Will the 4th of July be beautiful day for outside activities? Check out our local weather coverage.
Here are some of the stories that grabbed our readers’ attention this week.
Everybody knows that freedom isn’t free. Plenty have paid high prices to win you life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
What is free this year, however, is one of Vancouver’s main claims to fame: Independence Day at Fort Vancouver, the annual festival of music, food, fireworks and our own unique historical setting.
Thanks to political and budget realities — the messy downsides of a functioning democracy — the event has slimmed down this year. It doesn’t cost to get in, but it’s not the daylong extravaganza it once was. That’s because host the Fort Vancouver National Trust has reviewed expenses and feedback from previous years, and decided to refocus on the main event: the rockets’ red glare and (harmless) bombs bursting in air.
Get all of the details on places to celebrate Tuesday.
It’s a common strategy, according to General Manager Mike McLeod, for a hotel like the Hilton Vancouver Washington to look more fervently to book conventions and large events when competition is on the rise. The hope is to fill rooms with event attendees.
That strategy may become more important in the coming years if three more hotels rise, seemingly shoulder-to-shoulder, in Vancouver’s downtown and waterfront areas.
Learn more about the hotels planned for downtown.
When the U.S. Army sent Col. Larry Smith to Vancouver Barracks in 1989, it gave him the opportunity to work with community leaders.
Now Smith has been recognized as one of those community contributors. The Community Foundation for Southwest Washington announced Friday that Smith has been named 2017 First Citizen.
“So many people are worthy of this award,” Smith, 75, said Friday afternoon. “I’m completely flabbergasted.”
Read more about Larry Smith’s contributions to our community.
Vancouver’s Joey Gibson always paid some attention to politics but had little practical interest in the process. Then he took to the streets outside the Republican National Convention in Cleveland last summer.
There, the leader of the Patriot Prayer online community-slash-movement, whose organizing and activism has garnered national headlines after recent clashes on college campuses and the streets of Portland, was caught on camera tearing up a demonstrator’s anti-police cardboard sign.
“Why would you destroy my property?” asked the man, who was wearing a T-shirt that read “F*** the police.”
Because Gibson, 33, was fired up. But then he felt bad for ripping up the sign.
Learn more about the conservative-libertarian activist.
Line & Lure Seafood Kitchen and Tap is one of the many restaurants located inside the Ilani Casino Resort. The full-service family restaurant features regional dishes and a seafood boil along with local beer, wines and signature cocktails. In addition to an expansive indoor dining room and bar area, there is an outdoor patio complete with a fire pit and a 28-person private dining room that may be reserved.
Read more about the casino’s premiere seafood spot.
