Peninsular Thinking A conversation about Bremerton, Port Orchard, Poulsbo, Silverdale, Bainbridge Island, Kingston, Manchester, Seabeck, Southworth, Suquamish, Belfair, Keyport, Olalla, Bangor, Hansville, Indianola, Port Gamble, Allyn, Port Ludlow, Gig Harbor and every once in a while something about the good folks who don't have the good fortune to live here.
Bremerton-born blues
man TJ Wheeler will present a free workshop today at the Opal
Robertston Teen Center, 802 7th St. in Bremerton. He’ll also give a
concert at 8 p.m. Saturday at Island Center Hall on Bainbridge
Island, 8395 Fletcher Bay Rd NE; donations welcome. A 6 p.m.
potluck precedes Saturday’s entertainment.
Wheeler graduated from an alternative school on Bainbridge
Island and found music to be a grounding influence in his early
life, which was full of challenges, according to Jerry Elfendahl,
who is helping publicize the musician’s visit to the Northwest. He
has earned many awards and accolades, including the W.C. Handy
Keeping the Blues Alive Award in education.
Wheeler’s workshops combine music and inspiration. His
educational program Hope, Heroes and the Blues, which started with
a small grant from Ben & Jerry’s, has reached more than 450,000
students nationwide.
The concert/workshop in Bremerton is sponsored by New Life
Community Development Agency. Although the workshop is aimed at
youth, everyone is welcome. There is no cost.
Wheeler’s calling his Saturday concert a 50th Jubilee, since
he’s been playing guitar for 50 years.
“The next week the Jimi Hendrix Museum AKA EMP / (Experience
Music project) have booked me to do a ‘Blues to Hendrix’ BITS
(Blues in the School) residency and concert,” Wheeler wrote in his
blog. “It is a blessing to be coming home and I hope I see all of
you at one site or another.”
CKFR’s Lindsay Muller at the
Scott Firefighter Stairclimb in Seattle on Sunday, March 9.
Contributed photo
Firefighters from Kitsap County and across the country, ran, jogged
and sometimes leaned against walls on their way up 69 flights and
1,311 steps in full firefighting gear, including oxygen tanks and
breathing equipment, Sunday during Seattle’s annual Scott
Firefighter Stairclimb, a fundraiser for the Leukemia & Lymphoma
Society.
CKFR firefighter’s eight-man team has raised more
money than any other Kitsap area team with $16,036.13, beating its
$12,000 goal.
CKFR also has placed in the top 10 fundraising teams
per capita.
“Now we really set the bar too high,” joked
firefighter Ryan Orseth, CKFR team captain.
Orseth himself made an impressive fundraising push. He
was $403.95 short of making the list for the top 10 individual
fundraisers. He raised a total of $5,201.05.
Although firefighters are done racing stairs in
downtown Seattle’s Columbia Center, the second tallest building
west of the Mississippi, they can accept donations until the end of
the month.
So far, 1,800 firefighters from more than 300
departments have raised about $1.55 million.
Last year, the event raised $1.44 million with the
help of 1,500 firefighters from 282 departments.
While every Kitsap area fire district and department
participated in the event, not everyone is as closely connected
with the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society as the North Kitsap Fire and
Rescue is.
The district lost one of its own firefighters to
leukemia on March 8, 1997, according to NKFR spokesperson Michele
Laboda.
Tom Kenyon died at age 33, leaving behind his wife and
six-month-old daughter, who is now a high school senior.
The stairclimb has always been close to and sometimes
on the anniversary of Kenyon’s death, Laboda said.
This year, NKFR’s four-man team has raised $2,128,
just a few hundred shy of it’s $2,500 goal.
Besides the gratification of fundraising for a noble
cause, there also is a little pride in how quickly individuals and
teams climb the stairs.
Each team can have any number of participants, but
team times are calculated from the top three fastest times.
CKFR’s team time was 1 hour, 5 minutes and 30 seconds,
while the North Mason Fire Authority had the fastest time for
Kitsap area districts, finishing in 49:09.
The average firefighter takes 20 to 30 minutes to run
up 69 flights of stairs, according to the event website.
Only firefighters are allowed to climb in the
event.
This year’s fastest time was 11:03 by 32-year-old
Missoula, Mont., firefighter Andrew Drobeck.
