The Leader-Port Townsend

BIG BIRTHDAY FOR CO-OP A3 • ONE PLAYER, FIVE GOALS A9 • KITCHEN TO KITCHEN A16

PDA’s ‘glamping’ camping declared an ‘emergency’ as project sits unfinished

BRIAN KELLY BKELLY@PTLEADER.COM

Sleeping overnight in a moldy tent is nobody’s idea of glamorous.

That’s the dilemma now facing officials of the Fort Worden Public Development Authority.

Quilcene community icon Herb Beck passes away

Served 36 years as port commissioner

BRIAN KELLY BKELLY@PTLEADER.COM

Herbert F. Beck, a lifetime resident of Jefferson County and a former Port of Port Townsend commissioner for 36 years, died April 26 in Silverdale. He was 83.

A venerated mainstay of Quilcene, Beck was born in Port Townsend in 1938. He served nine terms as a port commissioner and later, in 2012, was elected as president of the Jefferson County Fire District 2 board of fire commissioners.

Beck’s service to his community and the greater good prompted the renaming of the Quilcene Marina to Herb Beck Marina & Industrial Park in December 2005.

Fred Beck said his father was a very hard worker, both physically and mentally, but with a lighthearted nature that was a strong contrast to his strong work ethic.

One of two sons of a dairy farmer, Herb Beck was drafted into the Army in 1959 — and for a spell, was a boxer in the military — but spent most of his life in Quilcene.

His interest in politics grew from attending Boys State in his youth, but Beck was more concerned about local affairs than events far beyond his community, his son said.

Beck joined the board of commissioners for the Port of Port Townsend after serving on a shoreline advisory board in the early 1970s, Fred Beck said.

His career included 37 years working for the Navy as an electronic technician at the naval torpedo station in Keyport.

Upon his retirement, he returned to his love of family and farming.

“His deal was, my mother had summed it up, ‘a member of the community of gentlemen farmers,’” Fred Beck said.

A public graveside service at the Quilcene Cemetery is planned for noon Saturday, May 7. There will be a potluck Celebration of Life at the Quilcene Masonic Hall following the service.

FONDLY REMEMBERED

Eron Berg, executive director of the Port of Port Townsend, said Beck was a local legend, especially within the port community.

During Beck’s time as a port

With the PDA’s “glamping” tents — short for “glamorous camping” — aging in place, sitting unfinished and exposed to the elements, the board unanimously voted to declare an “emergency” at its meeting last week in the hopes it can hire a contractor for $600,000 to complete the project.

Approximately $1.3 million has already been spent on the glamping project, according to David Timmons, executive director of the PDA. That estimate includes all designing, utility work, direct and indirect labor, and materials.

The declaration of an emergency will allow the PDA to hire a contractor without being subject to

state law that requires competitive bids for public works projects.

“The requirements are pretty onerous,” Timmons told the PDA

board during its meeting last week.

The glamping project has long been in the works. The PDA announced in 2018 a plan for

24 high-end camping tents, with hopes to have 20 tents available for visitors in 2019.

Installation of water, electrical, and other improvements started in 2019, and the PDA had hoped to complete the project in phases, with 15 bathroom-equipped tents ready for campers in June 2020.

The COVID-19 pandemic ultimately shut down additional work on the project, however.

Temporarily abandoned, in the words of the PDA’s attorneys, who noted in an April 22 memo to Timmons that the authority had borrowed money with an obligation to complete the project and that revenue from campers was supposed to be used to repay the loan.

The materials purchased to complete the project are now in storage, wrote attorney Brian C. Augenthaler of the Seattle law firm Keating, Bucklin & McCormack in

Longhouse for the People project partners with Chimacum woman in hopes of saving Native land

AUDREY

ROGERS AROGERS@PTLEADER.COM

Chasity Sade-Griffin moved to the forest surrounding the Chimacum Springs one month after her 11-year-old was born. Her 3-year old was later born right there on the same land.

For 10 years, she and her husband have grown gardens, explored, and raised their children in that forest. They’ve learned from and nurtured the land.

Now their home is at risk.

Sade-Griffin sat in her garden under water-logged spring skies, unbothered by the intermittent cool drops, with her voice strong and measured as she explained the factors characterizing her life, the things she feared losing.

And the things she hoped to gain.

Her landlord is selling the land she’s on, putting her home, her life, her children’s lives in

the balance of just a short time to come up with a daunting dollar amount. She’s always wanted to buy the land and involve its original people, the Chemakum in its future use.

Now, in the wake of such a stressful time, her dream may be within reach. It all depends on the generosity of the community. The next month will be an incredible push to achieve something that Sade-Griffin believes is integral not just to her and her family’s life but to the entire Peninsula.

Success came within view when Sade-Griffin finally found the Chemakum connection she sought. Naiome Krienke, of Chemakum, Clallam, and Macaw Native Tribes has been heading up the Longhouse for the People project, which seeks to bring the community together by rebuilding traditional longhouses and opening them for classes, potlatches, and experiential learning and healing.

“I realized this place was special and needed

to be put back in the hands of somebody who understood the significance of it and who is Indigenous. And I’ve been looking for that person for years,” Sade-Griffin said.

Now, the two women have been working together to garner funds and support for their dream to create a space where community, connection, and education are paramount, and keep Sade-Griffin in her home.

The longhouse project is a response to the silencing and disregard of the Peninsula’s original people.

Krienke mourns the lack of influence her people have had in the area, the lack of evidence of their existence, the lack of acknowledgement.

But in building the simple cedar structure, which would be the first longhouse in Chimacum since 1910, along with nature trails, and permaculture gardens she would establish

see NATIVE, Page A8

Herb Beck passed away April 26 in Silverdale. Photo courtesy of the Port of Port Townsend

Tents at Fort Worden State Park raised for the Fort Worden PDA’s glamorous camping project sit unfinished and unused at the park. Leader photo by Brian Kelly

Fresh water from the Chimacum Springs feeds the creek and its ecosystems and was sacred to the Chemakum people. Leader photo by Audrey Rogers

the memo.

“The materials purchased by the PDA are aging in a warehouse,” Augenthaler wrote. “Those tents that have been erected are without heat, creating a strong possibility of mold development in these expensive structures, which could result in the waste of public funds.”

SITTING EMPTY

Visitors to Fort Worden can easily see the glamping tents unfinished in place on one end of the campus of the park, many with unfinished decks and lacking internal amenities, sitting amid scattered orange safety cones and tall weeds.

PDA officials discovered in late 2020 that funding that originally was expected to pay for work on glamping, as well as other capital projects at the fort, had been diverted to pay for the day-to-day operations of the PDA.

Meanwhile, work on the glamping project had been halted because it couldn’t continue due to the pandemic shutdown.

“The staff that previously were engaged to do that were all terminated and let go as a result of the pandemic,” Timmons told board members last week.

“Now you have a project that is sitting there incomplete, much of the material to complete the projects like the flooring and finish work and lumber has already been purchased and in warehouses on campus.”

There was a reason the tents were put up despite the unfinished work on the project, he added.

“The tents were erected to try to preserve the platforms that got constructed,” he said.

