LETTER FROM THE EDITOR: Covering sensitive situations
R. HANS MILLER | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 1 year, 9 months AGO
FILE PHOTO
Managing Editor Rob Miller is a 4-year U.S. Army veteran who grew up in Western Montana in a community about the size of Soap Lake. An honors graduate of Texas State University, he enjoys spending time with his wife, Brandee, and their three dogs, Draco, Pepper and Cinnamon. He has one son, William. During his free time, he enjoys photography, video games, reading and working on the house he and his wife bought in Ephrata. He is passionate about the First Amendment and educating communities. | March 1, 2024 1:30 AM
MOSES LAKE — In recent editions of the Columbia Basin Herald, we're covered two delicate topics that require a great deal of empathy, compassion and thought to handle correctly. Those are the topics of bullying and the death of a student, Jett Johnson, who attended Ephrata High School.
We covered bullying issues at Frontier Middle School and the Moses Lake School District’s policies and practices regarding that issue in the past few weeks.
We know there is a great deal more coverage to consider with the bullying issue and we will continue to keep an eye on it and the impacts it has in all of the communities the paper serves. We appreciate the administrators, parents and students who have given us insight and information, even in off-the-record discussions, and we are committed to doing whatever we can to provide tools for students, parents and administrators to mitigate the issue. We will be writing stories for each of the school districts we cover to make sure families have the information they need to act when bullying arises.
The other is a much more personal issue. When I got the news that Jett had passed away in a car accident, I knew the paper needed to do something to support the family and the Ephrata community as a whole. I reached out to Ephrata School District Public Information Officer Sarah Morford to discuss possible ideas, and she immediately helped me connect with his amazing mother, Heidi, and multiple Ephrata Schools staff. I have since heard an amazing number of wonderful remembrances of Jett. It makes me wish I’d known him. Everyone I spoke to got choked up on some level, but all of them had a bit of a laugh at a wonderful memory with an amazing young man. I hope my writing did some justice to his memory and that, in the long run, it helps the community heal and remember Jett’s wonderful presence in their lives and the joy he brought them.
It is humbling to be able to do the work we do here at the Columbia Basin Herald. Humbling to have access to people during some of their most difficult times. Humbling to be welcomed and to be able to honor someone like Jett or help provide tools to help children avoid being bullied or becoming a bully.
Thank you to everyone involved for their support, trust, kindness and appreciation.
With great respect,
R. Hans “Rob” Miller
Managing Editor
ARTICLES BY R. HANS MILLER
Awareness helps prevent porch pirates’ success
EPHRATA — At least 58 million packages were stolen in the U.S. last year, with about 25% of Americans being the victims of theft, according to the United States Parcel Service. At the local level, there are thefts occurring regularly as well, but that doesn’t mean that you’re stuck being the victim, authorities say. “The experience of the Grant County Sheriff’s Office is that package theft happens regularly,” said GCSO Public Information Officer Kyle Foreman. “It is a crime of opportunity. When someone’s out looking to try and make a quick buck, they may drive through a neighborhood looking for unattended packages on the front porch.”
Gorge shooting trial rescheduled to 2026
EPHRATA — The trial in the case of James Kelly, the man charged in the June 2023 shooting that led to the deaths of two women at the Beyond Wonderland music festival held at The Gorge Amphitheatre, has been bumped to early next year, according to court documents.
LETTER FROM THE EDITOR: In appreciation of educators ...
An experience I recently had with a school district, quite honestly, has left me gob-smacked a bit. I am in awe of the teachers and administrators at school districts throughout the region and what they have to deal with. Let me get back to the beginning, though. Journalists often cover a wide variety of topics and are constantly looking for ideas for stories that will matter to readers. As such, when we hear of events of interest, we sometimes ask to attend so we can either cover it, or, as in this case, learn how to cover a topic better.