CKFR is looking at improving fundraising, not speed,
next year.
Orseth said he would like to see CKFR on the top 10
fundraisers list.
This year’s top fundraisers ranged from $22,318 to
$68,976.99.
To compete, Orseth suggested pooling Kitsap County’s
resources to create a countywide team.
And he has already started campaigning for next year’s
climbers, asking CKFR commissioners to consider joining the
team.
The July deadline is just one of several in the
recently released strategic plan from the Kitsap County Behavioral
Health Strategic Planning Team. Proposals for projects or programs,
aimed at reducing the number of mentally ill juveniles and adults
cycle through the criminal justice system and the demand on
emergency services, will be accepted from Feb. 20 to April 18 at 3
p.m. Kitsap County County Mental Health, Chemical
Dependence and Therapeutic Court Citizens Advisory Board will
review the proposals.
In the
62-page strategic plan, which outlines recommendations for
closing service gaps for mentally ill and substance abuse, it says
county and surrounding peninsula region had the highest number of
mentally ill boarded ever recorded in October 2013.
The plan recommends increasing housing and
transportation options, treatment funding and outreach, among other
suggestions.
Reporting and responsibilities
outlined
The strategic planning team makes recommendations
the citizens advisory board and establishes the strategic plan for
the mental health tax.
Proposals will be submitted to the citizens advisory
board for review. The board will make recommendations for the
proposals and funding level to the county commissioners, who
ultimately approve the proposals.
The citizen advisory board will annually review
projects and programs while receiving input from the strategic
team, and report to the director of Kitsap County Human Services,
who will present reviews to the county commissioners.
Meet the team and board
Kitsap County Behavioral Health Strategic Planning
Team
Al Townsend, Poulsbo Police Chief (Team Co-Chair)
Barb Malich, Peninsula Community Health Services
Greg Lynch, Olympic Educational Service District 114
Joe Roszak, Kitsap Mental Health Services
Judge Anna Laurie, Superior Court (Team Co-Chair)
Judge Jay Roof, Superior Court
Judge James Docter, Bremerton Municipal Court
Kurt Wiest, Bremerton Housing Authority
Larry Eyer, Kitsap Community Resources
Michael Merringer, Kitsap County Juvenile Services
Myra Coldius, National Alliance on Mental Illness
Ned Newlin, Kitsap County Sheriff’s Office
Robin O’Grady, Westsound Treatment Agency
Russell D. Hauge, Kitsap County Prosecutor
Scott Bosch Harrison, Medical Center
Scott Lindquist, MD, MPH Kitsap Public Health
Tony Caldwell, Housing Kitsap
Kitsap County Mental Health, Chemical Dependence and
Therapeutic Court Citizens Advisory Board
Lois Hoell, Peninsula Regional Support Network: 3 year
term
Jeannie Screws, Kitsap County Substance Abuse Advisory Board: 3
year
Aimee DeVaughn, Kitsap County Commission on Children and Youth:
3 year
Connie Wurm, Area Agency on Aging: 3 year
Dave Shurick, Law and Justice: 1 year
Walt Bigby, Education: 1 year
Carl Olson, At Large Member District 2: 2 year
James Pond, At Large Member District 3: 2 year
Robert Parker, At Large Member District 2: 2 year
Russell Hartman, At Large Member District 3: 2 year
Richard Daniels, At Large Member District 1: 1 year
The new year will bring new faces to the table, our second term mayor will hope
the seven’s able.
One thing is certain, for the Council’s 2014,
a lot of energy, they will need, or at least some caffeine.
Blogger’s note: The fight over
electric vehicle charging stations on the Pacific Avenue
improvement project was omitted from the year in verse. On purpose.
Like so many Seahawks fans, I was none too pleased when fans of
the 49ers decided to throw up money for a billboard bragging
about their previous Super Bowl victories.
Hart, once an employee of the Kitsap Sun and still a neighbor of
mine in Bremerton, decided that if those 49er fans would donate
their excess proceeds to Seattle Children’s Hospital, he’d
challenge those same fans by galvanizing the 12th man to send their
money south in support of San Francisco’s equivalent children’s
hospital. He set an ambitious goal: $20,000.
He’s well on his way.