BID WILL TAKE TIME

Putting together a bid package to have the project finished is problematic, he added, because the PDA already has the materials

needed in storage. The PDA, Timmons said, is in an “odd situation of where we really don’t know how to put together a bid package.

“And if we did put it together, we’re talking probably several months just to get the bid package figured out. Then going out to bid to see if there were contractors who would give us a bid on something like this,”

Timmons said.

Timmons recalled a similar situation when he was Port Townsend’s city manager and the city sought bids to have the skate park built.

The city tried three times to competitively bid the project without success.

“My fear is that’s going to be the same with glamping,” he told the board.

Timmons said he hoped to reach a contract agreement with Clark Construction on a “time and material basis” based on the project’s budget.

That could be done, according to the PDA’s attorneys, if an emergency was declared so the PDA would not need to competitively bid the project.

MORE MONEY NEEDED

Additional funding would also be needed to have the project managed.

“I’m also looking at bringing in some extra help for project management,”

Timmons said, adding he would seek the PDA board’s authorization at an upcoming meeting.

Through an earlier loan, the PDA has $600,000 available to spend to complete the project.

“Most of the work is going to be the flooring, the finishes, finishing the electrical and the plumbing installation,” Timmons said. “But beyond that, there’s not much else we need to do.”

A second phase of the project will remain, however. That includes the construction of a commons building, a kitchen and other bathroom facilities.

Timmons said that phase would be “shelved for now.”

Shannon Ragonesi, an attorney with Keating,

Bucklin & McCormack, said the status of the project would qualify as an emergency.

“There’s a real urgent need to shore things up and keep things moving,” Ragonesi told the board.

CONTINUING CONCERN

Members of the PDA board expressed some skepticism that the project could actually be finished for $600,000.

Questions arose about the life cycle of the glamping tents, and how soon they could be ready for rentals.

Timmons said the tents have a useful life of 10 to 15 years, and he noted that the cost of the tents amounted to less than 10 percent of the total cost of the glamping project.

He also added there had been talk of eventually replacing the tents with small, Quonset-hut style buildings.

“Sort of like in the old military days,” Timmons said.

“We have talked about looking at some other type of replacement model when that time comes, that’s more durable and permanent,” he said.

The $600,000 in funding would be used primarily for carpenters, electricians, and plumbers.

The PDA had plans to put furniture in the glamping tents, but not anymore, Timmons said.

“The original project incorporated funding for the furnishings, as well,” he said. “But that’s not going to happen, though. We just don’t have those funds available.”

Site work, including landscaping, is also needed.

“I’m looking to do that as as separate contract,” Timmons told the board.

The PDA will have to maintain tight budget controls, he said, and that was why extra project oversight was needed.

“Right now time is of the essence,” Timmons said. “We need to get these online as soon as possible.”

PDA Board Member Celeste Tell doubted that $600,000 would be enough, and guesstimated the figure might be $900,000.

“You’re not far off. In the context of it, we don’t know,” Timmons replied.

Each glamping tent will need to be examined to determine the amount of work needed.

“Each one is going to have to be individually assessed because each one had its own exposure period [to the elements],” Timmons said.

“I know that the first tent that had the flooring finished — the flooring appears it was not installed correctly. So that’s going to have to be reinstalled,” he continued. “Each one’s going to have to be looked at.”

Concerns from the board continued.

“I have a little PTSD about DIY projects, that then contractors come in and go, ‘Yeah, well this wasn’t...’”

Tell said.

“And more has to be redone than anybody ever thought,” she said.

Timmons recalled that the first competitive bid on the project centered on installing utilities.

The following bids for completing the project were beyond the PDA’s budget.

That led to work being done by PDA workers to put up the tents.

“They were brought inhouse and done with in-house labor,” Timmons recalled. “And they purchased a lot of tools and a lot of things and supplies and materials to try to build it in-house.

“I think that that probably wasn’t the best approach to this,” Timmons said, adding that the pandemic then “really torpedoed” the glamping project.

“It is what it is,” he said.

The PDA would do its best to bring the project in with the $600,000 available, Timmons said. “But I can’t guarantee it.”

“Because I don’t know what we’re going to find when we get done with it.”

“But the point is: It’s got to get finished. It’s got to get done. We can’t walk away

from it because we have the bond obligations to complete it,” he said.

Questions also remain on whether revenues from campers will be able to cover the debt on the project.

An earlier analysis by the PDA said camping fees would be sufficient to cover the debt over a 10-year period.

“There’s been some question about that study, as to whether how accurate it was,” Timmons told the board.

Even so, the debt must be retired and the PDA must show its lender it is trying to complete the project.

“If we didn’t have that obligation we could simply just write it off and start it over as some other future point,” Timmons said of the glamping project.

“We’ve got to finish what we started in that context,” he said.

After an extended discussion, the board agreed to declare an emergency but stopped short of authorizing Timmons to execute a contract to have the project finished.

Instead, he was asked to bring a plan back to the board for approval.

Skepticism remained.

“I don’t think we are going to get this done for $600,000,” said PDA Board Member Rodger Schmitt.

“We should be prepared to find a source to pick up the difference if we’re really going to go forward with this,” he said.

A RAY OF HOPE

PDA Board Chair David King had a sunnier outlook.

“I’m choosing to be optimistic. I’ve been walking past these mothballed areas for some time now since the pandemic hit,” he said.

“I believe that these will be popular, as well, because of the kind of experience they will offer to visitors that has not been available to visitors at this park before,” King said.

“I’ve chosen to be hopeful,” he added.

*Event will follow current Covid precautions and will be outdoors in a tented area with heat and ventilation

At least $600,000 in improvements is needed to make the glamping tents ready for campers. Leader photo by Brian Kelly

California woman rescued after falling into park outhouse on Mount Walker

BRIAN KELLY BKELLY@PTLEADER.COM

A tourist visiting the top of Mount Walker got a view Tuesday she won’t soon forget.

Emergency responders from the Brinnon Fire Department and Quilcene Fire Rescue were called to the north viewpoint after a California woman fell into a vault toilet while trying to retrieve a cellphone she had dropped.

The woman had been visiting the destination viewpoint in the Olympic National Forest while exploring spots along US Highway 101.

Brinnon Fire Chief Tim Manly said the tourist, a woman in her 40s, dropped her phone while using the facilities.

She then took the toilet apart, removing the seat and its casing, in an attempt to get at the phone.

She couldn’t get close enough to grab the phone, however.

The woman had several small

dogs with her, so she tried to use the dog leashes to fish out her phone.

When that didn’t work, she then

took the leashes and tied them together in an attempt to create a safety harness so she could reach

Visit of aircraft carrier USS Nimitz may mean hundreds of sailors in Port Townsend

LEADER NEWS STAFF NEWS@PTLEADER.COM

Sailors from the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz will be coming to Port Townsend in early May.

Mayor David Faber announced the upcoming visit during the Port Townsend City Council meeting April 18.

“The USS Nimitz … will be here from Saturday, May 7 to Wednesday, May 11, so we will probably have a lot of sailors in downtown and Uptown and other parts of town, potentially, so everyone welcome them,” Faber said. The aircraft carrier will

be coming from its homeport at Naval Base Kitsap in Bremerton.

