By Will Tuell

Senator Marianne Moore (R-Calais) and Representative Tiffany Strout (R-Harrington) honored the Class C Volleyball State Champion Narraguagus Lady Knights at the State House in Augusta last week. The team, which defeated the Calais Blue Devils for the title last October in the state championship game, finished the season with only one loss -- to volleyball powerhouse and Class B runners-up, Washington Academy. 

The Fellowship LEGO Robotics Team, part of the University of Maine Cooperative Extension’s Cobscook Currents 4-H Club in Washington County, was one of 25 teams to compete in the state’s first LEGO League Challenge.

The team won the Champions Award and an invitation to represent Maine in the first Championship World Festival in Houston, Texas, in April. That event will feature 160 LEGO League teams from all 50 states and 66 other countries.

By Will Tuell

Final figures are in for the annual Rise Above volleyball tournament organized by Steven and Britannia Balyint, and the charitable event has raised over $4,000 for Arise Addiction Recovery in Machias. 

The event was held the weekend of March 8-10 and featured some fourteen pick-up volleyball teams from Downeast and beyond. Arise merchandise, concessions, and sweets were available for purchase as well. 

All told, the weekend generated $4,200 in donations, the Balyints said via the “Rise Above” volleyball tournament Facebook page. 

You Can’t Sit Here, an original children’s opera from Eastport Arts Center’s Music for Children project, will be presented for 5th through 8th grade students from 15 local schools at the end of this month, followed by an evening performance for the public, Friday, March 29, at 7 p.m., at Eastport Arts Center. The characters are students at a small elementary school who experience loneliness, anger, and frustration in reaction to bullying, isolation, loss of status, and school mores. 

By Nancy Beal

Nearly 150 Jonesporters gathered in their high school gym on March 11 and, in under three hours, kept their budget under $1 million, approved a comprehensive plan, dedicated a future marine site to working waterfront, returned their top selectman to office, and voted two new faces onto the town and CSD school boards. In addition to the usual motions and votes, the session exhibited a bit of campaigning, fears of sanctuary city status, and opinions on a future fish farm. There were no changes to suggested money items in the municipal budget.

By Will Tuell

Two Washington Academy seniors -- Dakoda Davis of East Machias and Emerson Morris of Charlotte -- were honored at the State House in Augusta on March 14 after being named the school’s valedictorian and salutatorian. The pair received legislative sentiments from Davis’s grandfather, State Representative Kenneth “Bucket” Davis (R-East Machias), and State Senator Marianne Moore (R-Calais), highlighting their academic accomplishments over the past four years. 

By Will Tuell

Despite unprecedented storm damage and the Sunrise Trail being closed to ATV traffic, a University of Maine Machias senior is working with the state, local businesses, and the Sunrise Trail Coalition to install benches along one of the most heavily traveled sections of the corridor, from Dunkin’ in Machias to Archibald’s One-Stop in East Machias. 

By Jayna Smith

On Monday, April 8, 2024, a spectacular celestial event, the total solar eclipse, will dazzle parts of the United States. This eclipse marks the final opportunity to witness a total solar eclipse from the contiguous United States until 2044. The eclipse will commence its journey into the nation from Texas and traverse through Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, along with small portions of Tennessee and Michigan.

By Will Tuell

In the ideal world, kids turn in their homework early, road crews finish major reconstruction projects ahead of schedule, and you’re able to move into a new home before you have to move out of the old one. But that isn’t always the case, as Mason’s Downeast announced last week on social media that their renovation of the former Bluebird Ranch Family Restaurant in Machias would not be ready for a Saint Patrick’s Day relaunch as the popular brewpub had once hoped. 

By Will Tuell

Two men on trial in a Machias courtroom for murdering 17-year-old Brandin Guerrero of Massapequa, New York, on Nov. 4, 2021, were found guilty of the murder on March 15 following nearly two weeks of testimony dominated by witnesses presented by the Maine Attorney General’s Office who implicated both the accused and the victim in a complex web of gang-related drug trafficking that has sent shockwaves throughout coastal Washington County since gunshots echoed throughout downtown Machias nearly two-and-a-half years ago.