Some cities schedule spring yard cleanup
CHERYL SCHWEIZER | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 4 years, 4 months AGO
Senior Reporter Cheryl Schweizer is a journalist with more than 30 years of experience serving small communities in the Pacific Northwest. She began her post-high-school education at Treasure Valley Community College and enerned her journalism degree at Oregon State University. After working for multiple publications, she has settled down at the Columbia Basin Herald and has been a staple of the newsroom for more than a decade. Schweizer’s dedication to her communities and profession has earned her the nickname “The Baroness of Bylines.” She covers a variety of beats including health, business and various municipalities. | March 7, 2021 1:00 AM
MOSES LAKE — There are more hours of sun each day. It’s getting warmer. Time to get out in the yard and – wow. The yard could use some work.
Maybe it’s the leaves that escaped the pile last fall, or overgrown bushes, or cleaning all the stuff accumulated in the yard. Some local communities will offer help during spring cleanup, picking up debris or collecting it at a central dropoff point.
Lynne Lynch, communications and marketing specialist for the city of Moses Lake, said the city is postponing its normal spring event, hoping to offer it in the fall. But city crews will be picking up shrub trimmings, small tree limbs and other woody debris beginning the last week of March.
It will be the only brush pickup in Moses Lake in 2021.
The pickup date will depend on the address, and there’s a list of dates on the city’s website, www.cityofml.com.
Limbs and branches must be less than four inches in diameter and be at the curb and easily accessible to city crews. The material should be at the curb by Monday of the scheduled week.
Grass clippings, leaves, bagged or wrapped debris, nails or wire will not be accepted.
The city of Ephrata will stay with its scheduled fall pickup, said city employee Kari Chornuk. City officials encourage residents to cut back their shrubs in the spring if they’ve grown over the sidewalk, she said.
Mattawa city officials tentatively are scheduling a spring pickup, but haven’t nailed down all the details yet.
“We’re hoping for mid-April,” city clerk Anabel Martinez said.
There are some spring jobs perfect for early March, according to the This Old House website.
Homeowners should trim away dead or damaged branches from shrubs. Shaping hedges with hand pruners, rather than electric shears, helps prevent growth that keeps light and air out of the center of the shrub, the site says.
Flowering perennials also should get a haircut. Perennials should be trimmed to four to five inches, and ornamental grasses to two to three inches, to allow new growth to emerge. Winter-damaged roses should be trimmed back to one inch below the damaged area.
Flower beds and borders should get a cleanout, including raking out last year’s leftovers and pulling up dead annuals. All of last year’s plants are perfect candidates for a compost pile.
Leaves and branches larger than one-half inch in diameter should be shredded, the site says.
MORE FRONT-PAGE-SLIDER STORIES
ARTICLES BY CHERYL SCHWEIZER

Spokane Seed provides product, knowledge backed by a century
Evolution is a thing in business as well as biology. Spokane Seed has been around for more than a century, and it has evolved as the farms around the Palouse have evolved. “We’re a distributor, a wholesaler,” said Spokane Seed president Andrew Fontaine, the fourth generation of his family to run the business. Their customers, he said, are looking for a very specific kind of product; for dried peas, lentils and garbanzo beans, he said. Their customers come from throughout the world. Spokane Seed has the kind of reputation that has customers seeking them out, he said; that’s partly due to the company’s century-plus in business. Staying in demand requires more than a long history, however.

Moses Lake looking for provider for homeless support services
MOSES LAKE — Moses Lake city officials will advertise for organizations who want to provide support for homeless people looking for treatment for substance abuse and a way to get to that treatment. Liz Murillo Busby, the city’s housing grant manager, said the city money to pay for the contract will come from document recording fees. “We’re anticipating a contract of about $55,000 for this,” Murillo Busby said.

Moses Lake sit-sleep-lie ordinance approved
MOSES LAKE — New regulations in Moses Lake for sleeping, lying or sitting on sidewalks within a designated zone during specific times of day were approved Tuesday by the Moses Lake City Council. New rules governing shopping carts taken from businesses also were approved, but any fines levied against businesses that own shopping carts will be deferred for 90 days. Council member Deanna Martinez asked for additional time to look at alternatives for dealing with shopping carts once they’re abandoned.