He was born and raised in Yakima and has worked in the finest restaurants in town for the past 20 years and he's already upgraded our dining experience.

It's a unique bar. The room was originally a 1910 train station passenger lounge, and it's got a 35-foot-high dome, all done in the original architecture. The bar will seat 22 and is an 8-by-16-foot rectangle that sits directly under the dome.

We'll be going out into the community and looking for businesses who want to hold training seminars with food served for breakfast and lunch.

The increase has been larger this year than we've seen in the past. The introduction of some nationally known restaurants probably has driven traffic toward them, and we always see when a new restaurant opens, it tends to draw people to that area.

A boardwalk in spirit if not in composition — it's concrete — this path runs 3 miles past beachfront hotels, restaurants, stores, museums, bike-rental shops and street performers. Three stages present free summer entertainment, and two small museums belly up to the boardwalk: the Atlantic Waterfowl Heritage Museum (decoys) and The Old Coast Guard Station with nifty 'tower cam' ocean views.

They're looking for you to step up. And we've done it in the past.