[Klickitat] 🎨 A Door Through the Mural - Bingen August '26 Round-Up

Bingen's city attorney is leaving at the end of the year for two judgeships, and nobody outside City Hall has reported it. The Bingen City Council also filed a breach-of-contract complaint over a door cut through a community mural, caught a state agency handing them another city's contract, and gave two flood-damaged businesses a two-word update. From the meetings of August 4 and August 18, 2026.

In This Episode:

• City Attorney Chris Lanz resigns effective the end of 2026, for a District Court judgeship in Skamania County and a Superior Court commissioner seat in Klickitat County.
• A $15,000 mural, a new door, and a city council that would rather not enforce its own contract.
• The downtown flood ledger: two claims settled, one in review, and "No update" for Chips and Mugs.
• The SR-14 flashing beacon comes in about $2,000 under budget, on an agreement WSDOT addressed to the wrong city.
• Ordinance 2026-08-788 amends the 2026 budget, with no dollar figure stated anywhere in the minutes.
• Eda O'Connor takes the student council seat; her father abstains.

Resources & Links:

• Read the full written Dispatch at skamaniadispatch.com
• Our July Bingen edition, on the flood the city could not discuss: https://skamania-dispatch.ghost.io/the-flood-bingen-cant-talk-about-bingen-july-26-round-up-2/
• Bingen agendas, minutes and Zoom links: bingenwashington.org/AgendaCenter
• Adopted city ordinances, including 2026-08-788: bingenwashington.org/174/Ordinances
• Columbia Gorge News on the breach of contract: columbiagorgenews.com
• WSDOT on the SR 14 Bingen Access Improvements ribbon-cutting: wsdot.wa.gov
• Comment to the City of Bingen: administrator@bingenwashington.org, or (509) 493-2122

Stay Connected with the Gorge

The Skamania Dispatch and The Klickitattler are community-led projects of OpenGorge.org.

To stay updated on local news, governance, and community events across the region, you can sign up for both newsletters at SkamaniaDispatch.com. For real-time updates and to join the conversation, follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/OpenGorge.