In just five days, Hart’s gotten $8,261 donations from
nearly 300 people through his fundraising
site. The Suquamish Clearwater Casino, where he works, has
agreed to give a $5,000 match. And an anonymous donor in San
Francisco, in the spirit of this competitive giving, has already
pledged to match anything Seahawks fans give to the San Francisco
hospital to Seattle’s — up to $100,000.
His work has resonated with fellow fans big time. Hart, with the
help of former West Sound newspaperman Aaron Managhan, has appeared
on various media outlets to talk about it. In his hometown paper, I
wanted to give him a chance to explain, in his own words, how this
thing grew from an idea to a wave of charity, and why he did
it.
Q: How did you come up with this idea?
A: When I saw the story pop up about the Niners
fans paying for a billboard here in Seattle, my blood boiled for a
hot moment. Then I realized that was exactly what they
wanted. I started reflecting on the direction this
rivalry was heading. I was kicking around the idea of just raising
money for San Francisco’s Children’s hospital as a thank you for
them donating their excess billboard funds to Seattle Children’s on
Facebook. After some support from my friend Aaron Managhan, I put
together the YouFundMe
page.
Q: This isn’t the first time you’ve put on
fundraisers for children battling cancer and other ailments. Why is
this particular kind of charitable giving so near and dear to your
heart?
A: We started doing something called Extra Life five years
ago. It’s like Relay for Life, but instead of running or
walking for 24 hours you play video games and raise money for your
local Children’s Hospital. Every year we do this I meet
people who tell me about their experiences at Seattle Children’s,
and how it was completely live changing. They often take children
with no insurance, and that’s where the funds we raise go towards,
helping them get treatment. I don’t have children of my own
yet, but I have a niece and nephew that mean the world to
me. If something like this were to happen to them I would be
pretty devastated.
Q: Why do you think this resonated with so many
donors?
A: I think a lot of people felt the same way I
did. A rivalry can be good and fun, but does it need to get
nasty? I think when we put this out there people started
comparing the importance of football with a child’s health. I
can’t tell you how many people left comments that said “Now this is
how a rivalry should go down!” from both Seahawks and Niner
fans. I also think Russell Wilson and his continued
visits and support to Seattle Children’s Hospital have shown people
that football can really be used for something bigger than … well …
football.
Q: Were you surprised this effort caught the
attention of so many, and if so, what surprised you most?
A: When I started the campaign, I had hopes of
it catching on. Thanks to Aaron’s web savvy it was
everywhere almost instantly. I couldn’t believe how many
people had shared it, the amount of comments it was garnishing on
Reddit was really inspiring. I think what surprised me
the absolute most though was the amount of San Francisco fans that
embraced it. It’s completely painted them in a different
light for me. Even the guy that raised the money for the
billboard reached out to us telling us what a great idea he thought
this was.
Q: What is your ultimate goal here?
A: Our ultimate goal for this was definitely to
raise money for kids that direly need it while taking this rivalry
in a more positive direction. It doesn’t have to be about bricks,
banners or billboards. We have a great power in the ability to
do good with the things we are passionate about.
The outrage over Wendy Stevens’ participation
in the Kitsap County Superior Court’s felony diversion program,
rather than full-scale prosecution, was predictable and
understandable. The response, though, tends to ignore other
priorities beyond the lightening of a caseload.
Stevens was charged with theft of $8,061.27 from Naval Avenue
PTA. The PTA submitted documents suggesting the amount was higher,
but the charge reflected how much Bremerton Police could
verify.
Many commenters called her diversion agreement a “slap on the
wrist.” One asked, “Who said crime doesn’t pay?” That this was
Stevens’ second theft charge certainly did not earn her any
sympathy. That Stevens wouldn’t do jail time gave figurative chest
pains to those who first sought justice (i.e. jail time).
There is room, though, for those who think the $8,000 check and
$61.27 in cash the PTA received in restitution was the best
possible outcome, like the commenter who wrote, “The most important
requirement, restitution to the victim, has been met.” The writer
makes a point every bit as fair as those who say the county went
soft. This is especially true in a society that over the past few
decades has dared to ask, “What about the victim?”
In most criminal cases it’s nearly impossible for the
perpetrator to make things whole for the victim. In theft cases it
is possible. In this case the deal the attorneys crafted got the
PTA at least part of the way there. This year’s PTA President
Barbie Swainson told Chris Henry that many in the PTA were
relieved, even though they didn’t get the apology they also asked
for, at least not in court.