According to Faber, the Nimitz could bring potentially 1,800 sailors per day to

Port Townsend in the time that it will be here.

The Nimitz — one of the largest warships in the world and the oldest aircraft carrier in the Navy’s fleet — is a 1,092-foot, 100,000-ton vessel that was constructed in 1972.

The ship is expected to dock at Indian Island Naval Magazine. Officials at Indian Island would not confirm the visit, noting that the Navy does not discuss ship movements in advance due to operational security concerns.

The Nimitz is currently in port in Bremerton preparing for future operations, according to the Navy.

down deeper into the toilet for her phone, Manly said.

Instead, she dropped about 8 feet to the bottom of the outhouse pit.

“She tried to tie herself off so she wouldn’t fall in. You see how that worked,” the chief said.

“She fell in head first, covered from head to toe,” Manly said.

For 20 minutes or so, she tried to climb out, without success.

“She could reach the top with her fingertips, but she wasn’t strong enough to pull herself out,” Manly said.

The woman then used her cell phone to call 911.

Four firefighters/EMTs from Rescue 41 from the Brinnon Fire Department and Aid 21 from Quilcene Fire & Rescue responded to the mountaintop.

Unable to reach the woman, the crew passed down pieces of wood cribbing to the woman so she could make a platform to stand on. Emergency crews then put webbing around the woman and pulled her

out.

A hose line was attached to Rescue 41 and the tourist was gently hosed down.

Manly said she was given a Tyvek suit to wear.

The woman did not want to be taken to the hospital, Manly said, despite being strongly encouraged to seek medical attention and being warned of her exposure to human waste.

“She just basically wanted to get in her car and leave,” he said.

It was her decision to make, the chief added.

The rescue went quickly, Manly said, and the woman was grateful for the help. Manly said the woman was extremely fortunate not to be overcome by toxic gases or sustain injury.

It was a memorable afternoon for many, to be sure.

“This was one of the many calls that I’ve been on that I will never forget,” Manly said.

Officials respond to reports of door-to-door canvassing

Local and state authorities are warning residents about people visiting homes throughout Washington and posing as election officials.

The third-party canvassers who are going door-to-door “are not affiliated with and do not represent the Office of the Secretary of State, its Elections division, or any of Washington’s 39 county elections offices,” according to an announcement Monday from the Office of Secretary of State. Elections officials do not

make home visits and never ask people how they voted, said Secretary of State Steve Hobbs, adding they also don’t visit homes to verify information.

The Jefferson County Auditor’s Office, which oversees elections in the county, said it had received several phone calls during the 2021 General Election about canvassers, and a voter also came into the auditor’s office to talk about it.

Staff from the Jefferson County Auditor’s Office do not go door-to-door to gather voter information, according to the county, and does not have any jurisdiction to

authorize groups to do so. The auditor’s office said employees also don’t ask people how they voted, adding: “Voters are under no obligation to provide information to someone who comes to their door asking about the voting information. It is perfectly within your right to refuse to answer any questions from someone you do not know and/or trust.”

Officials noted that what a person confirms to someone at their front door is up to that individual and any such responses are completely voluntary.

MUSIC

Alexa Sunshine-Rose

Matt Sircely & Danny Barnes Unexpected Brass Band

Brinnon Firefighter/EMT Antonio Rubal and Quilcene Firefighter/EMT Zach Torres stand near the vault toilet where a California woman was rescued Tuesday afternoon.

Photo courtesy of the Brinnon Fire Department

Sailors on the USS Nimitz fold a ceremonial flag in the hangar bay last week. The Nimitz is in port preparing for future operations. US Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist Seaman Hannah Kantner

LEADER NEWS STAFF NEWS@PTLEADER.COM

COMES BACK AROUND

Granholm

makes

first-ever visit as Secretary of

Energy

Tours agency’s sole marine research lab

BRIAN KELLY BKELLY@PTLEADER.COM

A top official of the Biden Administration made a historic visit to the Olympic Peninsula last week as U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm toured the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory-Sequim.

County’s big event returns, and so do crowds

BRIAN KELLY BKELLY@PTLEADER.COM

Standing in his socks, David Olsen slowly pulled the wooden spoon out of his mouth, the taste of blackberry jelly on his tongue.

He looked around, thinking there was only one thing that would make this moment more delicious.

Some chunky peanut butter.

Kitty Gibson and Janine Boire quickly agreed.

The trio — all judges in the “best jam and jelly” contest at the Jefferson County Fair — had found one of the sweet spots of the beloved summertime event that had finally come back, escaping from its coronavirus cocoon of the past two years.

On a folding table in front of the trio sat 11 jars of homemade jams and jellies, and the threesome methodically tasted their way through each jar, one wooden spoonful at a time.

Plum. Blackberry. Strawberry plum. Mixed berry.

A crowd of a half dozen watched the judging Sunday in the fairground’s Oscar Erickson Building.

Boire admitted she came into the contest with a bit of a bias when a jar of boysenberry was opened.

“If that is our go-to favorite, should we disqualify ourselves from that?” she asked.

Olsen dipped a new spoon into a blackberry jam, and the sample scored a double lick on the spoon.

Then came an unexpected entry: fireweed jelly.

“It’s kind of earthy,” said Gibson, the most veteran jelly judge of the trio.

Boire watched Olsen’s reaction.

“Give that the furrowed brow. Very serious,” Boire said. Olsen approved, though, adding he could imagine it on plain toast.

“Sourdough toast,” Boire offered.

“That one gets marks just for being an outlier,” Gibson added. Fireweed? What’s that? The judges imagined what the plant

looked like, and the color of its flowers.

Watching the judges, Joanna Scheibl, the exhibitor who made the jelly, said it was made from the many, many blooms of the wildflower plant.

“It’s really big in Alaska,” she told the trio.

The judging continued until finally, after trading notes and shifting jars hither and yon until an agreement was reached on the top three, the first-place award in the jam contest went to Mary Rose Stanton for her strawberry plum jam.

A mixed-berry jam of loganberry, blackberry, and strawberry by Hundred Roses came in second, followed in third by a plum jam by Laura Pollock.

Pollock also won in the jelly contest, for her blackberry jelly, and Susan Clary was a winner with her blackberry freezer jelly.

And, to Scheibl’s surprise, the fireweed jelly also scored a win.

“I just won!” Scheibl said as she turned to her family, walking up to the judge’s table after the verdicts had been rendered.

Her family broke into smiles.

“Of course you did.”

“Great job, mom,” came another response.

When asked why he judged the jelly and jam contest in his socks, without his shoes on, Olsen said he’d been rolling with it earlier.

“I was spinning,” he said, motioning to the other side of the Oscar Erickson Building.

He gave a second thought to his judging attire and smiled.

“It might make a difference,” Olsen laughed.

