignment to Our Lady of Perpetual Fortitude in rural upstate New York. His bishop (Jeffrey Wright) knows the deacon had it coming, and knows all about Jud’s troubled past as a troubled boxer, but he sees something profoundly authentic about the kid’s faith and admires his commitment to the Gospel of Love, which is sorely needed at his new church.
There’s good reason for that, as Our Lady of Perpetual Fortitude is helmed by the tyrannical Monsignor Jefferson Wicks (a ferocious Josh Brolin), who inherited leadership of the parish from his even more monstrous father, Rev. Prentice Wicks (James Faulkner).
The Wicks family has apparently held such a strong and
pervasive grip on the church for so long, that the congregation has dwindled to a core of devotees bound together as much by fear as belief. Everyone has secrets, and Monsignor Wicks knows them all, holding leverage over the bodies and souls and his terrorized flock.
There’s Martha Delacroix (Glenn Close), who serves as Wicks’ righteous right hand and has spent her entire life in the service of the church. With her husband Samson Holt (Thomas Haden Church), the couple knows where all the bodies are buried — literally and figuratively.
Vera Draven (Kerry Washington) is the successful local lawyer who chokes on her resentment for caring for her half-brother Cy (Daryl McCormack), who has recently failed as a right-wing politico-bro and now spends his time spreading incendiary social media content in an effort to remain relevant. Still, Vera’s checkbook helps keep the lights on at Our Lady
of Perpetual Fortitude.
Dr. Nat Sharp (Jeremy Renner) is the village doc whose wife left him and now he’s also the town drunk, and Simone Vivane (Caliee Spaeny) is a gifted classical musician suffering from a painful illness that she hopes Wicks will be able to cure through his connection with the almighty.
Finally, there’s Lee Ross (Andrew Scott), the once renowned author whose mind has been rotted by online conspiracy theories and who worships not at God’s altar, but the cult of personality surrounding Wicks.
With this jewel box of a cast in place — which also includes Mila Kunis as the unflappable Chief of Police Geraldine Scott — the murder mystery gets underway amid dangerous divisions within the faithful. Father Jud has been labeled an unwelcome outsider and suffers a strained (to say the least) relationship with Wicks. Meanwhile, the others are also coming to question the motiva-
tions swirling around the church and its members.
When Wicks is apparently murdered under seemingly impossible circumstances after a particularly fiery sermon, Father Jud is immediately blamed. When Blanc arrives, he must team up with the priest to untangle the threads while also managing his own suspicions. Along the way are deep ruminations on the nature of faith, the power of the stories we tell ourselves and whether we can truly know the minds of others — or our own.
Wake Up Dead Man is easily the finest Knives Out addition since the original, which despite the relative diminishment of Blanc’s screen time does a stellar job of showcasing one of the key treats of these films — that is, enjoying how much Craig enjoys himself while playing one of the most charismatic detective characters since Poirot or even Holmes.
By Marcia Pilgeram Reader Columnist
Some recipes arrive neatly typed on index cards, already perfected. Others are passed down through labor, patience and love — learned by watching hands at work long before you understand why they do what they do.
My mother’s Blarney Stones were the latter.
These cake-like confections were reserved for the holidays, the kind that called for extra care and time. My mother began the process days ahead, shelling peanuts one by one, often during her relaxing time as she watched The Ed Sullivan Show. Then, when they were all shelled, she’d begin the task of grinding them by hand. There was no shortcut. The steady, quiet rhythm of her work was part of the recipe. Finally, the kitchen would fill with the vanilla scent of warm cake and fresh peanuts, and we all knew Christmas was coming.
The cakes themselves were tender and delicate. She cut them into small squares with extraordinary care and precision, knowing full well that they might crumble anyway. Often, they did. Frosting them was an act of patience — gently spreading buttercream over soft edges, coaxing them back into shape. She had patience — never rushing the process (a gene that sadly I did not inherit). These were not meant to be hurried.
As a child, I didn’t understand how much work went into those Blarney Stones. I only knew that they appeared at Christmas, at celebrations, at moments that mattered. They tasted like sweetness and
The Sandpoint Eater Our gift
love, and comfort and home.
