The City of Bend has announced that beginning Monday, April 2, the intersection of Bond Street and Wilson Avenue will be closed due to construction of a new roundabout. Traffic will be detoured around the construction area: - Traffic traveling on Wilson Avenue west from the Parkway will be detoured to a temporary access road to connect to Bond Street. - Traffic traveling on Bond Street will be detoured through the Old Mill District on SW Upper ... [full story]

A common expression has it that the opposite of love is not hate but indifference. Unfortunately, that's exactly the message the GOP is sending to the residents of our nation's capital by its recent actions in trying to defeat the bipartisan DC Voting Rights Act on a procedural motion. The Republicans in the House, as well as advisers to the president - by threatening a veto - are in danger not only of indifference to ... [full story]

The Deschutes County Commission on Children & Families (CCF) has announced the 2007-2009 Request for Proposal (RFP) process for public grant monies.  The CCF anticipates approximately $130,000 will be available in competitive grant funds through this 2007-2009 RFP process.  Priorities for the RFP will be addressed in two areas:  Positive Youth Development, and Child Abuse Prevention/Family Functioning. All organizations that serve youth and families are encouraged to apply. An optional bidder’s meeting will be held ... [full story]

When the cat's away, the mice will play. And for some­what si­m­i­lar rea­sons, bi­ol­o­gists have long be­lieved that the ex­tinc­tion of di­no­saurs caused the great flour­ish­ing of mam­mals on Earth - a pro­cess that pro­duced spe­cies in­clud­ing ours. That's not quite the way things hap­pened, a study has found.   A Cape Hy­rax (Pro­ca­via ca­p­en­sis), a small Af­ri­can mam­mal that looks like a ro­dent but is ac­tu­al­ly re­lat­ed to ele­phants. Their com­mon an­ces­tor lived 83 mil­lion years ... [full story]

Zoo brings back popular 3-D thrill ride 'Dino Island II: Escape From Dino Island' Oregon Zoo visitors come eye-to-eye with the threatening Tyrannosaurus rex, pteranodons and other dinosaurs in the return of the zoo's popular thrill ride, "Dino Island II: Escape From Dino Island." The feature, produced by SimEx-Iwerks, runs during the "Zoo's Gone Wild" spring break party, now through April 7. The "Dino Island" adventure catapults riders into the action from the very beginning. As ... [full story]

Flags to be lowered Friday, March 30, 2007 in honor of Sgt. Nicholas J. Lightner This week Governor Ted Kulongoski ordered all flags at public institutions to be flown at half-staff today in memory of Sgt. Nicholas J. Lightner, of Newport, Oregon.    Sgt. Nicholas J. Lightner Lightner, 29, died Wednesday, March 21, at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington of wounds suffered when an improvised explosive device (IED) detonated near his unti while on combat patrol March ... [full story]

An odd, six-sided, honeycomb-shaped fea­ture en­cir­cling Sat­urn’s North Pole has cap­tured the in­ter­est of sci­en­tists with NASA’s Cas­si­ni space­craft mis­sion.  The agency’s Voy­ag­er 1 and 2 space­craft im­aged the hex­a­gon over two dec­ades ago, but its ap­pear­ance in new Cas­si­ni im­ages shows it’s long lived, height­en­ing the rid­dle, sci­en­tists said. This night­time view of Sat­urn's north pole shows a bi­zarre six-sided hex­a­gon fea­ture en­cir­cling the north pole. (Cour­te­sy: NASA/J­PL/U­ni­ver of Ar­i­zo­na) “We’ve nev­er seen an­y­thing ... [full story]

With spring and Easter known as a popular time of year for people to buy baby chicks, the Oregon Department of Health Services (ODHS) yesterday announced the results of a study by two state agencies stating that nearly one-fifth of chicks sold in agricultural feed stores in the western part of the state harbor Salmonella bacteria.  The Oregon Public Health Division and the Oregon Department of Agriculture surveyed agricultural feed stores in western Oregon in February and March ... [full story]

NASA astronaut Suni Williams will go faster than anyone has ever gone in the Boston Marathon. She will run the famed race in April as an official entrant from 210 miles above Earth aboard the International Space Station. This will be the first time an astronaut in space will be an official participant in a marathon. Williams hopes her unique run will serve as an inspiration."I encourage kids to start making physical fitness part of ... [full story]

A study sent yesterday to the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice demonstrates that the proposed merger between XM and Sirius would create a monopoly, constituting a likely violation of the antitrust laws.  Conducted by one of the country's leading economists and scholars, the study lends concrete evidence and analysis to some of the most important questions that have plagued lawmakers since the merger was announced earlier this year. As lawmakers on Capitol ... [full story]