MOSES LAKE - The government shutdown seems like a hot-topic, current event, happening somewhere else. Mail is delivered, Grand Coulee is generating electricity, the paper is printed.

For many residents of Grant County the shutdown does not seem to have any effect on their lives. However, some residents' lives have changed or been put on hold.

National Guardsmen and women have been affected by the shutdown, wrote Rick Garces to the Columbia Basin Herald Facebook page.

He wrote that although he and his wife depend on supplemental income earned at drill, which are weekends of work with the National Guard. National Guard State Public Affairs Officer Capt. Joseph Siemandel said about 150 individuals from Moses Lake were affected by the cancellation, loosing between $300 and $1,000 each, depending on time in service and rank.

Siemandel said after the new budget is approved, drill will be rescheduled and lost income will be made up.

Most of the Fairchild Air Force Base civilian airmen who were furloughed were recalled and reported for duty this week as part of the Pay Our Military Act, according to a prepared statement from Fairchild Lt. Matthew Sanders.

On Tuesday, the House of Representatives passed a bill making sure all furloughed federal employees will be paid back as soon as the shutdown ends, according to a prepared statement from Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers' office, R-Wash.

Other readers, John Likes and Kim Deuel, voiced concerns on the Herald Facebook page for federal loans for college and textbooks.

Big Bend Community College Director of Financial Aid Jill Shankar said the status of student loans, grants and veterans benefits are stable for the time being, but if the shutdown continues they will not be processed in the future.

Those applying for financial aid for the first time are delayed, as the IRS needs to verify income and tax information, which can not be done during the shutdown, she said.

The Bureau of Reclamation Field Office is closed in Ephrata, although staff essential to water delivery services within the Columbia Basin Project, such as dispatchers and engineers, are still at work.

All offices in the U.S Department of Agriculture Service Center in Ephrata are closed and include the Farm Service Agency, which helps farmers and ranchers obtain funding for start-up costs, equipment purchases and other operational costs, and the Natural Resource Conservation Service, which provides conservation assistance, farmland protection and soil survey services. Employees will return to work when the government reopens, according to a recorded phone message.

Many federal parks have been shutdown along with the government.

However, the Grand Coulee Dam Visitor Center is still open, and giving tours. Supervisor of Reclamation Guide Ivan Snavely said they are funded through electric bills.

He said tours of the dam have been full to capacity at 24 visitors, an oddity this time of year, when they usually only have two to five.

Around the visitor center, though, one can see affects of the shutdown. Boat launches at Crescent Lake are closed with saw horses across the access road and all camping and recreation is blocked around Spring Canyon and the Keller Ferry.

The future holds uncertainties for many families who rely on Federal Assistance Programs like WIC (Women, infants and children) and food stamps. Moses Lake Food Bank Operations Manager Peny Archer said their facilities have not yet been affected. The federal government provides between 25 and 35 percent of their food stuffs. Archer said that cut would be significant to their supply.

If programs like WIC no longer provides families with food or formula, those families will have no other option than to go to food banks, she said.

Moses Lake Food Bank AmeriCorps VISTA member Jeni Roberts received notice that her pay will be cut 36 percent. As an AmeriCorps volunteer, Roberts is paid only about $800 a month already, Archer said, which would barely pay rent.

Other government supplemented industries like hospitals and public schools have experienced no impact on their services, although that may change in the future. Hospitals relies heavily on government programs like Medicare and Medicaid and the schools receives 15 percent of their budget from federal money. Moses Lake School District Superintendent Michelle Price said the first programs to feel the pinch would be grant-funded programs like Gear-Up, 21st Century and migrant education, as the district would not be able to pay for the programs out of their own funds.

Archer, of the food bank, believes an extended shutdown will affect low-income families first and most strongly, "and then trickle up."

Price summed up popular sentiment, saying, "Right now we're just holding on for the ride, and encouraging Congress to get results."

Columbia Basin Herald writers Shawn Cardwell, Cheryl Schweizer, Joe Utter and Tiffany Sukola contributed to this report.