For many years after I was grown, with a family of my own, Mom would arrive at my home with a shoebox full of the carefully wrapped confections.
When it became my turn to make them, I discovered just how labor-intensive the process really was. I tried to replicate her method exactly and, more often than not, I ended up with crumbs, smudged frosting and a fair amount of frustration. I wanted the result, but I was struggling with the process.
About 20 years ago, something clicked. I realized that if I treated the cake more like a cake pop dough — mixing the crumbs with buttercream, pressing it into a pan, freezing it, then cutting it into neat squares — I could keep the
soul of the recipe while making it more forgiving. Freezing the pieces allowed me to coat them cleanly with melted buttercream before rolling them in peanuts. The cakes held their shape. The process flowed. Honestly, at first, I felt a little guilty. Had I cheated? Had I compromised or ruined my mother’s recipe by streamlining it?
I didn’t share the story for a long time. I was embarrassed to admit that I had altered something she labored over so carefully. Yet the funny thing is — once the method changed, the tradition grew. Instead of one person (my poor Mom!) laboring alone, the whole family jumped in. One person handled the buttercream, another rolled the peanuts, and someone
Blarney Stones
INGREDIENTS: DIRECTIONS:
Cake Base:
• French vanilla cake (mix or homemade), baked and cooled
• Buttercream
• 2 cups (4 sticks) unsalted European butter, softened
• 2 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 4-5 cups powdered sugar
• 3-5 tbsp heavy cream
• pinch of salt
Coating:
• 2-3 cups lightly salted good quality, Virginia roasted peanuts, finely ground (don’t use Planter’s)
Prepare cake mixture — Crumble cooled cake into fine crumbs. Mix in enough buttercream to create a moist, dough-like texture. Save rest of buttercream for icing cakes.
Press and freeze — Line a large, rimmed sheet pan with parchment. Press cake mixture evenly to about ¾-inch thickness, pressing very firmly into pan. Freeze until very firm (1-2 hours).
Cut — Cut into ¾-inch squares, keeping cuts even. Return to freezer until ready to assemble.
Prepare coating — Make a fresh batch of buttercream. Melt about 1 cup until pourable. Place ground peanuts in a separate 9”-by-13” pan.
Assemble — Cakes must stay very cold for best coating. Working with about 12 frozen squares at a time, roll each piece in melted buttercream, coating all sides. Immediately roll in peanuts until fully covered. Gently square edges
else squared up the edges. We laughed. We worked fast. We made them by the dozens. At first it was my daughter helping me, and now all the grandchildren have had a hand in the tradition.
And still, the Blarney Stones tasted exactly right.
Over the years, I’ve been asked for this recipe more times than I can count. People love them. They ask how I make them so neat, so consistent, so rich. I would share the ingredients, but I hesitate to tell the whole story. It felt like confessing a secret.
But last week, my mother would have turned 100 years old.
A hundred years of hands that cooked, baked, nurtured and fed her family. A hundred years of traditions that adapt-
ed, whether she intended them to or not; and, suddenly, my hesitation felt so misplaced. Because this recipe — streamlined or not — exists because of her. Every shortcut I take rests on the strong foundation she built. For me. For us. Her patience taught me the value of care. Her labor taught me respect for the process. My version doesn’t erase hers. It honors it by making sure it continues.
So, this year, I’m sharing the recipe fully, openly and without apology. This is my gift to her, and to all of you who have ever loved a family recipe enough to keep it alive in your own way.
Happy Birthday, Momma, and Merry Christmas to all.
These addicting delights start as French vanilla cake, carefully frosted with sweet, rich buttercream and then gently rolled in lightly salted, ground peanuts. It’s an original recipe of my mother, Fern Martin, streamlined for busy, modern bakers. Inspired by my Irish heritage and the sweetest memories of my childhood. Should yield about 80 little cakes.
and place on parchment. Continue until all squares are coated. Keep remaining cake frozen between batches.
Work in teams: One coating with buttercream, one rolling in peanuts,
one shaping squares. Flavor improves after resting overnight.
