March for Meals Celebrates its Second Year

Whatcom/San Juan Senior Nutrition Program, a section of the Whatcom Council on Aging, is celebrating its second annual March for Meals campaign this month with 10 community events focused on spreading awareness and raising money for senior hunger.

The March for Meals campaign is part of the Meals on Wheels Association of America. The association “encourages programs at the local level to run their own campaign throughout the month of March,” Julie Meyers, Director of the Whatcom/San Juan Senior Nutrition Program said.

Meyers is almost in her third year working for the program and is excited about the success of the events so far. “We’re just trying to get the word out so people can use our services and we can continue to grow our services,” Meyers said.

The events are open to the public and participants are encouraged to give what they can to the campaign. All of the funds raised will be put toward the program to bring meals to seniors.

According to an Nhanes study about food security, one in six seniors nationwide are at risk for hunger, Meyers said. In Bellingham, 80% of the Meals on Wheels clients self-reported that they have either low or extremely low income according to local standards and 75% of those are at high nutritional risk, according to the dietician who does an in-home assessment of every client who signs up for Meals on Wheels in Bellingham.

“We want to make sure people know that we’re part of a nonprofit,” Meyers said. “We receive less than 40% of our funds from the federal government, so all of our meals are donation based. We’re out there fundraising for a good third or more of our expenses.”

Meyers works with the Bellingham Senior Activity Center to coordinate events, one of which was “Lunch with Mayor Kelli Linville” held on Fri. March 14 at the center. Mayor Linville helped serve food to the seniors at the center and spread awareness of the need for funds.

“When I was a legislator, I always supported the Meals on Wheels program because it’s so important for elderly to get good nutrition and sometimes we forget about that,” said Linville.

Linville was able to work with the city to provide $60,000 in emergency funds for Meals on Wheels during this next year so that “people can still get the food they need conveniently and well prepared,” Linville said.

“So it’s just social services in our city,” Linville said. We get a lot of really good programs, and this is one of them, and so I’m happy to support them.

Linville plays a large part in bringing awareness to the campaign as well as Meyers, whose involvement goes beyond her duties as Director of the program.

“My role is more administrative right now because I coordinate the programs, but my background in clinical nutrition allows me to really understand the importance of nutrition in maintaining the health and independence of seniors.” Meyers said.

The Whatcom/San Juan Senior Nutrition Program serves meals to nine of the senior centers in Whatcom County and three of the local high rises in town, Meyers said. Meals are prepared mostly by volunteers who make up around 80 percent of the staff. Last year Meals on Wheels served 61,800 meals in Whatcom and San Juan counties with 34,000 of those meals served to 180 people in Bellingham, Meyers said.

“It’s fun,” Meyers said. “I enjoy meeting lots of people and knowing that we’re really serving a population in need.”

The campaign has brought attention to senior hunger in the community and other companies in Bellingham have joined with the program. The local Subaru dealership donated money toward sandwiches for the St. Patty’s Day Breakfast and Parade on Saturday March 15 in Bellingham.

“They’ve stepped up and really become a huge supporter,” Meyers said. “They’ve really been helping us out. All this awareness building helps us build community partners too.”

Joan Fortune, a member of the Northwest Senior Services Board, was present at the lunch with the mayor at the Bellingham Senior Activity Center and is satisfied with how the program has helped the community.

“We’re serving many men; many men who don’t cook or cook a hot meal,” Fortune said. “And this is their main meal of the day for many of them. We have many men who age and find their socialization as well as their nutrition here. “This is their social center. This is the activity that draws them.”

At the Bellingham Senior Activity Center, lunch is served from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. every Monday through Friday. One meal ticket is $5 for adults over 60, $6 for adults under 60, and pay-by-donation for low income seniors or people who cannot afford to pay every time.

The Sumas Senior Center is hosting the next event, a community dinner, on Wednesday March 19 at 5:54 p.m. For information on how to support the campaign or participate in the remaining March for Meals events, visit http://wccoa.org/index.php/Nutrition/.

City Curbs Collisions with Plan for Alabama Street Remodel

Both city officials and residents of Alabama Hill and surrounding neighborhoods brought their concerns to the second open house meeting at Roosevelt Elementary for the Alabama Corridor Project on March 5. Bellingham’s Transportation Planner, Chris Comeau, presented the plan that proposed many changes to Alabama Street including the addition of “C-curbs,” which did not sit well with residents.

