Austin Jenkins
Stories
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Masks are now required in Washington state as Covid-19 cases rise
After weeks of relying on voluntary compliance, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee on Tuesday afternoon announced an enforceable, statewide requirement that...
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She lost her sister to COVID-19. The death highlights the heightened risk to people with developmental disabilities
At Christmastime last December, Sharon Gowdey was a healthy 56-year-old woman with Down syndrome. A video from a holiday party shows her in a Santa hat...
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Inslee orders furloughs, cancels some pay raises as forecast shows $9B drop in revenues
In a move not seen since the Great Recession , Washington Gov. Jay Inslee on Wednesday canceled pay raises for some state employees and ordered...
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Trump calls Inslee 'a stiff' and says 'I’ll do the job' to clear out CHOP
Stepping up an attack he began on Twitter last week, President Trump on Monday spent more than four minutes at a White House meeting inveighing against...
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It’s an election year, but that’s not scaring WA Democrats away from talking about taxes
As the state of Washington grapples with the economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, lawmakers are bracing for a bleak revenue forecast on June 17...
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Pried off and stolen: A nearly 100-year-old historic marker vanishes from WA Capitol Campus
A nearly 100-year-old historical marker has been mysteriously stolen from Washington's Capitol Campus and, with no leads on who took it, the state...
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In wake of unemployment fraud, Washington’s campaign finance watchdog blocks some online access
At the request of a powerful Democratic state senator who warned of “foreign intrusion,” Washington’s Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) on Sunday...
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Washington Republicans want to block pay raises and cut spending in June special session
Saying that it’s time for the legislative branch to “intervene” in the state’s COVID-19 response, Republican leaders in the Washington Legislature on...
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A special session of the Washington Legislature in June? Don’t bet on it, but don’t rule it out
As Washington Gov. Jay Inslee exerts his emergency powers to battle COVID-19, behind the scenes legislative leaders are exploring the idea of a special...
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At age 6, he and his classmates fled Mount St. Helens. 40 years later, this reporter recalls that day
Olympia Correspondent Austin Jenkins was a first grader on a school camping trip near Mount St. Helens when the volcano erupted on May 18, 1980. Austin recently unearthed his scrapbook from that time and interviewed several others who were on that memorable trip. On this 40th anniversary of the eruption, Austin recounts their harrowing escape.