Refrigerate in an airtight container for 4-5 days, or freeze in small batches in baggies, for longer storage.
MUSIC
Sandpointian Rhapsody
Champions Under Pressure to play Queen tribute at The Hive
By Reader Staff
There are a few bands in the history of music that rise above their peers. Led by Freddie Mercury and his outof-this-world vocal abilities, Queen is undoubtedly one of the greatest rock bands ever to grace the stage.
In homage to that legacy, Champions Under Pressure is a new tribute group with a dedication to delivering the ultimate Queen experience to the people, which it will present Saturday, Dec. 27 at the Nearly New Year’s Eve Weekend show at The Hive (207 N. First Ave., in downtown Sandpoint).
Doors are at 7 p.m., with Kevin Dorin opening at 7:30 p.m. and the main show at 8:30 p.m. Attendance is 21+ and $25 tickets are available at livefromthehive.com.
After more than a year of dedicated rehearsal, Champions Under Pressure debuted in Spokane to acclaim in November, and will now bring the rock to Sandpoint. Expect more than just a flawless recreation of Queen’s hits like “Bohemian Rhapsody,” “We Will Rock You” and “Somebody to Love.” Along with the music is a full concert production with costume changes,
spot-on musicianship and the powerhouse energy that made Queen legendary. Sandpoint High School graduate Aaron “Mr. Fahrenheit” Birdsall is taking on the role of Freddie Mercury. Birdsall has toured all over the world as a vocalist and multi-instrumentalist, is a Grammy Recording Academy member involved in more than 100 albums, and has worked with multiple Grammy winners and platinum record artists and producers. After
You know that feeling you get when a live musician plays a song you love and haven’t heard for a long time? Well, if you listen to Brian Jacobs’ play, you might get that feeling a lot. With just his guitar and microphone on stage, Jacobs plays songs everyone loves. He homes in on pop, indie and rock selections, and his steady, sonorous voice adds a lot of depth to his ex-
attending audio engineering school in Los Angeles and living in various cities around the nation, he now resides in Coeur d’Alene.
Joining Birdsall is Rick Hiller playing guitarist Brian May. Hiller has played more than 1,000 live shows with different acts and is known for matching May’s guitar licks note for note. Zack Cooper will take on the role of Queen’s drummer Rodger Taylor. Cooper has established himself as an excellent drum-
mer after touring the globe playing in multiple bands. Finally, Court Saunders will represent Queen’s bassist Jon Deacon. Saunders is a multi-instrumentalist and singer, as well as spending a lot of time working in TV and film. Expect this energetic show to pull no punches and send the audience back to a time when rock gods ruled.
A snapshot of notable live music coming up in Sandpoint
Dec. 27
cellent song selection. Jacobs has played the Pend d’Oreille Winery for years and has gathered a following, so arrive early for a good seat, order some wine and a handcrafted meal, and you’re all set.
— Ben Olson
5-8 p.m., FREE. Pend d’Oreille Winery, 301 Cedar St. Ste. 101, 208-265-8545, powine.com.
Folks may be surprised by the name “James Berkley,” since he isn’t one of the regular cast of characters who populate Sandpoint’s music scene. Berkley is one of those rare, new faces to town, though he grew up in the Pacific Northwest and is no stranger to the area. While he often sings and plays the guitar for bands like Oskar Owens, The Red Books and The Gruvé Smoothies, Berkley has
This week’s RLW by Zach Hagadone
READ
It’s been hard to stay uninformed of the hubbub caused by Vanity Fair’s longform interview with Trump White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, published Dec. 16 under the title “Eye of the Hurricane.” The two-part piece by Chris Whipple (and with controversial photos by Christopher Anderson) promises “an unflinching, up-close look at power — and peril,” and it delivers. Read the first part for free at vanityfair.com. The second part requires a subscription.
developed his own polished acoustic sound over the years, which lends itself to indie, pop and even yacht rock. His background in spiritual music makes him especially soulful — a trait he highlights in both original music and covers.
— Soncirey
Mitchell
5-7:30 p.m., FREE. Matchwood Brewing, 513 Oak St., 208-7182739, matchwoodbrewing.com. Listen at jamesberkleymusic.com.