ATTENDANCE BETTER THAN EXPECTED

With three packed days of events, from 4-H animal demonstrations and presentations to music and magic shows, baseball and dodgeball games, 4-by-4 mud drags and Western Games horse events, the Jefferson County Fair marked a sweet return last weekend to Port Townsend.

see FAIR, Page A5

The laboratory, known by the moniker of PNNL-Sequim, is the Department of Energy’s only marine research facility in the United States. Connected to Sequim Bay by a supply system that pumps 200 gallons of seawater a minute, the campus conducts marine-based research focused on sustainable energy, a

see ENERGY, Page A20

Anti-trans Press conference swarmed by protesters

JAMES SLOAN JSLOAN@PTLEADER.COM

More than 200 people crowded Pope Marine Park and both sides of Water Street in downtown Port Townsend Monday evening in response to the continuing controversy over a transgender YMCA employee at Mountain View Pool.

Port Townsend resident Julie Jaman has been at the center of national media interest since she confronted the YMCA staffer and was subsequently banned from the pool.

Her cause has since been championed by conservative media outlets and others who have been upset about the YMCA allowing the staff member to continue working at the Mountain View Pool.

A press conference called by Jaman’s supporters Monday across from Port Townsend City Hall was quickly overwhelmed by people supporting the YMCA employee and the transgender community.

While the standoff remained mostly civil throughout, tensions slowly rose as the protrans crowd surrounded the speakers and distracted from the speeches with chants, loud musical instruments, and a brigade of bikes adorned with Pride flags.

Chants of “Trans women are women” from the massive crowd were met with “We want sex-based rights” from the Jaman supporters.

see PROTESTERS, Page A21

U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm talks with researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory-Sequim while touring the research facility with Congressman Derek Kilmer. Photo courtesy of the Office of Representative Derek Kilmer

Above, Mike Stearns of Shelton watches as the Wheel of Fortune stutters to a stop in the Port Townsend Rock Club Building at the county fair. At top, one of the four-footed attractions at the 2022 Jefferson County Fair greets a visitor. Leader photos by Brian Kelly

Ronan Andrews takes a seat on a tractor at the Jefferson County Fair so his parents, Lissy and Christian Andrews, can get a photo. With the fair out of commission due to COVID the past few years, this year’s fair was the first for Ronan, who is 19 months old. Leader photo by Brian Kelly

But like jelly without its peanut butter partner, there were a few things missing as the fair emerged from the shadow of the pandemic.

4-H organizers noted a fall-off in the number of participants. Avian flu kept the chickens and other fowl away.

And some exhibitors also had challenges that kept them out, said Fair Manager Danny McEnerney.

Some had to cancel due to a lack of workers.

“One would sign up; one would get COVID. Literally, we just had one come in yesterday, ‘Can I be in it?’ It’s that chaotic.

“It’s been some work getting this going,” McEnerney added.

Even so, the fair surpassed expectations for its welcome return.

“People just really missed it,” said Don Pruitt, president of the Jefferson County Fair Board.

“We had a lot, a lot of excellent comments and compliments, he said. “The parking lots have been full. We had quite a line at the gate yesterday, with cars down the street.”

“After two years, I think people are ready for it to be back,” Pruitt said.

McEnerney, who took over as fair manager earlier this year, recalled a few of the firsts for his inaugural Jefferson County Fair.

He was a judge in a 4-H contest, he said.

“It was a fashion show for sheep,” McEnerney said.

For the 4-H youth with animals, the fair is a big deal.

“Other kids have soccer championships, ballet recitals,” he said.

For 4-H youth, the fair is a culminating event.

“This is their World Series to show off all their work. It’s been really great,” he added.

Overall, McEnerney said the early estimate was 10,000 fair goers and exhibitors, with about 8,500 being attendees.

“This is just a hair under our 2019 numbers and surpasses any expectation we had for the first year back. We are so thrilled!”

Some of the events were real crowd-pleasers, he added, noting the Washington State Draft Horse Pulls that were part of the fair this year.

“One team pulled more than 7,000 pounds of concrete, with seven people on top,” McEnerney recalled.

TOSS IT ON THE BAR-B

Lines were long, as expected, for the Sunday beef

barbecue.

Eric Johnson and a crew of more than a dozen worked the barbecue pit.

This year’s barbecue had 575 pounds of angus top round; 64 half roasts.

“We start on Friday,”

Johnson said. “We pick up the meat from the QFC. We bring it here, slice it in half, dry rub it, and put it in the cooler until this morning at 5.”

Johnson said it was enough beef for 500 to 800 portions.

“This is nothing. When we originally started this barbecue 25 years ago, we cooked 1,500 pounds,” he said.

The barbecue back then revolved around a hole in the ground and at least 10 cords of wood.

“We put the roasts in socks and lowered them down into the hole, and let them cook,” Johnson said.

Johnson had the assistance of 15 people during the fair, many of them retired volunteer firefighters or family members.

“We rotate them out, so people can get off their feet,” he added.

FOR THOSE ABOUT TO ROCK

Things were also rocking nearby, at the Port Townsend Rock Club Building.

Mike Stearns manned the Wheel of Fortune as youngster after youngster plopped down 50 cents to take a spin at a prize.

Kids cried out “ooh” after missing one of the four strips marked with a star at the top, which gives the winner the best pick of prizes, spread out on the table in front of the red wheel wonder.

“I was so close to that star,” one boy said, trying to convince his older brother.

Arlie Blankenship stopped by the Rock Club Building, pausing to admire a motorized Ferris wheel made of driftwood, with eight seats filled by tiny cloth people.

Blankenship, a Port Townsend resident, said the wheel was made by his father, George Blankenship.

“I’m guessing — 1969,” he said.

“I was in the service then,” Blankenship added.

His mother had a part in the display, which has been on display at the fair for years and always draws interested looks from folks visiting the rock club’s building. “She made the little people.”

Blankenship, 85, pointed to an old group photo of rock club members in a nearby display case. The group was gathered around a fountain club members had made, and a date of 1969 was written on the top of the photo.

That’s his dad, there, in the plaid shirt, he said.

Blankenship noted his brother Dale is a master jade carver, winning a series

of first- and second-place awards with his skills in recent years.

But rocks and gems weren’t his thing, he admitted.

“I don’t know a thing about it. I like to do machinist work,” he said, adding his wife does cross-stitching.

THE CAT’S WHISKERS

Things were purring in the 4-H Cat Building Sunday, with the open cat show, and costume and cage decoration contests.

Skippy John, coming off a Saturday where the feline had won the public vote for “favorite cat” of the fair, was getting examined for the open class show for shorthairs.

Melanya Nordstrom, a former 4-H’er now judging club shows and county fairs, noted to the audience that Skippy John was a pointed cat.

“Usually with pointed cats, as they age, they get darker overall.”

She noted that point coloration on cats is something that is carried in the feline’s genes. Skippy John has seal point coloration, she told the audience.

“He has little white mittens,” she added.

If he was a solid seal point, she said, he would not have any white fur.

“His whiskers would be dark, as well,” she said.

Nordstrom picked up Skippy John and held him aloft on two outstretched hands, to show how he could stretch.

Point coloration comes from Siamese cats, said Nordstrom, adding that Siamese are the super stretchers in the cat world.

“Siamese cats are supposed

to be very long and tubeshaped, as opposed to a Persian,” she explained, “those are short, compact, like a brick.”

Skippy, though, wasn’t really into overextending himself at the fair.

