EFR may seek budget help to cover shortfall
June 22, 2011
Eastside Fire & Rescue may need more than a 4 percent increase in funding from its partners in 2012.
The agency’s administration presented its draft budget to board members at their June 9 meeting. The budget predicts an $855,000 increase in expenses, due to more than $600,000 in increased labor and benefit costs.
Deputy Chief Wes Collins said the projected wage increases are a best guess by the administration, based on current cost-of-living rates.
The agency is in negotiations with its firefighters union and hopes to arrange for the current labor contract to be renewed for several more years, Collins said. If the existing contract is not extended and the agency and union start from scratch on a new contract, EFR may have to budget a placeholder amount until negotiations wrap up later in 2012.
Hospital foundation appoints its new executive director
June 22, 2011
The Snoqualmie Valley Hospital Foundation has a new executive director. The new appointment comes as the hospital district embarks on its plans to build a new hospital on Snoqualmie Ridge.
The new executive director, Kim Arellano, was elected by the foundation’s board of directors in May to take over after serving as a board member. The foundation — an independent, nonprofit organization — supports the hospital district through advocacy, education and fundraising.
Kim Arellano
Arellano said she plans to continue to focus on the foundation’s mission of supporting the hospital’s growing technological capabilities, offering networking opportunities for local health care providers and providing services, such as the hospital’s Affordable Access Voucher Program.
“We will listen to the needs of the community and help enable the district to provide for them,” she said in an email to the Star.
The greatest challenge to achieving the foundation’s goals is fundraising.
Museum’s ghost town exhibit wins honors
June 22, 2011
The Northwest Railway Museum has been honored with the Association of King County Historical Organizations’ Exhibit Award.
The museum received the award for its “Wellington Remembered” exhibit at the museum’s main location at the Snoqualmie Depot. The exhibit won for its scale replica snow shed, compilation of historic photographs and interpretive information.
Wellington was a railroad town in the North Cascades. In 1910, one of the worst avalanches in United States history crashed across the railway, sweeping two trains off the mountainside. Ninety-six people died in the catastrophe.
The avalanche was so traumatic that the unincorporated town changed its name to Tye, after the nearby Tye River. The town was eventually abandoned in 1929, when the second Cascade Tunnel opened.
The exhibit, which took several months to complete, was inspired by a set of glass negatives by photographer Casper Hansen that the museum received from John Oberg. Bob Kelly, of the Skykomish Historical Society, also contributed his expertise to the project.
The award was presented at a ceremony at the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle. King County Councilwoman Jane Hague served as emcee.
Learn more about the exhibit on the museum’s companion website, www.wellingtonremembered.org.
Celebrating being a survivor, twice over
June 22, 2011
She was 25, she was single and she was invincible.
So when she found a lump on her left breast in 1998, Michele Trumbull did not panic. She waited a month before she went to the doctor.
Even when the diagnosis came in, she cried, but she carried on.
“I was in denial, maybe because of my age,” Trumbull said June 17, 13 years after that day. “My regular doctor helped me find an oncologist and whatever they told me to do, I did it.”
Cancer or not, mastectomy or not, life went on.
Michele Trumbull, with her son Nathan in 2003, has since regained her brown hair and her cancer has disappeared. Contributed
“I didn’t read any books, didn’t do any research,” she said. “I just kept living life.”
Brian Trumbull said his wife made it easy for him.
“She was pretty seamless about it,” he said. “She accepted it, I accepted it, we both accepted it and we moved on.”
Losing hair and losing a breast, however, was hard.
Hens live the high life
June 22, 2011
Snoqualmie woman builds avant-garde chicken coops
Stairs to your apartment, plenty of protection to keep pesky neighbors away, a custom-made door with your silhouette on it and a pair of wheels to get you where you need to go.
Good news is, your house is cooooool. Bad news is, you’re still a chicken.
Tracy Belvill inspects a chicken coop she built for chickens to live in urban, moveable style. By Sebastian Moraga
Tracy Belvill builds these tricked-out chicken coops in her Snoqualmie back yard, and what began almost accidentally has turned into a budding cottage industry for her.
“This wasn’t like, ‘OK, I’m going to be an entrepreneur and think about an idea,’” she said. “This was personal, like building a vegetable garden, something for me. It just turned into something that other people would like to have.”
Belvill’s business, Urban Chicken Coops, has built 12 coops in the past two years, all designed for urban farming.
North Bend teen wins statewide art award
June 22, 2011
Becky Orcutt displays ‘The Last Look Back,’ a drawing of herself that has won the North Bend teenager many awards. By Sebastian Moraga
Joy Orcutt glanced at her daughter Becky and smiled.
“Artists think way different,” Joy said. “With her sister, everything is pretty much black-and-white. The creative mind is different and as parents we have to be patient.”
Mount Si teacher, class pile up the hardware
June 22, 2011
Mount Si High School teacher Joe Dockery and some of his students closed the year gathering praise from high places.
Dockery, a teacher of instructional technology and video production, has won the “Making IT Happen” award for his contributions to the successful integration of technology in education in schools.
The IT stands for instructional technology.
The award is given to teachers nationwide. Dockery was set to receive the honor at the International Society for Technology in Education conference in Philadelphia.
“Those of us who know Joe Dockery, we know he’s one of the leaders in the innovative things he is doing in technology,” Snoqualmie Valley Schools Superintendent Joel Aune said. “We all know Mr. Dockery, we all know he’s the best.”
In an email, Dockery deflected the praise.
Snoqualmie girl is part of winning cast
June 22, 2011
Even by phone, the transformation stuns.
Gone are the measured tones of the thoughtful teenager. Instead, it’s all attitude.
When Snoqualmie’s Nalani Saito, 16, becomes Erzulie, her voice acquires an edge proper of a superstar, a diva or a goddess.
Nalani Saito
Which is exactly who Erzulie was in the Eastside Catholic musical, “Once On This Island” — a goddess.
The production won Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre award for outstanding performance by an ensemble group June 6.
It was Saito’s first performance onstage since middle school, and it managed to impress even Erzulie.
Climbers barely avert Mount Everest disaster
June 22, 2011
Brian Dickinson, of Snoqualmie, climbed Mount Everest as part of his goal of climbing the seven summits, the highest mountains on each of the seven continents. By Dennis Broadwell
His Facebook status read, “Heading to the summit of Mount Everest … brb!”
After spending two months climbing up and down Mount Everest, acclimatizing his body to the world’s highest mountain, Brian Dickinson reached the top during a solo ascent.
Then, he went blind.
Snoqualmie golfers sweep club team championships
June 22, 2011
Golfers from TPC at Snoqualmie Ridge swept the sixth annual Washington State Men’s and Women’s Member Club Team Championships at Suncadia Resorts in early June. Golfers from Snoqualmie Valley dominated the top rankings.
Overall, four teams from TPC competed.
In the men’s field, TPC Team 3 grabbed the lead early, and never let go. The foursome of Chris Bae, Vince Calouri, Charles Schmidt and Fred Johnson had a combined score of 409 over two rounds of golf at the course in Roslyn.
It was the team’s second win, and its first with Johnson as a teammate.
Bae led the team with a four-over-par 148 after two days of golf. The Issaquah resident won the 2010 Seattle Amateur Champion Tournament.
Calouri is from North Bend. Schmidt and Johnson are Snoqualmie residents.
