The Wahkiakum County Eagle - Established as The Skamokawa Eagle in 1891

This week, I announce some changes in staff.

Reporter Melissa Linquist is leaving us, more or less.

When we hired her last spring, she was completing her student teaching. It looked like none of the local school districts would be hiring a full-time elementary school teacher, and she would be a substitute teacher. That would have allowed her to continue as our part-time reporter.

Alas, the Ocean Beach School District experienced some staff changes in August, and when an elementary position came open, they snapped up our enterprising reporter.

However, Melissa wants to keep her finger in journalism, so she's going to submit articles to us on a freelance basis. She's going to focus on the Westend and Naselle, but she won't be limited to those areas.

Other people have expressed an interest in freelancing for us, and we've decided to use them rather than try to fill the part-time reporting job.

Readers saw Jennifer Hanigan's photos from the Downhill Corral in last week's edition; this week she submitted a report of the Buzzard's Breath Chili Cookoff. She'll do an occasional article when she can squeeze time away from the job as a real estate lawyer for Wahkiakum Title and Escrow. Journalism is fun, she says.

Also joining the crew will be Diana Zimmerman, a Wahkiakum High School graduate who has moved back to town after earning a bachelor degree in English at Whitworth University in Spokane and working as a librarian and executive assistant at residential care facility there. Diana is going to tackle coverage of some sports and local government and turn out some human interest feature stories for us, too.

We know you'll look forward to the variety of stories they'll produce.