“Skippy John is not a fan of that today,” she said as the feline fussed slightly, drawing a loud laugh from the spectators.

Only nine cats made it down to the Jefferson County Fair this year, an event that has normally had 20 or so feline entries in past years.

The double-whammy of two missed fairs, COVID restrictions, 4-H members aging out of the organization, and younger siblings getting exposed to the 4-H fun, were noted as factors in the fall off.

Each cat was judged for trimmed claws, and clean eyes, nose, and ears.

Nordstrom said all of the short hairs were doing extremely well at being handled.

In the end, it turned out to be a good fair for Skippy John, who was picked as a reserve grand champion. Aspen won grand champion honors.

Fuzzy was a close call for second place, but fell short.

“Fuzzy had eye boogers,” Nordstrom explained.

BIG FINISH

All in all, the fair was a surprising success.

“We didn’t know what to expect. We’ve had the biggest attendance, by far, than what we expected. So it’s been really great; lots of happy kids, smiling,” said McEnerney, manager of the fair.

4-H judge Melanya Nordstrom evaluates Skippy John during judging for domestic shorthairs Sunday. Leader photo by Brian Kelly

A sculpture by Sophia Jankins in the fine arts contest for kids up to 12 years old. Leader photo by Brian Kelly

Sunken sailboat prompts emergency

County steps in to remove derelict vessel

BRIAN KELLY

BKELLY@PTLEADER.COM

Nameless and adrift, she finally hit bottom sometime in January.

Now, it was really time for her to go.

“She” was a Catalina 27 sailboat, no name on the transom, known only by the vessel registration number WN 7877NE. The boat, nearly beached, was stranded on private tidelands near the Indian Island Bridge.

The abandoned boat was sighted near the bridge about a month ago. Battered by the recent windstorm and king tides, it started to take on water and local mariners and residents worried it could damage the support columns to the bridge or pose an environmental threat from spilled fuel or other fluids.

But during a stormy Saturday three weeks ago, in an O-Dark-Thirty rescue in sideways rain, a team led by TowBoatUS/ Marine Assist of Port Hadlock worked to recover the hazardous vessel and remove it from the water.

“It was awesome,” said County Commissioner Heidi Eisenhour of the effort.

“We have amazing professional mariners in our community. And it was the right team of people and the right moment. And nasty weather — but they didn’t care,” she said.

Eisenhour recalled how a subcommittee of the Jefferson Marine Resources Committee had been tracking the issue of derelict vessels in local waters, with hopes of using funding from the Northwest Straits Commission to get at-risk boats out of the water.

The Marine Resources Committee group had already taken notice of 14 other problematic boats, with six listed for removal in Jefferson County and eight more on a watch list.

“We started to develop our own backof-the-napkin list of vessels that we knew were sitting on the beach or sunk in shallow water or had been on their mooring for five years. And who owns them, and do we know anything about them, and were concerned they might become derelict,” Eisenhour said.

The Catalina 27 quickly got noticed by others after it started its partially submerged snuggle with the Indian Island Bridge.

A member of the Marine Resources

Committee who lives on Marrowstone noticed the boat, as did the owner of the shoreline property where the boat was offshore. The white sailboat, covered with blue tarps, had earlier been seen anchored in Hadlock offshore from the Ajax Café.

After the sailboat became stranded on private tidelands on the Indian Island side of Portage Canal, however, a new boat sank to the top of the wanted list. Battered by king tides and rough weather, the sailboat posed a chance of damaging the bridge and breaking apart.

Eisenhour recalled how fast action was needed, and she contacted the Washington State Department of Natural Resources’ Derelict Vessel Removal Program to see what removal options existed.

The speediest step to getting the boat out of the water was for the Jefferson County to take action itself.

The county took emergency possession of the boat Jan. 14, and Eisenhour obtained authorization from DNR to spend up to $30,000 to take the boat out, with Jefferson County’s costs to be eventually reimbursed by the state.

Eisenhour then turned to Roger Slade of TowBoatUS Port Hadlock, the owner of

Coyote runs loose in PT hospital

JAMES SLOAN JSLOAN@PTLEADER.COM

A coyote wandered into Jefferson Healthcare Medical Center Tuesday morning and shattered a glass panel after it got frightened and tried to escape.

The coyote was first spotted by Amy Yaley, the hospital’s marketing and communications director, around 10:05 a.m.

“It was hard not to notice, I was sitting in a meeting area outside the cafe,” Yaley said.

The animal apparently entered the hospital through the facility’s automatic doors. It wandered through the hospital’s express clinic, ran down a hallway, broke a glass panel trying to get away, and finally tried to hide in a corner of the hospital’s outdoor courtyard.

see COYOTE, Page A8

Truck crash shuts down Hood Canal Bridge

Span closed for seven hours

BRIAN KELLY BKELLY@PTLEADER.COM

When it comes to backups at the Hood Canal Bridge, ain’t nothing like the real thing.

A Coca-Cola semi-trailer truck jackknifed on the Highway 104 span just after 3 p.m. Friday, shutting down the bridge in both directions for more than seven hours.

Long lines of drivers formed on both sides of the Hood Canal. An early estimate of a reopening at 6 p.m. Feb. 3 was quickly replaced by warnings from the Washington Department of Transportation that the bridge was closed “until further notice.”

The shutdown caused ripple effects throughout the region.

Ian Sterling of Washington State Ferries said a number of ferry crew members on both sides of the water couldn’t report to work due to the closure.

Ferry service was shut down between Port Townsend and Whidbey Island. The 8:30 p.m. sailing Friday from Port Townsend and the 9:10 p.m. departure from Coupeville were called off.

In addition to the Port TownsendCoupeville ferry run, cancellations were also

see BRIDGE, Page A8

A salvage team works to remove a sunken 27-foot sailboat from Portage Canal near the Indian Island Bridge. Photo courtesy of Peter Harrison see SAILBOAT, Page A8

A crane operator works through driving rain to remove the derelict vessel from off Indian Island.

Photo courtesy of Peter Harrison

The derelict Catalina 27 sailboat can be seen near the Indian Island Bridge before the vessel became submerged. Courtesy photo

A body camera image from an animal control officer with the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office shows the moment the wayward coyote was captured.

Photo courtesy of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office

COYOTE

continued from Page A1

The Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office, Port Townsend Police Department, and Center Valley Animal Rescue were called to the scene shortly after the animal was spotted.

No one was harmed in the encounter, but the coyote sustained injuries from breaking through the glass panel, and had lacerations to its snout, said Detective Sergeant Brett Anglin of the Sheriff’s Office.

The operations of the hospital were not impacted by the unexpected visit, Yaley said.

“The animal had sat down and started resting [in the courtyard], the situation could’ve been much more difficult had it gone somewhere else,” Anglin added.

Animal Control Deputy Erik Allen of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office caught the coyote with a net before it was sedated.

“Center Valley Animal Rescue came and assessed the situation, went in, and sedated the animal without any problems,” Yaley said. “It was a pretty big coyote, and took a while to sedate.”

Around 11:30 a.m., the creature was transported to the animal rescue’s veterinary facility to treat its lacerations and other potential injuries.

