Results 131 - 140 of about 6070.
Such is the result of the last-minute decision by the Washington State Ferries (WSF) to reduce our usual weekday route from three boats to two. And such is life on ferry-dependent Vashon Island.
The unsung heroes of our school districtFor The Beachcomber
I nearly tear up when I think about the special people who have mentored me over the years. One of the dearest is my fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Balzer, whose photo sits prominently on my desk.
Learning from ones daughter what it means to be whiteFor the past couple of decades, Linda Peterson affectionately called the Imelda Marcos of ice skates by her friend and fellow skating enthusiast Neil Drawbridge has been snatching up used pairs wherever she could find them. As a result, she now boasts around 70 pairs. And when theres a long enough cold snap to turn Fisher Pond into an outdoor ice arena, she shows up, skates in tow, to loan them out to anyone in need.
Party caucuses are at the heart of grassroots political participationOne of the first signs of spring in the Northwest is a certain sweetly intoxicating scent that permeates those first warm days. It took me years to figure out its source: the sticky resin covering the newly formed leaf and flower buds of the cottonwood or poplar trees.
These resinous buds are made into a variety of medicinal preparations, including the well-known anti-inflammatory massage oil called Balm of Gilead, a remedy that has been documented as early as the second century A.D. The balm is a wonderful addition to your medicine chest for relaxing sore muscles and for soothing the pain of arthritis. Since it is an anti-infectant, it can be applied to cuts and scrapes. Bees actually collect the cottonwood resin to seal their hives and ward off bacteria and fungi.
Islanders must act to keep ferry fares from climbing even moreFrequent ferry-user discounts are threatened, and peak-hour surcharges are apparently on the horizon unless we act. These, taken together, could result in an increase of between 25 and 40 percent for a very significant number of ferry-users on Vashon and in the Puget Sound region.
Language ensuring the economic impact on Vashons frequent ferry users in setting fares would be seriously considered was deleted from the Revised Code of Washington last year by the passage of the bill that froze ferry fares until September 2009. At the time it was apparently stated that the deletion was unintentional and the language would be restored this year. With that in mind, Rep. Sherry Appleton (D-Poulsbo) introduced a bill (HB 2718) to restore the deleted language. Last Wednesday she was advised by the Transportation Committee Chair, Rep. Judy Clibborn (D-Mercer Island), that the deletion was intentional and there would not be a hearing on the bill. Subsequently, Rep. Clibborn apparently agreed to have a hearing on the bill if the words shall consider were deleted and the words may consider were substituted. Apparently, in order to get the bill to the floor, Rep. Appleton agreed to the change.
