Everett Daily Herald, September 08, 2015

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The AquaSox and Dust Devils were tied 1-1 in the 13th at press time

Kamiak High graduate moves to Hollywood to pursue her acting dream B1

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Park closed for cleanup Everett’s popular Legion Memorial Park is completely shut down so crews can remove smelter-contaminated dirt. By Dan Catchpole and Noah Haglund Herald Writers

EVERETT — A popular north Everett park is closing for several months starting Tuesday while work crews clear contaminated dirt left behind by a

long-gone smelter. The south portion of American Legion Memorial Park shut down for cleanup earlier this summer and now the rest is set to go off-limits. That includes the picnic shelter, playground, restrooms, American Legion Hall and ballfields. Legion

Memorial Golf Course will stay open. The whole park at 145 Alverson Blvd. should reopen next spring, but the job won’t be complete. “We will need more funding to finish the work,” said Meg Bommarito, a project manager for the state Department of Ecology. The smelter was located near the intersection of Broadway and East Marine View Drive,

just downhill from where Legion Park is today. It only operated from 1894 until 1912. After it closed, homes gradually filled in most of the area. Arsenic-laden smoke particles had rained down on a one-square-mile area nearby. The worst of the contamination was near the former smelter site. See PARK, back page, this section

Everything for sale at auction Backer of bankrupt MicroGreen Polymers trying to recover losses

Justin Standish labels equipment with lot numbers for the now defunct MicroGreen Polymers in Arlington on Aug. 14.

Herald Writer

ARLINGTON — Justin Standish could barely move around the defunct factory in Arlington when he first stepped inside on another hot summer day. It was packed with industrial machines and spare parts, stacks of undelivered plastic cups, bags of raw plastic resin pellets, assorted shop tools, garbage and foam balls for toy guns. “There were a lot of Nerf balls and guns around,” he said. “I guess they had that startup mentality — play hard, work hard.” Standish had come to clean

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up the place, figure out what was there, price it and get it ready to sell at public auction later this month. The creditors of the defunct company, MicroGreen Polymers, had hired his company, the Brandford Group, to sell anything that could be sold. The goal was to wring out as many dollars as possible from the debris left in the wake of the greentech company’s sudden and dramatic crash earlier this year. MicroGreen Polymers had rapidly grown in recent years. To outsiders, it appeared poised to upend the food packaging industry. But while company leaders publicly talked about getting bigger, MicroGreen

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internally was in a downward spiral sped by poor cost control and a string of bridge loans with crushing interest rates. In short, everything was great — until it wasn’t. MicroGreen Polymers went bankrupt in April, putting more than 150 people out of work. The company’s primary financial backer, the Confederated Tribes of Grande Ronde in Oregon, had decided to cut its losses and foreclosed on MicroGreen’s secured debt. Foreclosing meant the tribes would never get back most of the tens of millions of dollars invested in the startup. So it is auctioning off everything that can be sold at

Ditching work Someone’s got a case of the Mondays: President Barack Obama signed an executive order Monday requiring federal contractors to offer employees up to seven paid sick days a year (Page A5). In a related move, Obama made a note in his personal calendar to call in sick on Dear Abby . . . B3 Good Life . . . . B1

MicroGreen’s former plant and warehouse in Arlington. That means everything — mop buckets, shop tools, industrial presses as tall as a two-story building, patents and trade secrets. The tribes don’t have the experience to stage such an auction so they hired a Connecticut company, the Brandford Group, which runs auctions around the world. The company runs 80 to 100 auctions a year, which have $50 million to $75 million in sales, according to Andy Duncan, vice president of business development for the Brandford Group.

the days he is scheduled to pardon the Thanksgiving turkey, meet with the New England Patriots in the Oval Office, and go golfing with John Boehner after the Speaker has already hit the country club cocktail lounge. Surfing the vast cultural wasteland: “The Late Show

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He was always there for kids Greg Gelderman, who was hit and killed while out for a ride, is belovedly remembered by his children and education colleagues. By Sharon Salyer Herald Writer

EVERETT — To his two children, Greg Gelderman was the dad who was always there for every sports meet and practice. His daughter, Suzanne Rivera, remembers him driving to Snohomish, standing on a hill and waving as she glided through the water as part of a crew with the Everett Rowing Association. “It’s not a thing parents come to watch — crew Greg practice,” she Gelderman said. “I don’t think I ever saw another parent there.” To his education colleagues, where he worked as a principal in the Everett and Mukilteo school districts for a total of 15 years, he is remembered as someone with a fiery commitment to serving each child and his ability to inspire teachers. “Every staff meeting was like a master class in teaching,” said Lynn Watson, a fourth-grade teacher who worked with him at Everett’s Cedar Wood Elementary School. “He made me a better teacher. It was an opportunity of a lifetime to work with someone like that.” Gelderman, 62, died Sept. 1 while on vacation with his family in Grant County. He was out for a morning bicycle ride near Mattawa when he was struck by a car. He died at the scene. The accident was blamed on the 38-year-old driver being temporarily blinded by the sun. A memorial service is scheduled for 11 a.m. Sept. 12 at Westgate Chapel, 22901 Edmonds Way in Edmonds. Gelderman was a principal at Mukilteo’s Horizon and Endeavor elementary schools from 1992 to 1999 and at Everett’s Cedar Wood Elementary School and Heatherwood Middle School from 1999 to 2007. He always was on the lookout to help kids whom he felt needed it the most, whether See ALWAYS, back page, this section

See AUCTION, Page A2

with Stephen Colbert” debuts at 11:30 tonight on CBS (The Clicker, Page B4). One of Colbert’s opening night guests is presidential candidate Jeb Bush. Judging from the treatment Bush has been getting lately from Donald Trump, it could turn out to be a Very Special Episode about the traumatic effects of bullying. Short Takes . . B4 Sports . . . . . . C1

Don’t know much about history: On this day in 1985, Pete Rose collected his 4,191st hit, tying Ty Cobb’s career record (Today in History, Page B4). Rose finished his career with 4,256 hits. The Buzz bets that record will stand for many years to come, and so does Pete.

— Mark Carlson, Herald staff

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