BRIDGE

continued from Page A1

made on the Edmonds-Kingston route during the bridge closure.

That left just one way off of the Olympic Peninsula Friday: US Highway 101 south.

The semi-trailer truck that crashed on the Hood Canal Bridge struck the concrete barrier on one side of the span.

According to the Department of Transportation, a section of the barrier was displaced along with the guardrail, and there was also some damage to the bridge deck itself toward the edge where the barrier sits.

Mark Krulish, a Department of Transportation spokesman, said there was no indication that any pieces of the bridge were knocked into Hood Canal.

“We had concerns about a fuel spill as the truck’s fuel tank had been punctured, but our crews were able to simply pump the fuel out before it was towed,” Krulish said in an email to The Leader.

The region was buffeted by high winds Friday, which may have been

JOIN

SAILBOAT

continued from Page A1

a vessel assist company that also handles salvage operations. She still had his number from her days as chief operations officer at the Northwest Maritime Center.

“I said, ‘Roger, are you retired yet?’,” Eisenhour recalled. “He was like, ‘Not quite.’

“I said, ‘Well we got a boat under the bridge.’ He said, ‘I know. We’ve been looking at that one for a month.’

“I’m like, ‘I got to get it out of there.’ I said, ‘Can you help?’ And he said, ‘Yeah, I can do this one.’”

Slade said the sailboat wasn’t taking on water when it was first spotted a few months ago. The Coast Guard and DNR were notified, he said, and the owner of the boat was contacted and talks began about what to do with the boat.

A tentative agreement was made to have it turned over to the state’s Derelict Vessel Removal Program.

Still, there was a rub. The boat had to be floating, and the owner was responsible for delivering it to a haul-out facility. In this case, Boat Haven.

The owner had no resources to deal with the problem, though, and was living on another boat anchored in the harbor.

Then came the damaging windstorm and king tides at year’s end.

a factor in the crash, according to Trooper Katherine Weatherwax of the Washington State Patrol. Weatherwax said the wreck was still under investigation.

No injuries were reported.

The backup on both sides stretched for miles, and many drivers simply gave up and turned around on the highway instead of waiting for the bridge to reopen.

Eventually, two trucks with state transportation crews from Shelton arrived at the bridge around 8 p.m. Friday; one loaded with an excavator, another with pieces of replacement concrete barriers.

Maintenance crews placed a temporary barrier and the Department of Transportation’s Bridge Preservation Office came to inspect the damage. Once the barrier was in place, workers at the Hood Canal Bridge performed a test opening to make sure that the bridge would open its entire length for marine traffic.

The span reopened at about 10:30 p.m. Friday.

The bridge was scheduled to be shut down to one lane Tuesday for four hours to remove a section of barrier wall that was damaged in the crash.

continued from Page A7

b. Establish a mechanism to ensure that the units go to local workforce members and are maintained as permanently affordable.

3. Do not upzone R1 and R2 until the city adopts a comprehensive affordable housing strategy.

4. The city should evaluate the risk of rental displacement in any density changes.

5. Enact zoning changes that allow for tiny homes, mobile homes, and alternative

“It was just getting worse and worse and the boat was breaking up,” Slade said.

“It was sunk, but it was still moving in the water. So we were concerned it was going to move out into the channel or hit the bridge uprights,” Eisenhour said.

With a barge, salvage vessel, and a tugboat, a team started working to raise the sailboat Jan. 14. Due to the swift currents of the canal, divers worked during a 15-minute window in the early morning slack tide to put straps around the sailboat, put a bridle between the straps, and pull the boat alongside a barge, slowly hoisting it partially out of the water.

With the boat filled with water, Slade estimated the vessel weighed about 5 tons.

Eisenhour said there were huge holes in the boat’s hull from it resting sunken on the shore for a month, through the king tides and the storm.

The owner of the sailboat came out when the divers were in the water, Eisenhour said, and was warned by the tow boat to stay away because of the danger to the divers in the water and the movement of the boat.

“He wanted one of his fenders,” she said.

“Someone said it was probably the only thing he paid for on the boat,” she recalled.

With the sailboat stabilized, the rescue team headed back to the

dock in Hadlock by Star Marine. Eisenhour followed in the salvage boat Timber Wolf.

It was a moment of relief.

“My point of stress: People were putting their lives at risk to do this. Those divers were in the cold water for hours,” Eisenhour said.

With the barge, tug, and derelict boat alongside and going to Hadlock, Eisenhour said, “I finally took this deep breath, and I was like, everyone’s safe. We got this.”

The sailboat was put on the hard at Star Marine, and a notice was posted on the boat that said Jefferson County was taking emergency possession. The notice declared the vessel would remain at Star Marine for 60 days. The owner of the sailboat was notified via certified letter Jan. 19 of his right to reclaim the vessel, but must cover the costs of paying

for the removal. The county will maintain custody for 30 days, and an appeal period of another month will follow.

There’s a sense that the number of boats that are derelict or nearly so seems to be growing.

“The more people who live here, the more boats there are. Everything’s more, right?” Eisenhour said.

Slade agreed.

“I’m very pleased that Heidi Eisenhour stepped up to the plate as a county commissioner,” Slade said.

More needs to be done, he added.

“Just in Port Townsend Bay there are other derelicts that have been sitting around waiting to be dealt with,” he said. “Derelict vessels have been a problem for a long time and it just seems like it gets worse.”

For her part, Eisenhour said she could only take credit for making the call to Slade.

It’s the community of skilled mariners who deserve praise, she said.

“It was one of those moments in your life where you’re like, as I said, it takes a village. And we live in the exact right village to make this happen quickly,” Eisenhour added.

affordable housing developments within the city.

6. Rushed decision-making on such complex issues is inherently risky.

As we work to develop a comprehensive, affordable housing strategy and determine which steps to take with our near-term zoning decisions, it will be important for us to hear best practices and lessons learned from other communities and affordable housing experts. With the help of Kim Herman, the former executive director of the Washington State Housing Finance Commission for 35 years, HSN has been researching solutions deployed elsewhere in

Washington state. Please come, listen, and learn; join in the heavy lift and conversation at the upcoming joint city council plus planning commission meeting on Feb. 13. HSN will be there in support of the work carried forth by the staff and commissioners; helping to find more stability and affordability in local zoning codes. There will be multiple ways to engage; stay up to date at housingsolutionsnetwork.org.

To reiterate: it is powerful to carry with us the act of sistering; spreading the burden of a heavy lift and bringing more support and stability to the task at hand. We should

allow ourselves to carry on the ancestral practice of accepting help and living in community.

Together we can accomplish great things for the community at large, all while strengthening our own structural integrity.

(Liz Revord is the Director of Housing Solutions Network. With the help of the Network, this monthly column will amplify the voices of the workforce, highlight housing issues, and celebrate big victories across the housing landscape. To learn more about the work HSN is doing in our community, visit housingsolutionsnetwork.org.)

WEEK OF FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 15, 2023

PORT TOWNSEND TIDES

DISCOVERY BAY TIDES

PORT LUDLOW TIDES

“Derelict vessels have been a problem for a long time and it just seems like it gets worse.”