Naval Avenue PTA members might have felt whatever joy justice
brings had Stevens been sentenced to jail time, but that joy might
have come at the expense of the organization itself. The $8,061.27
it received as part of the diversion agreement might never have
materialized, even if Stevens was ordered to pay it, had she gone
through a trial and was sent to prison. Instead, the PTA got a
check and some cash, fulfilling one of its primary objectives —
surviving.
We don’t always get to satisfy our desire for justice and
restitution. We sometimes have to pick one or the other. In August
2001 I was working for The Columbian in Washington’s
Vancouver and wrote a business story about
embezzlement. Much of the focus was the point that
it’s often better to go after embezzlers civilly, rather than
criminally. You don’t as often get to see the guilty one rotting in
jail, but your business stays open.
While you can legitimately argue that there was not enough
punishment in the Stevens case, it’s a mistake to overlook the
value of the restitution to the PTA.
Two other elements each from the Stevens story and the one I
wrote in 2001 match each other, and these are tangents. One is that
Stevens is well liked and respected, a common trait in cases like
this. In the 2001 story, my sources pointed out how surprised
business owners are not so much when they discover they’re losing
money, but by who is responsible. In one case, it was a bookkeeper
who had been with the company 20 years.
The second point is that this entire episode could have been
prevented if the simplest of financial controls had been in place.
The person doing the books should not be signing the checks. All
entities should be set up so someone tempted to steal will be
dissuaded by the perception that someone else will notice. “Checks
and balances are not designed to keep a determined thief from
stealing,” fraud investigator David Marosi said in the 2001 story.
“Checks and balances are designed to keep an honest person
honest.”
If you’re in business or run an organization and you want to
prevent something like this, I recommend you read the 2001 story.
If you have a Kitsap Regional Library card you can read it online
for free by going to the ProQuest Washington State Newsstand and
searching the term “allmyne.”
On Friday, students from Bremerton High School lined up side by
side along the roughly two-and-a-half blocks between the front
entrance of the school and Bremerton Foodline’s warehouse. Police
stopped traffic as the students executed their “food chain,”
handing off boxes of canned goods, bags of potatoes and sacks of
stuffing and other comestibles they had collected over the past few
weeks.
The food drive is an annual service project for the school,
spearheaded by its leadership class. This is the first year they
undertook the special delivery. Patti Peterson, the food bank’s
executive director, said the gift of food “meant so much more”
given the very public display that accompanied it.
“Just look at this,” Peterson said. “This is the answer to
sequestration, to budget cuts. It’s the community coming together.
It starts with our kids in school and goes for every person, every
neighbor, every person you see on the block.”
The students collected 4,392 pounds of food. That’s more than
two tons. And given that each student handled each item, that means
each one lifted more than two tons on behalf of the food bank. So,
kids, how are your arms feeling today?
Here’s the video, in case you missed it. Happy Thanksgiving to
all.
Like many of you, I savored the Seattle Seahawks’ trouncing of
the San Francisco 49ers a couple Sundays ago, a big win and a great
start to a promising season that continued with a victory versus
Jacksonville this week.
But as heavy rains had delayed the game versus San Francisco, I
got a little worried, too.
With the delay, Bremertonians and other Kitsap County residents
who took the ferry to the game had pretty much one option to get
back here: the 10:30 p.m. ferry. (Not counting those of you who
drove to the game via the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.)
Yes, there’s a later boat, but 12:50 a.m. is just too late to
wait, especially on a school night. We’ve all been in this tight
spot before. Fortunately, the game ended with enough time to get to
the 10:30 p.m. boat. (And with ticket prices being what they are,
I’d be there for every moment myself.)
But would the 10:30 p.m. boat hold everyone? We’re talking about
a lot of fans here. I went to bed thinking good thoughts for those
coming back to Bremerton, and sent a note off to Washington State
Ferries asking about how many people climbed aboard the next
morning. I also put a note on my
facebook page.
To my surprise, those who responded said it wasn’t too bad. The
Walla Walla was working the route, which helped because of its
size. Everyone made it aboard, it seems.
A week later, I finally got those ridership stats. The ferries
counted 1,057 passengers on the 10:30 p.m. sailing. Not even the
Bainbridge Island boat at 10:40 p.m., which was that route’s most
populated run of the day, reached that number (it totaled 907).