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hey there, and welcome back to Open Gorge. We're in binge in this time, rounding up the meetings of August 4th and August 18th. So let's start with the thing that took four sentences in the minutes and is probably the biggest story of the month. City Attorney Chris Lance told the council on August 18th that he's resigning at the end of this year, and it's for a good reason. He's been appointed District Court Judge in Scamania County and Superior Court Commissioner in Clickitac County. Two seats on the bench. Here's why that's bigger than a basic staffing note. Lance has been the voice of Benjen through one of its hardest years. He's the one who told that PAC July 7th meeting about the flood that because litigation had been threatened, the city had to make no comment. He's the named reviewer on the County Dispatch Agreement, the State Highway Agreement, and the fence code that they've been drafting all summer. He did introduce a possible successor, an attorney from the Scamania County Prosecutor's Office. So Bengen has about four months to replace an attorney who knows where every live wire in that city is buried. The record shows no recruitment process so far and no timeline, no council vote, just an introduction of the topic. Now we move on to the mural. Go back to June 2025. Then Mayor Catherine Kewitt told the council there'd be a community youth painting day, part of a mural on the old Washington Gorge Action Programs building. Kids came out and helped paint it. We covered it as a nice piece of summer programming. That mural came back on August 18th as a breach of contract. City Administrator Chris Deloney brought the council a memo with photographs, the breach of contract email, the signed agreement. Bigfish Properties, which owns the building, had cut out a substantial section of the mural to put in a door. Councilor Dale Grinstead Mail held up an image of the original so everyone could see the portion of the mural that was now gone. Columbia Gorge News filled in what the minutes might have left out. The contract said that the owner would keep that mural as a permanent fixture for the life of the art and wouldn't remove it without the city's consent. The city filed a complaint, offered three ways out. Hire the original artist to repaint it, pay back the $15,000 the mural cost, or have your own artist make a replacement with the city's approval. So here's a part that interests me. Once the breach was on the table, the room went looking for the door out of it. Grinstead Mail says the property manager told him former mayor Kewitt knew a door was planned for that spot. Loney called Kewitt, who said that the location was never finalized and never committed to. Grinstead Mail agreed. It was never in the contract, they're in breach. Then Councilor Ryan O'Connor said the city should be flexible so it doesn't discourage other businesses from putting up murals. Counselor Craig Trummel agreed and raised the optics, especially after the flood. The meeting ended with a plan to have coffee about it, an on-site meeting with Grinstead Mail, Mayor Kelsey Ramsey, and the owners. There'll be no deadline, no enforcement step. The city is a signed contract, a documented breach, a $15,000 number, and three stated remedies, and it adjourned toward a conversation. And I honestly think that this is the best possible outcome. A small city runs on goodwill, and council knows these people. It's our hope that actually most of these kinds of disputes can come to a conversation and working together on voluntary plans for action before enforcement becomes part of the picture. It's going to be a decision really about what the city's signature is worth next time, but hopefully these conversations can help hammer that out. Moving back to the flood. You've heard me on this all summer. April 15th, a contractor working for the city hit a water main and flooded the businesses on West Steuben. Then the August 18th update was the shortest yet, and for some people that's progressed. Studio CBC, all claims settled, multi-use ventures, remediation and reconstruction settled, Carmen's Kitchen, paperwork in, and under review, with reopening now down to the building owner's construction schedule. Two weeks earlier it was down to the settlement, and then it moved from a money problem to a scheduling problem. And then chips, no update, mugs, no update. So that's the whole entry. Two words each. Those are the businesses whose owners pack the July 7th meeting and push hardest in the public since April. Muggs isn't coming back to that address either way. The city's own August 4th minutes say it plainly. Muggs was never going to continue in that space, and Studio CBC is taking the unit. Then the most recent numbers are from August 4th, just over $82,000 in lost wages to Carmen's kitchen, about $71,000 to chips. The August 18th minutes have no dollar figures at all, so we won't hear those as updated. And a last lighter one, sort of. Bing's new flashing crosswalk beacon on State Route 14 is basically done. Progress estimate number two covers 98% of the work, and it came out about $2,000 under budget. But the council also had to sign a maintenance agreement with the state, and what it says is that the state will let you put your beacon on a state highway, and every dollar to install it, repair it, or remove it is yours forever. So Chris Lance read the front page of that agreement at the table and pointed out it was addressed to the city of South Bend. A different Washington city altogether. Somebody at the state had accidentally grabbed a template and didn't change the name. The council authorized a revised version, and note, that got caught because a lawyer read page one aloud in the room. That's the office that Bingin is about to have to fill. Same corridor with better news. On Thursday, August 27th, the state held a ribbon cutting for the SR 14 Bingin Access Project. $34.3 million. And now there's a new street under the railroad track, so a train can't cut off Bingin point from the highway anymore. And the roundabout at Elm with the historic boat. The council's own roundabout business was smaller. The glass has been ordered, and on the recording, what they really wanted to know was whether electricians would leave them an actual outlet out there for Christmas lights later. I certainly hope so, as the idea of getting to decorate the roundabout for all the different holidays seems kind of fun. Like Binshin having its own boat-shaped porch goose or something. And now let's do a quick run through the rest. Council adopted ordinance 2026-08788, amending this year's budget. Mostly bookkeeping plus salary and benefits for two new public works employees starting August 31st. Nobody testified, and I can't tell you what it costs just yet, because the minutes state no total. We will get those caught up in the council packet when they post it. Binge and Fire ran 36 calls in July, seven in Bingin, and 29 mutual aid from Lyle Tuscamania County to Glenwood. 190 so far this year. Chief Carl Spratt said other agencies asked for help Bingin couldn't send, and on the recording explained why a small department sometimes has to. When you send a crew, you don't know if they're going to be gone for overnight or two weeks. And Council seated its student member, Edna O'Connor, the only applicant. Her father, Councillor Ryan O'Connor, abstained. So what's next? September 8th, the city's certificate of deposit matures. Loney told council she put in a 12-month term at 3.6, not the rate they voted for. Council's September 1st agenda had the final beacon estimate, another mural update, and an item called the upcoming council vacancy. Those items will go in next month's roundup. The council meets first and third Tuesday at 6 p.m. And reminder, at the end of this year, Chris Lance is gone. So still not scheduled, that on-site meeting about the mural, and the city's request to the state to drop a speed limit to 20 miles an hour still not filed. Thanks for joining us today. You've been listening to a production of opengorge.org, home of the Scamani Dispatch and the Cleve Tattler. We believe that informed communities are stronger communities. To support our work and stay up to date on everything happening in the gorge, head over to ScamaniDispatch.com to sign up for our newsletters. You can also find us on Facebook at facebook.comslash open gorge. Join the conversation and share your thoughts on today's episode. Thanks for tuning in. We'll talk to you next time.