RECORD SOUTH WHIDBEY
INSIDE
Runaway victory ... See Sports, A8
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2013 | VOL. 89, NO. 73 | WWW.SOUTHWHIDBEYRECORD.COM | 75¢
Flying high
Craig Johnson photo
An osprey flies over Whidbey Island with a sole in its talons. Craig and Joy Johnson filmed several days’ worth of bird behavior around their neighborhood in Freeland over the past year in a 53-minute film, “Birds, Backyard Habitat and Beyond.”
Freeland filmmakers soar to new heights By BEN WATANABE South Whidbey Record
Seeing a yellow-rumped warbler chick waddle around like a wind-up toy is the highlight of a 53-minute movie on Whidbey Island’s birds for filmmaker and avid birder Craig Johnson. That one scene, mere seconds, is the culmination of an 18-month journey of collecting footage and editing clips for
Johnson and his wife, Joy Johnson, in the upcoming DVD “Birds, Backyard Habitat and Beyond.” A release party, hosted by the Whidbey Audubon Society, is set for 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 12 at the Coupeville Recreation Hall. “It’s been a long time,” said Craig Johnson, who amassed 40 gigabytes of footage, about 200 hours. “It’s been a big project
for Joy and I.” More than a year ago, the Freeland residents, authors of birding books “The Amazing Hummingbird Story of Red Rufous” and “Our Pacific Northwest Birds & Habitat,” set out to capture how birds of all sizes, from the miniature warbler SEE FILMMAKERS, A24
Ethics commission aims to settle conflicts of interest By BEN WATANABE South Whidbey Record
Record file
Langley City Councilman Hal Seligson is one of many city officials casting support behind a recently penned code of ethics.
On the heels of a mayor’s resignation, a specially-created Langley commission is close to finishing a 25-page code of ethics for the city. The Langley City Council received a brief update from the Ethics Commission’s facilitator, Mary Boyd, pastor of Langley United Methodist Church, last month and is set to have a workshop on the code in early October. The commission was created in the wake of former Mayor
Larry Kwarsick’s resignation after he was charged with falsifying a city document when he worked as city planner in 2011. The permit in question concerned a relative’s home. Kwarsick admitted to falsifying the document and received 15 days in Island County jail, which he served this past February. “One cannot avoid the fact that we did have a bit of a controversy last year, which I think was harmful to people’s faith in government,” said Councilman Hal Seligson, who assumed SEE ETHICS, A24