Bremerton’s route carried 2,560 people altogether that Sunday
(Sept. 15), meaning that one sailing had more than 40 percent of
its ridership for the day.
The WSF’s Ray Deardorf said that even if the
Walla Walla (capacity 2,000) hadn’t been working the
route, the
Kitsap — usually the smallest boat on the Bremerton run —
could’ve accommodated the load, with a maximum capacity of
1,200.
Yet had the Kitsap made the journey, some 400 people wouldn’t
have had a seat to sit on, he added. “An uncomfortable crossing,”
he said of the possibility.
Yep, those of us in Bremerton have our gripes about the
frequency of the ferry sailings. But it’s nice to know that that
boat might be bulging, but there’s lots of room on our ferry
vessels.
Have you driven aboard the Bremerton ferry from Seattle, only to
find your receipt says you went to Bainbridge Island?
Lots of people have. In the words of Yogi Berra
this story is “like deja vu all over again.” The most recent
time, it was Kitsap Sun columnist Ann Vogel who took to Facebook to
vent this complaint:
“Once again, at the ferry ticket booth in Seattle, I tell the
employee that we are driving on the Bremerton ferry and he hands me
a receipt for the Bainbridge route. This time, I ask to have it
corrected and explain why. He tells me that the computer system
automatically defaults to Bainbridge for all receipts and thus, for
record keeping of ferry use. Time to write a letter. No wonder we
have so few evening ferries while Bainbridge’s are so
frequent.”
I asked the Washington State Ferries’ Marta Coursey about this
frequent complaint. First off, we are only talking about cars here
— pedestrians are counted at the turnstile where tickets are
scanned at Colman Dock in Seattle.
For vehicles, it is ferry policy that all sales are credited to
the correct route for each ticket sold. The ticket seller has a
choice — Bainbridge or Bremerton — and the ferry system believes
it’s important they pick the right one for the purposes of tracking
ridership stats and planning, as well as accurate accounting.
In short, Ann, it’s not OK for the ticket seller to credit your
Bremerton voyage to Bainbridge Island, and Coursey says the ferry
system is “working directly” with those sellers and managers to
“ensure staff is following procedures correctly.”
Here’s what you do if you’ve been issued a ticket incorrectly.
Take your receipt, and mail it to:
Washington State Ferries
Attn. Operations Manager Kathy Booth
2901 Third Avenue, Suite 500
Seattle, Washington 98121
The big question is whether undercounting Bremerton cars
actually harms Bremerton ferry service, the subject of
a piece by Kitsap Sun reporter Ed Friedrich a few years back.
But if nothing else, having accurate record keeping is important.
And that means Ann’s ferry trip should count toward Bremerton — not
Bainbridge.
We trot out the lists whenever some magazine decides to
recognize us. “They like us! They really, really, like us!” This
goes back to the early 1990s when Money magazine said Bremerton was
the best place in America to live. It made perfect sense to me at
the time, because Bremerton was said to be near Seattle and that
you got here by boat. And I had never been to Bremerton.
We’ve continued to rank high now and again on those kind of
lists, though we’re also suspected of being an ungodly bunch.
Now the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which I’m told is not a
magazine, has released a publication about expenditures on
children by families in 2012. The Daily Beast, which is an online
magazine, used metropolitan geographic stats from Redfin to come up
with the 15 most expensive places
to raise a child in the first year, citing the costs of housing,
energy, healthcare and stuff for the baby and added a stat about
how many OB/GYNs there are in an area.
On Redfin Bremerton is #14. Throw in the OB/GYN stat on the
Daily Beast and Bremerton is #8, joining New York, L.A. and
Miami.
Why blame Silverdale? Because I can. This goes back to the days
when the Central Kitsap Reporter got all huffy because these lists
were coming out lauding Bremerton, when most of those accolades
included data that came from Bremerton’s outlying parts in the rest
of the county, even Port Orchard. In those days I worked overtime
finding ways to make fun of Port Orchard, because I was the
Bremerton reporter. I thought it was in my job description. I might
have made that up.
The point is, if you’re going to get all jacked up about a silly
list that says Bremerton is neato, you better bow your head in
shame when another list comes out and says it will take a bigger
chunk of your paycheck to raise the li’l feces factory during the
first year than it does in Seattle.
