The Mountain News – WA | Serving those who live close to Mount Rainier in body or spirit

SCHOOL’S OUT! OH, OH…WHAT TO DO ABOUT FOOD FOR KIDS DURING SUMMER?

Posted on June 22, 2016 by brucesmith49

Special to the Mountain News-WA

by Paula Morris

There are many after school programs in the Pierce County area that offer food and snacks to kids during the school year. But what happens when summer vacation starts?

Carol Wright, the Director of the Graham-Kapowsin Community Council (GKCC), says there are 360 homeless kids in the Graham area alone. All of them may have depended on school lunch and after school care as their major source of food. It’s not only homeless kids who need help. Kids whose families are facing a crisis—job loss, low-wage jobs, illness, etc., need food as well.

Happily, through the generosity of private donors, and through community grants, there are a number of excellent resources in the Graham, Eatonville area, that cater to the issue of feeding kids through the summer. Continue reading →

Posted in Bethel News, Eatonville News, Graham News, Health, Newbie in Graham, Paula Morris, Recipes, Self Reliance | Leave a comment

Pacific Northwest prepares for the Big One – the Cascadia Rising earthquake drill

Posted on June 2, 2016 by brucesmith49

By Bruce A. Smith

Next week, June 6-10, local, state and federal officials will be conducting the nation’s largest-ever earthquake drill, called Cascadia Rising. Over 6,000 first responders, military personnel, and emergency management crews will simulate what life will be like throughout the Puget Sound region in the event of The Big One, a 9.0 quake.

In advance of this exercise, the Pierce County Department of Emergency Management (DEM) sent community action teams into Graham and other locales in March to talk about such a historic earthquake, and Peggy Lovellford of the DEM said “It is not a question of ‘if,’ but ‘when.’” Continue reading →

Posted in Environment, Graham News, Nature, Science and Technology, Self Reliance, Weather | 1 Comment

GKCC and Feed the Children Project to host Swap ‘n’ Shop, and a 5K Fun Run

Posted on May 28, 2016 by brucesmith49

Editor’s Note: The Graham-Kapowsin Community Council and its partner in helping feed Bethel school kids, the Harvest House Food Pantry, are holding a Swap ‘n’ Shop meet, along with a 5K Fun Run, to raise money for their joint “Feed the Children Project.” The monies go to stocking weekly food bags that eligible Bethel students receive to sustain them through their weekends, holidays, and summer vacations when the school breakfast and lunch programs are not available.

The following press release was received from the GKCC and Mountain News contributor Paula Morris.

****************************************************************

May 6, 2016

SUMMER FUN EVENT FOR GRAHAM/KAPOWSIN AREA RESIDENTS

SWAP’ n’ SHOP/Fun-Run-Walk

Saturday June 4, 2016, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Sponsored by: Graham/Kapowsin Community Council (GKCC), and Harvest House Food Pantry’s – Feed the Children Project.

WHERE?

Graham Elementary School

10026 204^th St

Graham, WA

Enjoy the day and help feed your community at the same time.

Featured will be: Unique handcrafted gifts as well as new items.

A 5K and 1K run will be held at 10 a.m. All ages invited to participate.

($10 donation is suggested. T-shirts will be available for $15.)

Please bring a non-perishable food donation to stock the food pantry and to replenish the GKCC backpack for kids, project.

If you would like to participate as a vendor: Fees range from $25-$30 for a 10X10 space. For application, (by May 27)

Contact: Carol Wright at 253-279-3071 or

Email at: carol.victoria.wright@gmail.com

*******************************************************************************

I love human-interest stories, don’t you? There are so many talented people in the Pierce County area. I had the privilege of meeting one of them the other day.

Calvin Gibson was kind enough to allow me to interview him for information about the SWAP’ n’ SHOP event accompanying this article.

Calvin is the “marketing arm” of the GKCC. He considers himself to be an inventor, and I would have to agree with that designation. In fact, he not only invents stuff—like collapsible Christmas trees–but is re-inventing himself as well.

After a few starts and stops career-wise, Calvin chooses to spend his days helping his community. He has been involved in the District for over eleven years. “Bethel Pride” featured him in an article, and the school district’s kids dedicated one of their yearbooks to him!

An unfortunate run-in with a major bank left Calvin without a house. But instead of considering himself a victim, he relocated to a living arrangement that allowed for him to be free of debt and stress. He now uses his time to “give” of himself to others.

I enjoyed Calvin’s entrepreneurial spirit and believe the Graham-Kapowsin Community Council is lucky to have him as part of their staff.

Be sure to say “hi” to Calvin at the SWAP’ n’ SHOP event, and hopefully you will find his “trees” for sale there!

Paula Morris

Graham, WA

(Author of “Newbie in Graham” column for the Mountain News-WA.)

Posted in Bethel News, Events, Graham News, Kapowsin, Newbie in Graham, Paula Morris | 4 Comments

Elana Freeland to present on chemtrails and electromagnetic health dangers

Posted on May 22, 2016 by brucesmith49

Editor’s Note:

Elana Freeland is a local author who will be sharing her 10-year research on the harmful effects of “chemtrails” and electromagnetic energies at the Traditions Café in Olympia on Tuesday, May 31 at 7pm. Elana recently delivered a presentation at an international symposium in British Columbia on her work on geoengineering technologies, especially the aerial phenomenon known as “chemtrails.” Her book is titled: Chemtrails, HAARP, and the Full Spectrum Dominance of Planet Earth.

