Reporter Central Kitsap
Turning 100 WSU Extension Service makes a milestone Page 8
FRIDAY, JUNE 6, 2014 | Vol. 29, No. 35 | WWW.CENTRALKITSAPREPORTER.COM | 50¢
Students add new colors to nature
BY SERAINE PAGE SPAGE@SOUNDPUBLISHING.COM
A mural of the space needle — with a 12th Man flag flying high — snow-capped mountains and spawning salmon are now part of nature’s landscape on Shadow Glen Boulevard bridge. As a final year-end salute to the salmon they’d been studying, Clear Creek Elementary students painted the side of the bridge — that replaced a culvert last fall-as a tribute to the beloved fish they studied all year long. On May 29 and 30, Barbara Bromley’s fourth grade students — who also released salmon into the creek earlier this year--spent time working on the mural in small groups. “I’ve never painted this much,” said Ainara Singleton, 10. “It’s fun. I usually paint at home. This (mural) is something I love painting. It’s not like being a famous painter, but I get to do something fun.” Looking down at the paint tarp atop a small wooden bridge that covered the trickling stream, Singleton noted that she and her classmates would be extra careful not to harm the salmon environment. “You’re in a natural habitat,” she said. “(If we drop paint) it will kill macroinvertebrates and then what will the salmon eat?”
Hospital strike is looming BY KEVAN MOORE KMOORE@SOUNDPUBLISHING.COM
Seraine Page/staff photo
Clear Creek Elementary fourth graders paint a mural on a Shadow Glen Boulevard bridge. The students have studied the creek and its environment throughout the school year. Pat Kirschbaum of Kitsap County public works, was on hand to encourage students and to also show them some macroinvertebrates she found nearby under rocks. The public works department
provided the paint for the project, the first of its kind in the county. “It gives them some stewardship. We talked about why all this is down here to protect the creek,” she said of discussions about the bridge
area. Only one side of the bridge will be painted since the neighbors facing it were agreeable to the new artwork. “It’s cool. It’s better than
Harrison Medical Center’s 800 or so professional and technical workers that belong to UFCW 21 will hold a strike authorization vote on Tuesday, June 10. “The key to winning a fair contract is our unity and resolve,” states a flier announcing the upcoming vote. “We are holding this strike authorization vote so we can have as much strength as possible when we resume negotiations on June 17 and 18. While striking is a last resort, your Bargaining Team needs this authorization to change Management’s offer and come back with a contract we can all be proud of.” The union and Harrison have been in negotiations on a new contract since last summer and workers have overwhelmingly rejected previous contract offers from management. Jacquie Goodwill, Harrison’s director of marketing and communication, says hospital leaders are committed to negotiating in good faith to reach a fair settlement. “We understand that this is a
SEE MURAL, A9
SEE STRIKE, A9
Residents weigh in on proposed sign code BY KEVAN MOORE KMOORE@SOUNDPUBLISHING.COM
Kitsap County Planning Commissioners got a earful Tuesday during a public hearing on a proposed new sign code for unincorporated areas of the county. Some residents said they found it limits free speech, while others said the current code is confusing. The county’s sign code has been in place since 1998 and the department of community development, the planning commission and others have been working for more than a year to update it. The draft sign code is designed to foster economic
development by providing predictability while preserving high levels of visual quality of Kitsap County, according to Larry Keeton, director of the department of community development. “Our goal is to adopt a user-friendly sign code recognizing the preferences of Kitsap County residents and businesses,” he said. Randy Hanson, from the Hanson Sign Company in Silverdale, was one of several people who testified at Tuesday’s public hearing. He said his family has been in the sign-making business since 1937 and his company has more trouble getting permits in Kitsap County than
anywhere else. “We have a code that is not workable,” Hanson said. “It’s not enforceable. It’s not understandable. It wastes a lot of your county staff time trying to figure out what is allowed for a sign in the community.” Hanson said the current code makes it nearly impossible to tell customers what kind of sign they can have at a given location in the county and the rules often “get made up from site to site.” Hanson said he can get permits over the counter in other counties, but in Kitsap it can take three weeks or more. Teresa Osinski, the exec-
utive vice president of the Homebuilders of Kitsap County, also spoke about the inadequacies of the current code. “The current code makes it very difficult for someone who wants to follow the rules to know what they are and be successful in getting their sign,” Osinski said. “And (the code) makes it easy for those that want to violate those rules to get around it because the county really has a tough time enforcing it.” Old Town Silverdale resident Joyce Merkel said the proposed sign code update was developed by, and for, business interests at the expense of residents.
“I see nothing wrong with the current ordinance we have, other than the fact that (the department of community development) has refused to enforce it,” she said. Tracyton resident Ron Gillespie also talked about a lack of sign code enforcement, with the electronic sign in front of Klahowya Secondary School serving as a prime example. “If we can’t get one high school to comply with the code regulation and electronic signage regulations what are we going to do when we get every business competing to get people in and trying to push the enve-
lope every step of the way?” he asked. “The result is that we’re going to have business after business trying to get cuter than the next business with imaging and messaging. The result is that we’re going to be constantly violating the code.” Henning Larsen, vice chair of the Kitsap County Democrat Central Committee, was one of several speakers to raise concerns about proposed SEE SIGN CODE, A9