Roger Slade TOWBOATUS PORT HADLOCK

A semi-trailer truck sits jackknifed on the Hood Canal Bridge Friday. Photo courtesy of the Washington State Patrol

Students tackle ‘ghost-pot’ problem

JAMES SLOAN JSLOAN@PTLEADER.COM

Many people who’ve lived or visited the Olympic Peninsula and surrounding regions know the importance of the Dungeness crab as a foundational part of local cuisine and the specie’s role as a major export of the local fish trade.

After all, the crab species was named after the unincorporated community of Dungeness north of Sequim.

While the local crustacean is a valuable and vital part of the Peninsula’s economy, the effects of “ghost pots” — derelict crab traps on the ocean floor — have left a lasting effect on the local marine life on the sea floor.

The crab-catching cage itself isn’t necessarily the problem here, but rather the fact that many of the pots are lost or forgotten by fishermen over time.

Crab traps are typically built with a failsafe latch that frees the creatures trapped within after a period of time, but in many cases, the latch doesn’t work.

This causes the crabs within to die, leaving a carcass that attracts other crabs and creatures to enter the pot and fall to the same fate.

While the ghost pot problem primarily impacts crabs, the cage can lead to dozens or more unnecessary deaths for a variety of critters, also leading to lower yields for fishers in the same area.

Sensing a problem and searching for a solution, members of the Sea Dragons — a local underwater robotics team consisting of four college students in the area — partnered with the Jefferson County Marine Resources Committee to find a fix to the derelict crab pots looming within the depths of the Salish Sea.

Consisting of sophomore environmental science

majors Ella Ashford and Riley Forth of Willamette University in Salem, Oregon, sophomore engineer Logan Flanagan of Western Washington University, and Teach Northwest High School graduate Nathaniel Ashford, the four-part team found a way

Port Townsend bids farewell to Western Flyer

Restoration effort at Boat Haven comes to an end

BRIAN KELLY BKELLY@PTLEADER.COM

Croatian lavender, 20 million-year-old shark teeth, and the “Western Flyer.”

All three went into the water last Wednesday as a crowd of more than 200 gathered at Boat Haven to see the fishing boat — made famous by literary great John Steinbeck — was reunited with the sea after a nine-year restoration effort at the Port Townsend boatyard.

The appreciative crowd at Boat Haven swelled from a few dozen as the 76-foot purse seiner, originally built in 1937 by the Western Boat Building Company, was rolled out from the Port Townsend Shipwrights Co-op’s boat shop on 10 large steel rollers, pulled by a bulldozer inch-by-inch to where the Port of Port Townsend’s 300-ton Marine Travelift could reach it.

With three horn blasts, the Travelift slowly began to creep toward the water with the Western Flyer as the crowd cheered.

“Welcome to this unbelievable day,” Chris Chase, the project director for the restoration effort, told the large group of shipwrights, boatyard workers, gathered

by the boat launch. Also in the audience, dozens of members of the Petrich family; grandchildren, nieces, nephews of Martin

Petrich, founder of the Western Boat Building Company where the Western Flyer was built in Tacoma in 1937.

Chase thanked the craftsmen and cast of hundreds of locals who brought the fishing boat back to life, from the Shiprights Co-op to the guys milling wood at Edensaw.

“This is once in a lifetime to the men and women who have worked on it. It is incredible,” Chase said.

Chase was present when the vessel was brought ashore in Port Townsend in July 2013, covered in barnacles inside and out.

Purchased by John Gregg for about $1 million, the Western Flyer earned fame as the fishing vessel charted by Steinbeck and marine biologist Ed Ricketts in 1940 for a six-week expedition to collect sea life in the Gulf of California. It was a journey that led to the nonfiction book “Sea of Cortez” by the pair in 1941 and “The Log from the Cortez” by Steinbeck in 1951.

Chase recounted the Western Flyer’s life in and out of the water, going back to when a new owner purchased the

see FLYER, Page A10

Center Valley Animal Rescue celebrates 20 years

DEREK FIRENZE DFIRENZE@PTLEADER.COM

What started with one woman and a handful of friends networking to foster neglected and abused animals has grown into 20 years, 32 acres, and countless saved lives.

Sara Penhallegon, founder and director of Center Valley Animal Rescue, is the woman behind it all whose vision has created a legacy of love, compassion, and second chances for helpless creatures.

When asked what drives her to keep at it after all these years, Penhallegon

replied, “Give me a challenge and I will be happy.”

It was a motto prompted by the story of how she rescued eight starving bison without any previous experience working with the massive animals.

On this long road Penhallegon has seen more than her fair share of tragedy, but still she stays positive. Her secret?

“I see the light at the end of the tunnel,” she said.

“I don’t focus on what was. I look at what I can do.”

With the celebration of all she has done approaching, Penhallegon and her team are currently in the middle of baby season with more than 60 newborn animals at the facility. As part of this work, she just sent kittens to prison.

Penhallegon has teamed up with

the Welfare for Animals Guild and the local corrections system, to pair semi-feral kittens one-to-one with individual inmates to help the kittens socialize, and the prisoners, too.

The stories and letters from inmates about how the program changed their lives are yet another one of the joys that keep Penhallegon going, she said.

Penhallegon will be hosting two talks on wildlife and domestic animals where she’ll be telling similar stories; on Saturday, July 9 at Center Valley Animal Rescue’s 20th anniversary celebration and summer open house.

In addition, there will be tours of the facility, a vegetarian barbecue, a raffle, and silent auction to help raise funds to save more animals.

For more information on the event, go to centervalleyanimalrescue.org.

Sara Penhallegon of Center Valley Animal Rescue plays with Henry the black sheep and Bunnie the brown and white sheep.

Photo courtesy of Center Valley Animal Rescue

“Community members ... can enact change in small or big ways.”

Ella Ashford MEMBER OF THE SEA DRAGONS

The Western Flyer is slowly moved from the Shipwrights Co-op’s boat shop at Boat Haven. Leader photo by Brian Kelly

Chris Chase, the project director for the restoration of the Western Flyer, talks to the crowd before the iconic boat is renamed. Leader photo by Brian Kelly

boat and stripped its notable name from the hull.

“It had its name changed to the ‘Gemini’ in the 1960s. And that’s when all its trouble really happened. It sank three times as the Gemini,” Chase said, adding that the boat would finally return to the sea with its original name.

The Port Townsend Shipwrights Co-op took over the restoration effort in June 2015, and the boat will eventually be used as a state-of-the-art marine research vessel with at-sea experiential learning programs for school children.

Chase told the crowd that tradition dictated changing the boat’s name and a blessing must happen before the Western Flyer touched the water.

“Once Neptune gets its hands on the boat, it’s Neptune’s boat. We don’t want any mishap,” he said.

Before that, Chase repeatedly thanked the shipwrights and others involved in the restoration project.

The boat was brought to Port Townsend, Washington, on July 4, 2013, Chase recalled, and hauled out the next day.

“I mean, nine years in Port Townsend, Washington,” Chase said. “It’s an 85-yearold boat. That’s like 12 percent of its life has been in Port Townsend. This boat will always, always — a chapter of this story — will always be Port Townsend.”