The main idea behind the project is to address safety. Alabama Street is second on the list of streets with most collisions with Guide-Meridian taking the number one spot, Comeau said. Over a 6-year period, Alabama has had 93 collisions with known or possible injuries making it a priority for the city, Comeau said.

C-curbs are the city’s term for small curbs in the road that block cars from making left turns across opposite lanes of traffic. These types of turns are the main cause of the collisions on Alabama Street, Comeau said.

Pinky Vargas, a City Council Member, lives at the east end of Alabama Street and wants the city to consider traffic as much as they do the safety of the road.

“I drive Alabama Street at least twice a day,” Vargas said. “I understand C-curbs are for a safety issue, but sometimes we need to look at the flow of traffic and make sure that is considered.”

The plan would include a C-curb from Superior Street to Yew Street and another curb from Yew Street to Woburn Street. There will be a few more C-curbs added further down Alabama toward Cornwall Avenue. There is already an existing C-curb median at the intersection of Alabama and James Streets, which the planners are using as a model to improve the safety of Alabama.

“You can’t solve one problem and cause another,” Vargas said. “I think that when we look at things like designing our streets, we have to look at it more holistically, not just the one element. What’s the flow of traffic? Where are people walking? How do we make it safer but also keep people moving? I think they have to be overlayed with each other, not just one.

Alabama Hill Association’s Chair Dean Haskins, also a long time resident of Alabama Hill, was not sure about the addition of C-curbs. The curbs would only cause people to make illegal u-turns farther up the road instead of driving around the block, Haskins said.

Bellingham’s Fire Training Director Chief, Brad Bannerman, worked with the city as the plan was being developed to make sure emergency response vehicles would not be blocked by any road changes. The city was originally talking about adding a center divide much higher than a curb, but Chief Bannerman made it clear that center divides would not be safe. C-curbs are much easier for the emergency vehicles to cross.

“They are designed for us to drive over,” Bannerman said. “Our fire and ambulances will easily get over them.”

The fire department is required to meet national response times, but the C-curbs will not be a problem.

“In a CPR call or an instance when someone needs life support or a structure fire or we need to get people in there right away, it’s a big deal,” Bannerman said. “A minute makes a huge difference.

For more information on the plan, there will be a city council public hearing on April 7.

City to Improve Bloedel Donovan Park

       Bellingham’s Department of Parks and Recreation has plans to develop Bloedel Donovan Park off Electric Avenue in the Silver Beach neighborhood as early as this fall. The plan will fix the high level of phosphorus runoff, remove the eroded retaining wall and create a boathouse for storage space.

       Alabama Hill residents can look forward to a beach area modeled after the recent renovations to Boulevard Park and a cleaner park overall, said James King, Director of Parks and Recreation.

The park plan is currently still in the design process and permitting needs to be approved, but so far the plan is on schedule. The start time also depends on the level of the water, which will decrease in the fall and allow for construction to commence, said King.

       Originally a lumber mill and industrial site, the park was donated to the city in 1946 to be used and developed solely as a public park. According to the city of Bellingham’s website, $812,000 will be invested in the project from various grants including the City of Bellingham Water Fund, the Department of Ecology Statewide Stormwater Grant Program, the Washington State Recreation and Conservation Office Aquatic Land Enhancement Account Grant and the Whatcom Rowing Association.

       The first project will take out the retaining wall that has been eroding over the years from the force of the water and replace it with a pebble and gravel shore. 

       “It’s become dangerous, and we need to do something there,” said King.

       The second of the three projects will tackle the high level of phosphorous runoff going into the lake. In order to reduce the contamination, the city is going to build a sand-filled trench to filter waste through the sand into the groundwater and not directly into the drinking water. The trench will run along the beach area and the lower area in between the volleyball courts where runoff often collects, said King.

       The last project, proposed by the Whatcom Rowing Association, is the construction of a boathouse that will be built on the concrete slab near the volleyball courts. The boathouse will be used for storage of boats and other amenities for park-goers to use.

       Some residents are opposed the the private use of a public space for the boathouse, but the Rowing Association is open to the public, said King. Others are also worried that there won’t be enough usable park space.

       “We don’t have enough park space as it is,” said King. “This project will not reduce the amount of park space.