LISTEN WATCH
Canada-born, New Orleans-connected Duff Thompson plays the “swampy blend of folk, pop and garage rock” that you didn’t know you were missing. Performing solo since 2016, he debuted with Haywire (2020), followed by Lore of the Shadow People and Lore of the Shadow People II — the latter released in 2024. His tracks are haunting, darkly funny, sometimes boppy, sometimes wistful, but all top-notch. Listen on the streamers.
When Amazon streaming series Fallout premiered in 2024, it immediately earned high praise from critics and viewers alike — including fans of the venerable video game franchise on which it’s based. Evidence: 15 Primetime Emmy nominations (including Best Drama Series) and one win (for music supervision). Now we have Season 2, which began Dec. 16, returning us to the retro-techno post-apocalypse where vault-dwellers, mutants, ghouls, nefarious bureaucrats and evil scientists tangle across the Western wasteland. New episodes Tuesdays.
Brian Jacobs, Pend d’Oreille Winery,
James Berkley, Matchwood Brewing, Dec. 27
Champions Under Pressure will play The Hive Saturday, Dec. 27. Courtesy photo
From Northern Idaho News, December 22, 1905
BOLD ATTEMPT TO ROB P.O.
A bold attempt was made Thursday morning to rob the Sandpoint post office. The burglars were undoubtedly frightened away by the presence of Night Office McKinzie, who happened to be in the neighborhood of the post office at the time. The attempt was made some time between the hours of 3:30 and 5 o’clock as Officer McKenzie passed the post office at 3 o’clock and there had been nothing doing then. At five o’clock he again passed and found where the men had broken the frame part under the plate glass making a hole just large enough to admit a man’s body. After making an entrance in the building it was easy to reacdh the safe on which they placed a piece of soap to which was attached glycerine, cap and fuse. The fuse had not been lighted as the men had become frightened before they got that far. The men thoroughly understood their work and it was evident that no amateur did the work. As soon as Officer McKenzie found what had been done, he sent for Postmaster Wilson, who came hurriedly to the office. He found that the robbers had taken his watch, which was hanging in the office on a nail, and which he has owned for the past ten years. There was little value to the watch but he prized it because he owned it for so long. The officers have been looking since for traces to give them some clue, but so far have found nothing. If the burglars had succeeded in opening the safe they would have secured $120 in money and about $1000 in stamps besides several papers valuable only to the government and Mr. Wilson.
BACK OF THE BOOK Man bites back at dogs
By Zach Hagadone Reader Staff
Among the quickest ways to get yourself in trouble is pointing out that all dogs are not God’s perfect creatures, nor do they belong in every space where humans conduct human business and leisure. Like dumping on Christmas or George Washington, having a less than 100% positive opinion of canines is to touch an apparent third rail of contemporary society.
Renowned humorist/satirists/essayist David Sedaris has activated this cultural live wire with a piece published Dec. 8 in The New Yorker titled “And Your Little Dog, Too,” which described an unfortunate experience in Portland, Ore., in November when he was bit by a dog on the sidewalk.
As he tells it, Sedaris was on his way to buy doughnuts when he crossed paths with some folks smoking fentanyl on the sidewalk using an empty baby stroller as cover (apparently a common camouflage tactic among the Rose City’s public addicts). In addition to the carriage and drugs, they also had two unleashed dogs — both of which “rushed toward me, snarling, and one of them bit me on my left leg, just below the knee. It all happened within a second.”
That was bad enough, but what really rankled Sedaris was that no one — not the people ostensibly responsible for the dogs, nor practically anyone else he told about the incident — gave a damn about his pain. They mostly worried about the dogs’ welfare or otherwise gave them a pass.
By his own insinuation, the extent of Sedaris’ injuries weren’t too extreme, given that he threatened to but didn’t call the police, nor did he
STR8TS
go to the hospital — instead visiting a pharmacy and getting on with the author event he had scheduled in the city later that day.