“Of course, Steinbeck. Ricketts. Monterey. Fishing. Alaska,” he added. “But Port Townsend will always be a chapter in the story of this boat.”

Bringing what’s been billed as the most famous fishing boat in the world back to its former glory came with a cost; earlier estimates put the cost at roughly $2 million.

The restoration has been a community project, Chase said, noting that donors have come from far and wide, from up and down the West Coast.

Chase recalled how Gregg,

founder of the Western Flyer Foundation, decided to purchase the boat.

That was after it’s life as a salmon tender in Alaska in the 1970s, a purchase by a California real estate developer who wanted to use the boat as a decoration for a cafe that would be part of a new hotel, and the following year, it sank twice near Anacortes in 2012. It was raised the following year and brought to Port Townsend.

Two years later, Gregg bought the boat.

“He got a wild idea; he had been inspired by this story, ‘The Log from the Sea of Cortez,’” Chase recalled. “And he bought this boat, a little bit of a whim, a little bit of a crazy idea. He might wonder what he was doing at the time.

“But he had a vision to turn it into an educational research platform built on the backbone of a historically significant vessel. And that is what is here today.

You are looking at an awful lot of new wood. But there are some real original bones deep inside this boat,” Chase said.

Gregg “has been a true

continued from Page A1

to help with the ghost pot problem by returning to their robotics roots.

Flanagan, Ella Ashford, and Nathaniel Ashford are longtime members and alumni of the Port Townsend STEM Club, where they got acquainted with robotics from an early age.

Their first taste of the world of robotics came from a maker’s fair they attended as children, where the trio was fascinated by a simple aquatic automation at the event.

“It was a PVC robot in a bucket and we couldn’t get enough of it,” Ella Ashford said, laughing. “All of our imaginations were really piqued.”

A decade later, the robotics squad is continuing their passion, albeit with bigger toys and much more strenuous challenges.

“Logan, Nathaniel, and I have been on robotics teams together for the last 10 years,” Ella Ashford said. “We’ve know each-other since we were like 9 and working with Lego robots … it felt so natural to keep that same team, because we’d spent years building the

champion of this boat from Day 1,” Chase added.

Members of the Petrich family then stepped forward for the renaming ceremony.

One quoted Steinbeck from “The Log from the Sea of Cortez”: “A man builds the best of himself into a boat — builds many of the unconscious memories of his ancestors.”

Joe Petrich, a boatbuilder and the grandson of Martin Petrich, took on the role of Poseidon for the renaming ceremony, prompting laughter from the crowd as he approached the bow of the Western Flyer holding a plastic trident.

“I well remember the day the Western Flyer first touched my waters at Western Boat Building Company. She was a sound, yar vessel,” he said.

“Well-suited to life at sea. She fished the Pacific and the Gulf of Mexico. Later she changed hands and was renamed the Gemini. And fished in Alaska and Puget Sound.”

“I didn’t like that name much, so, thus the three sinkings,” Petrich said,

referencing its mishaps near Anacortes and earlier, when

it hit a reef in Alaska in the early 1970s.

our main objective is to keep the environment clean,” he added.

For the Sea Dragons, environmental stewardship and preservation is the primary motivation for the work that they do.

“I think so many people don’t recognize how polluted our oceans are starting to become. More than just crab pots, we were running into countless marine debris down there,” Ella Ashford said. “It’s startling, we can’t go down in a dive without finding something that a human has left behind.”

According to the Northwest Straits Foundation, 12,000 crab pots are lost in the Puget Sound, killing an estimated 180,000 Dungeness crabs each year.

“I was sad to see her wallowing in the mud of the Swinomish Slough, covered with barnacles, bullwarks sagging, slowly dying. Today you are all here today to celebrate the work you have done to return her to my kingdom, the kingdom of the sea,” Petrich continued, speaking as Poseidon.

“So I ask you, speak out and answer me now, have you purged all traces of her old name, Gemini?”

The crowd responded with an enthusiastic “Yes!”

“What do you propose to return her to?”

“Western Flyer!” they shouted.

Nora Petrich of Port Townsend then led the wellwishers in a call to the rulers of the four winds, and wine was splashed on the hull of the boat.

The Rev. Perry Petrich, a Jesuit priest and the greatgrandson of Martin Petrich, then led a blessing of the Western Flyer.

The ceremony was temporary interrupted by a fawnequin great Dane that walked out from the crowd. The dog wandered up to the front of the boat launch, stood next to Petrich, and started drinking from an open plastic container holding the Holy Water.

“That is the holiest dog!” Petrich said as onlookers erupted in laughs.

Prayers were shared and and Croatian lavender, from shipwrights who had helped restore the boat, was tossed into the water.

In another nod to superstitions of the sea, Gregg encouraged everyone to grab a small fossilized shark tooth from a small cloth bag to toss into the water around the Western Flyer. The vessel was then slowly lowered into the water as cheers erupted.

The boat was towed from Port Townsend Thursday to Seattle by the tugboat Red Bluff, where the Western Flyer will be fitted with an engine and have other work done before it is taken to its eventual home in California.

Resources Committee (MRC).

“District 2 Representative Jeff Taylor raised the issue of derelict crab pots to the MRC and saw the opportunity to work with the Sea Dragons,” said Monica Montgomery, the Washington State University Jefferson County Extension Water Programs Coordinator. “Many were skeptical that an underwater ROV could successfully locate — let alone remove — derelict crab pots in our surrounding waters, but overcoming challenge after challenge, these students proved the concept by doing just that.”

camaraderie and support systems and communication that it just flowed really naturally.” With Forth as a recent addition to the team, the Sea Dragons have been aiding the local marine ecosystem by using an ROV (remotely operated vehicle) used in previous competitions and equipped with up-cycled bike batteries from The Broken Spoke in Port Townsend to locate and recover ghost pots from the local seafloor.

“We found that local fishermen are just as invested in this project as we are. They want to see these crab pots removed, they want to assist in better [crab pot] safety so that they can’t be lost as often,” Nathaniel Ashford added.

“Realistically, our goal is to work with the fishing community, because for the fishing community this has many negative effects on them, as well. “They rely off this as a source of income and food …

“That’s why this project is so unique in some ways; we’re specifically looking at communitydriven solutions to this problem,” Ella Ashford explained.

“Community members, people who care most about the community that they’re in, can enact change in small or big ways, so that’s what inspires me most about this project.”

The student-research team has received help from Jefferson County as well as a boatload of permitting assistance from the county’s Marine

Using her environmental science background, Ella Ashford acknowledged that while using automated devices like ROVs can be a massive benefit to countering climate change, the problem is too broad and too persistent to only pursue through that strategy alone.

“For me, an ROV has always been a tool, not necessarily the whole solution,” Ashford said. “For me, its too big of a problem, especially when it keeps increasing, so we can’t solely rely on technology to bring us to a solution. It has to do with people too.”

Logan Flanagan and Ella Ashford retrieve a crab pot from the ocean. Monica Montgomery photo

The Western Flyer is lowered slowly into the water while part of the crowd of hundreds gets a closer look. Leader photo by Brian Kelly

The propeller is secured before the vessel is moved. Leader photo by Brian Kelly