For those unfamiliar with HAARP, it is an acronym for High-frequency Active Auroral Research, and is a high-tech facility based in Alaska. Noted researcher and author Nick Begich describes HAARP as an “ionospheric heater,” and says it will “zap the upper atmosphere with a focused and steerable electromagnetic beam” of energy.

Elana is known to many local residents as a renown storyteller and an on-air personality at KAOS-FM in the early 1990s. Continue reading →

Posted in Book reviews, Culture, Environment, Events, Health, Nature, People Profiles, Politics, Science and Technology, Self Reliance, Weather | 2 Comments

DB Cooper and the FBI – now in paperback

Posted on May 1, 2016 by brucesmith49

By Bruce A. Smith

The only comprehensive book on this iconic hijacking, DB Cooper and the FBI—A Case Study of America’s Only Unsolved Skyjacking, is now in paperback. Published by CreateSpace, a print-on-demand title, it is available at Amazon and in selected bookstores. This is the 2^nd Edition of this work, as the e-book version was published by Amazon’s Kindle division in 2015. The paperback features a deeper examination of the DNA issues of Norjak, as the DB Cooper case is officially called by the FBI.

Continue reading →

Posted in Book reviews, Culture, DB Cooper, Entertainment, Politics | 17 Comments

Slogging through the Amazon Swamp – True Survival Stories from the World of Self-Publishing

Posted on April 27, 2016 by brucesmith49

Bruce A. Smith

It all began with a manuscript.

I was a former newspaper reporter with a good story – the iconic tale of the famous skyjacker DB Cooper. The manuscript had a 32-page treatment that I sent to the Pacific Northwest Writer’s Association summer conference contest in 2010, and it was deemed a finalist and a “page-turner.” But I lost to a bunch of memoirs about growing up on a farm. Then I sent the manuscript to dozens of literary agents, all of whom had been to the PNWA conference – and got rejected by them all – but some more sweetly than others. One, Liz Kracht, encouraged me to keep going. Continue reading →

Posted in Book reviews, Culture, DB Cooper, Eatonville News, Entertainment, Folk tales and stories, Graham News, People Profiles, Stories from Backstage | 3 Comments

Open Letter to Jim McCune on homelessness – from Wayne Cooke, Graham community activist

Posted on April 25, 2016 by brucesmith49

Open Letter to Pierce County Councilmember Jim McCune, District 3

By Wayne Cooke

Re: Homelessness

Dear Jim,

I have spent many hours researching our “homeless problem,” sparked by my friendship with a young homeless couple from Graham. As our representative, you must be concerned about those street corner beggars and parking lot loafers, just as I am. To be clear, we are not talking about the 85% of total homeless who lost their housing, but take full advantage of the social services to get rehoused within weeks. It is the 15% that resist or avoid real help – the alcoholics, druggies, and mentally ill; those incapable; or the public leeches that I have in mind. My guess is that you wish, as I do, that there was some way to make that problem “disappear.” Continue reading →

Posted in Eatonville News, Graham News, Kapowsin, Parkland, Politics, Puyallup, Roy News, South Hill, Spanaway, Uncategorized, Wayne Cooke, Yelm News | 1 Comment

Don Wayne Keehoty misses the mark in Graham

Posted on March 27, 2016 by brucesmith49

By Wayne Cooke

Don Keehoty was a quiet man, a dreamer who liked to fix squeaky doors. When he and his wife moved to Graham in 1995, he found no local newspaper. He fixed that by putting out a neighborhood newsletter, for three years, delivering it to 300 homes monthly. A few thanked him. Most just wondered why he did it. Continue reading →

Posted in Culture, Graham News, Wayne Cooke | 2 Comments

Preparing for the Big One – public meeting scheduled for Thursday in Graham

Posted on March 14, 2016 by brucesmith49

by Bruce A. Smith

There will a public meeting to discuss earthquake preparedness this Thursday, March 17, at the Graham Library at 6:30 pm. It is free, and is hosted by the Pierce County Department of Emergency Management. The topic will be preparing for a 9.0 earthquake, which is estimated to be 2,000 times more powerful than the 7.2 Nisqually quake about ten years ago.

Apparently, several governmental agencies are having a regional, mega-disaster drill in June, mobilizing up to 4,000 employees in simulations, and these public meetings are a prelude. Besides the gathering in Graham, there are several more scheduled throughout the county this month.

I’m going to the meeting, if for no other reason than to see what the County is doing – and who else is preparing around here. The last time I did a story on earthquake preparedness, specifically what the plans are at the Pierce County Department of Emergency Management, they told me in the event of a Really Big Earthquake they would survive by getting take-out from a local Teriyaki Place and stay in a local Motel 6. They had no food, water, or bedding supplies for themselves in their HQ, but they did have a $5 million diesel generator on spring shocks. They also had a ton of wall-mounted Big TV screens so the media people could see their operations in real time. Not sure how the TV crews are going to get there if all the bridges are down in a Nine-Oh, and if they would cover the story rather than take care of themselves and their families. Continue reading →

Posted in Bethel News, Environment, Events, Graham News, Self Reliance, Weather | 2 Comments

Graham-Kapowsin Community Council celebrates 13th year with EXPO

Posted on January 27, 2016 by brucesmith49

Special to the Mountain News-WA

The Graham – Kapowsin Community Council is celebrating its 13^th year of service to the residents of the Greater Graham area with its annual “Expo.” This year, the festivities will be held at the Graham Elementary School, located on 204^th St, just west of Meridian Ave.

Continue reading →