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PENINSULA DAILY NEWS December 10, 2012 | 75¢
Port Townsend-Jefferson County’s Daily Newspaper
Warm coats needed for YMCA drive
Wedding bells for area pairs
BY CHARLIE BERMANT PENINSULA DAILY NEWS
PORT TOWNSEND — Those who are unprepared for the cold weather will benefit from a coat drive designed to ward off the chill of winter. Sponsored by the Jefferson County YMCA, the drive has placed boxes at several locations in Port Townsend where people can drop off their gently used coats, which in turn will be donated to anyone who asks. “It doesn’t get that cold here, but there are families in need who don’t have coats,” said Amanda Funaro, who is coordinating the drive.
Boxes with snowflakes “We do a lot for our kids in this community, but there are a lot of mommies and daddies who go to work and need coats, and there are a lot of people who work in the rain and the mud, and are unprotected.” The drive, now in progress through Jan. 7, has donations and distributions happening as they occur. Large cardboard boxes decorated with paper snowflakes are installed at the Boiler Room, Port Townsend schools, the Port Townsend Athletic Club, Kitsap Bank, Quimper Unitarian Universalist Fellowship and the YMCA office at Mountain View Commons, 1919 Blaine St. TURN
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STEVE MULLENSKY/FOR PENINSULA DAILY NEWS
Dana Fickeisen, left, and Karen Frank, both of Port Townsend, make history as the first same-sex couple to be married in Jefferson County. The couple said they’ve been together for more than 25 years. Officiating at Quimper Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Port Townsend before a gathering of about 50 people is the Rev. Bruce Bode, assisted by minesterial intern Carol Thomas Cissel, right.
More Peninsula firsts
COATS/A4
Three same-sex couples tie the knot in PT, Sequim PENINSULA DAILY NEWS AND NEWS SOURCES
CHARLIE BERMANT/PENINSULA DAILY NEWS
Amanda Funaro of Port Townsend is coordinating the local YMCA coat drive.
Same-sex couples in Washington state recited wedding vows Sunday at events across the state, on the first day they could marry after the state’s gay marriage law took effect. On the North Olympic Peninsula, three happy couples took their vows. The first ceremony in Clallam County took place Sunday, as Diana Wickman, 47, and JP Persall, 59, of Happy Valley, east of Sequim, made their decadelong relationship official. Wickman said the couple didn’t think they would ever see the day that they could legally marry. “We can’t believe it’s here. It’s real — it’s really real,” Wickman said prior
to the ceremony. The couple chose to keep the wedding small, with 26 guests and a brief, five-minute ceremony at their home, during which the brides wore jeans and dressy blouses. “We had a big commitment ceremony three years ago,” Wickman said.
Cupcakes and wine Chocolate cupcakes and wine were served for their chocolate and winethemed reception “It’s astoundingly casual. We want to be comfortable,” Wickman said. Wickman and Persall plan to honeymoon in Cabo San Lucas. “Right now, it’s like, ‘Wow,’” Wickman said.
In Jefferson County, several pairs wed at the Quimper Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Port Townsend. About 50 people attended the early-afternoon wedding of Dana Fickeisen and Karen Frank, both from Port Townsend. The couple have been together for more than 25 years, they said. Port Townsend residents Sharon Chirichillo and Mary Langley also were scheduled to be married at the church later Sunday. Carlyle Bishop and Harry Vossemas of Port Townsend were the first same-sex couple to apply for licenses in Jefferson County on Thursday. TURN
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Local volunteers return with tales of aiding Sandy victims BY ARWYN RICE PENINSULA DAILY NEWS
PORT ANGELES — A team of North Olympic Peninsula Red Cross volunteers is back home after three weeks in areas hard-hit by superstorm Sandy. When the Red Cross called nationally for volunteers, 15 trained volunteers and two nurses from the Olympic Peninsula Chapter of the American Red Cross were deployed to New York, New Jersey and other affected East Coast states. They were the ones where superstorm Sandy caused more than $62 billion in wind and water dam-
age to countless homes, businesses and public works in late October. Frank Keener, 67, of Sequim was among the first volunteers from Washington state to be deployed across the country as a bulk logistics manager, controlling and tracking the flow of supplies coming into the Red Cross’ Massachusetts warehouse headquarters and their distribution. The storm didn’t hit the Northeast evenly. “There were pockets of normalcy and pockets of devastation,” said Keener, who also was on a Red Cross team sent to New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane
Katrina in 2005. This time, Keener spent 20 hours a day organizing the loading of supplies into hundreds of trucks that transported water, food, tents, medical supplies and other relief items to stricken communities.
Resources strained The Sandy relief effort took up most of the resources American Red Cross had nationwide — including people. “I didn’t think I was going to be deployed,” said registered nurse Jamie Goodwin, 62, of Sequim, who was sent to manage health
issues at a shelter on Staten Island, NY. Goodwin, who said she was available to go to New York for only 10 days, said that normally the Red Cross only will mobilize people who can devote three weeks to the effort. But the scope of the storm meant that all available trained people were sent, even if only for a week. Every Red Cross emergency-response vehicle from across the nation also was sent, including one stationed in Bremerton, but it still wasn’t enough, said Ryan Ollerman, 37, of Port Angeles. TURN TO SANDY/A4 14706106
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Red Cross volunteers Roger Drake, Don Flowers and Vince Costello, from left, are in Jersey City, N.J., last month to bring supplies to families affected by superstorm Sandy.
INSIDE TODAY’S PENINSULA DAILY NEWS 96th year, 297th issue — 2 sections, 18 pages
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