Depending on your perspective - and your ability to wade through verbiage - St. Edward State Park has secured another victory to maintain its pristine forests.At a Jan. 12 meeting, the Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission voted on land classification and long-term boundaries of state-owned and surrounding properties. In short, the forest west of the seminary building has been given a natural designation with a potential trail that will form a loop to the lake. This will allow a corridor for mountain bikes at the southern border of the park, all open to environmental review.BackgroundIn August 2005, parks staff set out to prepare a Classification and Management Plan (CAMP) for St. Edward State Park. Beginning in the fall of 2005, staff created an advisory committee during the fall of 2005 to provide guidance on the array of issues associated with the park and CAMP.The advisory committee met more than 20 times and held four public meetings. Last November, parks staff held a public meeting specifically to seek comments on the long-term boundary and land classifications recommended by the advisory committee. The advisory committee then prepared a recommendation to parks staff. The parks commission is receiving staff recommendations in two documents. The first contains recommendations for land classification and long-term boundary. On April 26, the commission will review the second document with the staff recommendations on the remaining policy questions. That item will also contain the management plan for the park. The meeting will be in Ephrata and is open to the public.
Shawn Wilcox, a para-educator, worked with special-education students at Kirkland Junior High School for more than eight years and never had a problem.But that changed this past fall, when she walked out because a 13-year-old special-ed boy at the school attacked her both physically and sexually, and because she got no support from school officials, Wilcox said."I was hit multiple times (by the boy)," Wilcox said, adding that she complained numerous times about the student. "All I could get is, 'We know he targets you,' but they wouldn't do anything about it."Worse, Mott accused her of "having it out" for the child, Wilcox said. That didn't make any sense, she added. "I've got eight years of glowing performance reviews." Wilcox said she complained to her union representative about the problem, but before the union rep could get back to her, the boy did something that proved to be the final straw, she said. "The kid came up behind me and started humping me."Police report filedWilcox said she told Mott she considered the incident to be sexual assault and she later filed a police report about the alleged attack. Mott, however, was less than sympathetic, according to Wilcox. He not only wouldn't do anything, Mott yelled at her that she had "provoked" the boy because she was standing near him, Wilcox said.
Thanks to the December windstorm and ensuing snow and ice hiccups that all but shackled the city, staffers have had several opportunities to execute its emergency preparedness procedures, and then evaluate successes and failures.After all is said and done, a single buzz word has surfaced."One thing we learned was that we need to have a better system of communication," said Tracy Burrows, senior management analyst with the city.And Helen Ahrens-Byington, deputy chief for the Kirkland Fire Department and emergency manager for city emergency preparedness agreed: "The general information we're getting is that we did pretty well. Communication with our citizens is one of the biggest areas where we can improve."So exactly how will this be done?For starters, Burrows mentioned that the city needs a point person with Puget Sound Energy. "We had conflicting information as to when power would be back on; sometimes there was no information at all," she said. The point person optimally would provide reliable information that the city would deliver to residents.This is one item in an after-action report that the city is putting together, which is focusing on the difficulty in communicating to an entire city with a complete power outage. "Now we're trying to set policies and practices so that we continue to improve communication," said Ahrens-Byington, who has emerged as the key organizer in emergency preparedness in the city.
The 13th annual Neighbor Appreciation Day is coming up on Feb. 10 - a day when Seattle Department of Neighborhood encourages residents to say "Thank you!" to those who have made their neighborhood a nicer, safer place to live and play. One element of the celebration is a greeting-card art contest, and three students at Coe Elementary School have done very nicely by the theme of "neighborliness."Winner of the first prize is Thurgood Marshall Elementary fifth-grader Hadimo Gado, age 11. But right behind in second place is Maia Whitehorn, a 6-year-old in Coe teacher Lonnie Gunsolus' kindergarten class.Coming in for honorable mentions are Philip Kiefer, age 11, in Maria Rodriguez's fifth grade, and Claire Malarkey, age 9, in Elsie Miller's fourth grade.
Middle schoolers understand metaphor. In "Wenny Has Wings," for example, a boy has an out-of-body experience. Another character, Igor, is a female tarantula who molts. "Shedding her exoskeleton is a metaphor," says author Janet Lee Carey. Both boy and spider step out of their bodies. Kids get the connection. Will, the boy in "Wenny Has Wings," has a near-death experience in the accident that kills his younger sister, Wenny. His parents aren't ready to talk about the accident yet, so he finds another way to deal with it."The book is a series of letters," says Carey. "I've paired heavy letters with more humorous ones, so kids can go in and out of different emotions," making the book accessible even to reluctant readers.Last month, Carey, a local author, talked about her writing at McClure Middle School with about 50 sixth-graders who are reading "Wenny Has Wings." The McClure presentation was arranged by Suzanne Perry, events coordinator at Secret Garden Bookstore, and by school librarian Kristan Gale.Carey began by talking about the writing life."Who wants to be a writer?" she asked. A few hands were raised, so she gave some advice. "It's really important to keep your imagination alive," she said, prompting the students to come up with different ways to do that.