       Richard Maneval, 60, the newly elected Vice President chair member of the Alabama Hill Association, local volunteer and resident of Bellingham, is glad the plan is proceeding.

       “It’s really great we updated the plan,” said Maneval. “We need to do more in the watershed.”

       The city of Bellingham has made many improvements to the park in the past and these upcoming changes will be another improvement. Bloedel Donovan is a recreational park and was originally meant to be for recreation, said Maneval, who hopes this will remain as the purpose of the park.

       “These types of projects aren’t about bringing more people to the park,” said King. “It’s about doing the right thing environmentally.” 

New Leadership For Roosevelt Elementary

Tom Gresham, 38, never wanted to be a teacher, let alone a principal. It was the farthest thing from his mind. As a student, he jumped from major to major studying subjects such as outdoor recreation, business, computer science, spanish, and geology. It was the suggestion from his wife to volunteer at an after school program at Alderwood Elementary School that made him realize how much he enjoyed education.

“I was with the student, and he said he was going to miss me,” said Gresham. “And the fact that there was this relationship there that he valued and I valued, that is when I decided, ‘that matters,’ so that’s why I decided to go into education. I wanted to do something that mattered in other people’s lives.”

Now in his first year as Roosevelt Elementary’s principal, Gresham, originally from Cheney, Wash., is leading the school with experience from his previous role as principal at Columbia Elementary and a plan to keep the school progressing in arts education.

“I love this school,” said Gresham. “Just because it has some diversity across the school, and we have an amazing staff. A staff that is so dedicated that works well with each other, and has a real strong collective ownership of all the students. I inherited this great gift, that I get to take over in a sense and try to see if we can get even better.”

Gresham began his work in education at Parkview Elementary while working on his masters degree in educational administration. He worked his way up from a teacher in Bellingham, to an assistant principal in Spokane and finally to a principal at Columbia Elementary where he spent the last two years. He wasn’t planning on leaving his job at Columbia because of the short amount of time he had been there, said Gresham.

“I remember when he said that he was going to be leaving I remember thinking, ‘I wouldn’t want to be the person to follow him’ because he is just a great leader and a great man, and people just loved him,” said Gresham.

Gresham said his main challenge as the new principal was adjusting to how the school worked and getting to know the staff, students and parents. Like any new job, it was just a matter of learning the ropes.

Season Coppinger, the second grade teacher at Roosevelt, has been working there for 13 years, and welcomes the new addition to the staff.

“It has been a very smooth transition,” said Coppinger. “We are very happy with this choice because there are so many similarities between our previous principal and our new principal. Both are easy-going, funny, and have a calming manner.”

Alabama Hill neighborhood resident Brittany Marquis, whose son attends Roosevelt, said the change in leadership has not affected the school. It is still a mix of “high standards” and an “easy-going” atmosphere.

“I have personally met him and he seems like an outstanding man,” said Marquis. “He’s always with a smile and cheerful greeting. He asks how you’re doing and likes to personally get to know everyone. I think he is a wonderful addition to the school.”

Just in the first five months at Roosevelt, Gresham already has plans to continue the focus on visual arts, music, drama and possibly a new emphasis on the integration of dance into physical education. Gresham also wants to improve teaching techniques by employing “instructional rounds” similar to what doctors use to watch each other practice medicine. Teachers each have their own individual techniques and by sitting in on classes and discussing the different styles of teaching, they can improve their styles of teaching, said Gresham.

Another current project is Playworks, a philosophy and structured program for recess. The main idea of Playworks is inclusiveness and provides support for children on the playground. It designates specific areas of the playground for different activities and includes new games for the children to learn and be involved in together.

As a father of two 9-year-old twins and a 6-year-old, Gresham keeps busy but enjoys working with the students.

“The best part of my job is going into classrooms and getting to see what kids are working on, what kids are learning and getting to watch them have that moment where it clicks and you can see that light bulb come on,” said Gresham. “A lot of times when I come into a classroom, kids will want to show me different things they’re working on, and I love seeing that sense of ‘I can do this,’ that sense of achievement, that they feel empowered and they know ‘I can do this’."

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Alabama Hill News is a sited devoted to providing the news to Alabama Hill residents in Bellingham, Wash. Residents are welcome to share ideas on current events or things happening in the area as well as comment on story posts.