But all that wasn’t really the point. Sedaris’ piece has poked Portland’s bruised sense of self — eliciting an article posted Dec. 14 by the Willamette Week in which interim Associate Arts & Culture Editor Christen McCurdy suggested that he has recently “come across as tedious and cranky rather than funny and perceptive,” and sought to correct the record on some perceived misperceptions about Portland and Portlanders (“who are a little bit sensitive about our city lately, what with all the war-zone talk from the reality TV star who now runs the country”). Specifically, she reminded readers that it’s actually illegal to smoke drugs on the street in Portland and there are laws in effect in Multnomah County related to dog bites. Duly noted.
Again, that sidesteps the point. Why did no one care that Sedaris got bit by a dog on a public sidewalk in a major American city?
As a fellow dog-bite survivor, I feel his pain; and, as someone who likes dogs but doesn’t like them everywhere, I’d submit that the reason no one gave a rip about his attack is because a cult of doggophilia has been allowed to grow so large as to be become anthropophobic.
From “dog moms” and “dog dads” of “fur babies” to the innumerable, insufferable instances I’ve heard a human say proudly they’d sacrifice other humans for the comfort of their pet, I’ve had it with this fetish.
I got bit while walking the streets 23 or so years ago as an ad sales representative for the Daily Bee and,
photo
as I was shaking the thing off my leg, the animal’s owner rushed out at me screaming “what did you do to my dog?” and “he’s a good boy!” I beg to differ. The same thing happened to my wife last year, when she was walking in Pine Street Park and a dog latched onto her in full view of the owner, who simply stood there telling her that nothing was amiss.
Don’t get Reader Publisher Ben Olson started on the years and mounds of dog turds he had to endure scattered around the front door of his former apartment in town, and don’t get me started on the occurrence I suffered just a week or so ago when I was enjoying a beer at a local bar and someone’s dog cut one of the nastiest farts I’ve encountered in 45 years of farts. I almost left, it was that disgusting. Then I spent the next hour or so having the animal jump on me while its owner shouted “down!” (though with a cutesy chuckle) and it barked at every other dog in the place, which also barked back to the point that I felt like I was drinking in a pound or some cur-filled Elizabethan slum. Don’t worry, though, they were all “good boys” and “good girls.”
Finally, just last week, I nearly got pushed into Cedar Street by some lady and her dog who took up the entire sidewalk (walking on the wrong side, I should add), and the former had the temerity to glare at me and spit an acidic “thank you” when I gave way.
To borrow a phrase, “screw you, lady, and your little dog, too.” Count me among Team Sedaris on this one.
Courtesy
Laughing Matters
Solution on page 22 Solution on page 22
By Bill Borders
CROSSWORD
ACROSS
1. Neuter 5. Pathfinder
Cobras 14. Floor covering 15. Run off to wed 16. Eject
17. A certain punctuation mark
19. Identical
20. Adult males
21. Employ again 22. Started
23. Make-believe
25. Disconcert
27. Half of two 28. Abroad
31. Mix
34. Courageous
Solution on page 22
of the Corrections:
[noun] 1. gossip; idle or foolish talk.
“Don’t pay attention to the clichmaclaver coming from the office. Most of it is unreliable and based on nothing but the whim of the office gossip hounds.”
Nah, we’re good, but have a merry Christmas anyway.
I remember we were all horrified to see Grandpa up on the roof with his Superman cape on. “Get down!” yelled Uncle Lou. “Don’t move!” screamed Grandma. But Grandpa wouldn’t listen. He walked to the edge of the roof and stuck out his arms, like he was going to fly. I forget what happened after that.
35. One plus one 36. Not prerecorded 37. Poorly 38. “Smallest” particle 39. Flowery verse 40. Pens
Grin
42. Ambassadorial
Faint 45. Refine 46. Brave deeds
Life sustaining bodily fluid
Overact
Excluding
Connect
Primary
Desire
Change
Nitpicky to a fault
Low in pitch
Rips
Expunge
DOWN
Unit of postage
Plays the bagpipes
Companionless
“I agree”
Calm
Cirrus or cumulus
Whoopsie
Convulsions
9. Golf ball support 10. Judge 11. Pasta 12. Mountain lion 13. Observed 18. Vogue 22. Naked 24. Pitch