Often it seems: volunteers can't get no respect. How often have I heard some volunteer-project snafu get excused by the words, "Well, it's just a volunteer effort." Why is that? Just a volunteer effort?White collar workers, blue collar workers, pink collar workers-they don't make mistakes in their jobs? They certainly did at all the places I worked. Are they "just" employees?Volunteers do their work because they believe in the cause-because they want to make a contribution to society and know there is no money in the budget to pay for their efforts, ideas and projects. But to give of their free time freely, and for free to accomplish something good? Volunteers do that. They love to do that.Volunteers possess passion, generosity and good will. They create and build non-profit organizations (i.e. the docents program for Discovery Park); fill in for community needs (the Magnolia and Queen Anne helplines); and they make neighborhood projects happen (SummerFest, Karen's Place, the Magnolia Historical Essay Project II). Let me introduce you to volunteerism-to help you see into the workings of the Magnolia Historical Essay Project II.First, volunteerism is exponential: the works of one person spread and often generate more volunteerism. When a writer for The Magnolia History Book II begins a story, contacts are made, questions are asked, tales are shared and, before long, a whole bunch of folks are digging through drawers, searching attics, writing down memories and offering them to the project. This is volunteering. It is also one way the more than 30 volunteers on the Magnolia history project have rounded up a lot of new volunteers. This amounts to a lot of Magnolia good will-the costs absorbed by the givers. Good stuff.
You "stand in line" at your computer, waiting on an 800 number or in person at a government office, and finally the right document for your situation is identified and retrieved, either by snail mail, printed off their Web site or handed to you by a person.Then there is the delicate task of translating the bureaucratic language and, hopefully, submitting the form properly completed.Recently I have been helping a friend renew his green card, which is the document proving his resident alien status in the United States. Somehow, we figured the cost incorrectly, so a few months later his check was returned as insufficient and a statement of the funds needed was printed in bold letters. Off went a new check. The months passed until a form arrived for his biometric appointment.I will not bore you with the arcane details of his case. The very important information I wish to pass along to you is called INFOPASS.This wonderful feature on the U.S. government's citizenship and immigration services Web site (www.uscis.gov) was brought to my attention by an expensive immigration lawyer rather than our government.Nevertheless, INFOPASS is an invaluable tool.
I have spent the past five years of my life resisting something that seemed to have gotten most of my friends addicted. I already suffer from a Cheeto addiction, and I figure that's all the addictions I can handle right now. People gushed about their need to see this thing. Once wasn't enough. They wanted more. Had I seen it? Wasn't that a wonderful thing? Wasn't that a travesty of justice and goodness and all things honorable? I was not going to fall victim to it. No how, no way. I was better than that, wasn't I? I didn't need to feast on other people's misery. There was nothing enticing me to spend days talking about it, waiting for it, then waiting for the next one. I ... would ... not ... watch ... "American Idol."Until this past week. It got me. I never saw it coming. Oh sure, I thought. I would just peek at it for a minute and then flip over to the Discovery Channel and watch something educational. I was above that cheap and tawdry grab for fame. Simon Cowell held no attraction for me. Avoiding rude people in the real world is an artform for me; I had no desire to inflict one on myself voluntarily. And yet ... I did.
I have two friends who work for this chain of newspapers that publishes my weekly blather, and coincidentally these two journalists and my sister Karen are the only three peo-ple in their 50s I see regularly who are still married.Among the five middle-agesters fellas I have regularly walked Green Lake with, played golf every Sunday with and had dinner with once a weekend since returning from Hawaii in 2002, there are no marriages remaining.That fact is a bit misleading: only two of the five were married when I returned from the islands, two of the fellas are lifelong bachelors and the fifth is a midlife-crisis guy with two girlfriends.Recent studies allege that four-and-a-half of every 10 marriages entered into in King County eventually end up in divorce.All of this saddens me because I am, in addition to being a rabid cynic, a hopeless romantic.
Magnolia artist Charlette Haugen's watercolors will be featured in "Scenes Across the Continents," a show to be held Feb. 6 through March 4 at Parklane Gallery in Kirkland.Scenes Across the Continents highlights architectural images from around the world-places the artist has visited and found memorable. Haugen's vivid watercolors are impressionistic in style and often whimsical in nature.Most often a person is attracted to the landscape or buildings connected to that landscape. A career in interior design cemented Haugen's interest in architecture, and her travels to most of the continents inspired her latest works of architectural images.Previously, the artist's painting "Village Vignettes" was chosen for the Magnolia Summer Festival and Art Show poster in 2004, and her work "Stonewalled" won the People's Choice award that year.
The Queen Anne-based Mountaineers Club is planning to mark the organization's first outing in 1907. That was when 48 members of the newly formed club took a street car to the foot of Magnolia, hiked to Fort Lawton to meet the base commander and walked to the West Point Lighthouse, where they built a fire and had lunch before walking back downtown on the beach at low tide, said Matt Vadnal, chair of the 100 Year Hike Committee.Back then, club members wore their Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes, according to a University of Washington archive photo of the group posing in front of the lighthouse. But the commemorative event on Sunday, Feb. 18-100 years and one day after the original trek-will include period costumes, he said."We're going to get a group of reenactors," Vadnal said of around a dozen Mountaineer Club members who will wear mountain-climbing gear used in those early days, along with recreations of regular clothing from 100 years ago.There will also be Mountaineer Club members wearing modern hiking and mountaineering gear, and the general public is welcome to participate, he said. "The more the merrier; I'm hoping to get 200 people."
Catharine Blaine School needs a landscaping makeover, according to one of the school's PTA committees. That's because the original plantings surrounding the 1952-era building have run amok, according to committee member Nancy Gilbert. Trees are growing through other trees, for example, an evergreen on the southeast side of the building has grown so large that its branches are splayed out against the wall like waves crashing against a cliff (see photo on p. 10), the school name is obscured by greenery and there are landscaping gaps that make the building a target for graffiti, Gilbert noted.Furthermore, the plantings are obscuring a prime example of International Style Modernism, said Jennifer Meisner, a Blaine parent who is executive director of the Washington Trust for Historic Preservation. Also known as Mid-Century Modern, the architectural style is noted for its clean lines and simple forms.
The Seventh Church of Christ Scientist on Eighth Avenue West is slated for demolition, despite last-ditch efforts by the Queen Anne Historical Society to save the building, said a disappointed Char Eggleston, chair of the society's landmark-preservation committee.A notice of plans to demolish the building went up on a Master Use Permit sign last October, she said. "From that point on, we have been trying to find a buyer for the property."As part of that approach, the historical group enlisted the aid of the Queen Anne Community Council, which wrote a Jan. 9 letter to church officials asking for permission to have a structural engineer take a look at the building for free to see if it were salvageable, Eggleston said.The historical society even had a volunteer standing by to do the inspection, and the group also managed to find three people interested in buying the building and converting it to other uses if it was OK, she said. One of the proposed uses would be for a private school, while the other two potential buyers wanted to convert the building into condos, according to Eggleston.
Need to start exercising, but not sure where to start? Walking is one of the safest, simplest forms of exercise and Kirkland is one of the best places to do it. And here's a good statistic: On average, every minute spent exercising can extend your life by one and a half to two minutes.For most outdoor walks you need no special equipment apart from a good pair of comfortable, supportive shoes. They can be the difference between a fun, rejuvenating walk and an uncomfortable, painful one. Walking benefitsThe health benefits of walking include the increase of aerobic endurance; it's easier on the joints, burns almost as many calories as jogging and reduces the risk of coronary heart disease. Fit walkers are less likely to fall and suffer injuries because their bones are strengthened and they have better range of movement around their joints.There's no doubt, walking is good for you. It's good for your heart, lungs, muscles and it's great for your overall well being. It is something that costs you nothing and can fit in with almost any lifestyle and all ages. Unlike most sports and fitness activities, walking can be done anywhere at any time. Whether you want to walk to improve your general health, to keep fit or control your weight, it can be fun.
Does it still feel like the beginning of a new year, or has the weather taken its toll on you? We've endured some pretty intense conditions, and the continued winds, snow and sleet may have activated the instinct to simply cope. Yet, thinning the forest and expanding the view provides favorable conditions for continued growth ... throughout the forest and within ourselves.What's happening right now?So what's happening for you right now? Are you already on course to achieve your New Year's resolutions? No matter how ambitious, resolutions signify your potential. Do you find yourself lacking the know-how or the follow-through to materialize these legitimate aspirations? We do not typically falter because we are lazy or lack discipline. More likely, we are constrained by a map that provides inaccurate guidance to awaiting possibilities.We draw our map from life experience; this map comprises the conscious and subconscious commitments we sense as desires and expectations.Our characteristic life patterns/rhythms reveal the interplay of these combined influences time and again, and provide ample opportunity for introspection and personal development. Holistic practitioners discern your mental, physical, emotional and energetic states to determine the best pathway for meeting your needs, and so can you.