OLYMPIA–More than 750 scientists, salmon recovery experts and interested citizens from Washington and Oregon will meet in Tacoma next week for the seventh biennial Salmon Recovery Conference, marking the 20th anniversary of the Salmon Recovery Act.

“By bringing together our state’s field biologists, engineers and policymakers, we’re providing a forum for information sharing and networking that’s critical to finding solutions to some of the big problems facing salmon recovery,” said Kaleen Cottingham, director of the Recreation and Conservation Office, home to the Salmon Recovery Funding Board. “It’s going to take innovation and collaboration to build up salmon to sustainable levels so they can support our environment, our economy and those who rely on them, including our beloved southern resident orca whales.”

“Recovering salmon is perhaps the single most important conservation issue in Washington,” said Kelly Susewind, director of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. “The plight of the southern resident orca has highlighted the key role that salmon play in the environment, and it’s encouraging to see so many partners coming to the table with new energy and greater determination. There’s a lot that this agency and others can do to support salmon recovery, and we’re actively participating to ensure that our expertise and willingness to collaborate is helping to turn the dial in a positive direction.” Continue Reading

Mark your calendars! WSF and local Ferry Advisory Committees are hosting nine upcoming community meetings! Come learn about the future of ferries, proposed changes to fares, and local projects on your route.

• Kingston: Monday, April 29, 6 p.m., Kingston Village Green Community Center, 26159 Dulay Road NE, Kingston
• Coupeville: Wednesday, May 1, 6 p.m., Island County Commissioner’s Hearing Room 1, NE 7th St, Coupeville
• Bremerton: Wednesday, May 8, 5:30 p.m., Kitsap Conference Center, 100 Washington Avenue, Bremerton
• Bainbridge Island: Thursday, May 9, 6 p.m., Bainbridge Island Senior Center, 370 Brien Drive SE, Bainbridge Island
• Anacortes: Tuesday, May 14, 4 p.m., City Hall Municipal Building, 904 6th St, Anacortes
• San Juan Islands: Wednesday, May 15, 5 p.m., Orcas Senior Center, 62 Henry Road, Eastsound
• Southworth: Tuesday, May 21, 6 p.m., Harper Church, 10384 SE Sedgwick Road, Port Orchard
• Mukilteo: Thursday, May 23. Mukilteo Multimodal Terminal Project open house 5 – 6 p.m., WSF Community Meeting 6 p.m. Rosehill Community Center, 304 Lincoln Ave, Mukilteo
• Vashon Island: Thursday, May 30, 7 p.m., Vashon Island High School, 9600 SW 204th Street, Vashon

For more information go to: http://bit.ly/WSF2019CommunityMeetings

San Juan Island National Historical Park announces that it is accepting applications for the 2019 Teacher Ranger Teacher (TRT) program. Teacher Ranger Teacher is a professional development opportunity for K-12 teachers to spend the summer acquiring new skills in experiential learning through a program provided by a partnership between the National Park Service (NPS) and the University of Colorado-Denver (CUD). Graduate credit, and a $3,000 stipend will be awarded for successful completion of the project.

The participant will spend between four and six weeks in San Juan Island National Historical Park developing a major educational project and participating in an online graduate course from CU-Denver. This year’s project focuses on the women’s suffrage movement, and passage of the 19^th Amendment to the US Constitution. Continue Reading

Safe San Juans wants to remind you of this event coming up this weekend…

Join us on April 6th for the SAFE San Juans’ third annual Safe on the Rocks 5k. This is in honor of April being Sexual Assault Awareness Month. This well-lit fun run and walk will feature glow sticks, glow paint and a post-race event with music, snacks, and more. SAFE on the Rocks will have something fun for everyone. 

The race starts at 7:45 p.m. at the San Juan County Fairgrounds, while the race staging starts at 7 p.m. All racers will receive a swag bag, with a headlamp, which is required to wear, completion prize and other cool giveaways. Walkers are welcome. Day-of-registration is $15 for adults and $10 for Youth.

ORCAS RACE DATE- APRIL 13th

LOPEZ RACE DATE- APRIL 20th

For more information, contact the San Juan Island SAFE San Juans office at 360-378-8680 and register safesj.org

Tim Dustrude photo

San Juan Islands’ Firefighter Association Hosts Annual Jackson Beach Easter Egg Hunt

The San Juan Islands’ Firefighter Association will again host the annual Jackson Beach Easter Egg Hunt on Easter Sunday, April 21 at 1:00 p.m.

The egg hunt is free but we are seeking donations to the San Juan Island Food Bank (money or food donations gratefully accepted). This annual family fun tradition is more than 25 years old and hosted by the San Juan Island Firefighters’ Association.

More than 1500 eggs will be cooked, dyed and hidden on Jackson Beach. Children will hunt for eggs in four different groups organized by age. Children will hunt for dyed eggs as well as plastic eggs that have coupons for prizes (limit 2 per child). There will also be a special “Golden Egg” with a coupon for a fire prevention prize (one per group). Continue Reading

Minnie Knych at the Career Center shares the following with you…

Attention Parents: Put Your Teens To Work This Summer!

Employment statistics show that fewer teens are spending summers waiting tables, swinging hammers mowing lawns. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that teen labor force participation overall has been on a long-term downward trend, and the decline is expected to continue. Reasons are varied: teens today spend more time in sports and summer camp activities, travel and visiting with friends or family.

Forty years ago, nearly fifty-eight percent of teens had summer jobs and many worked part time during the school year. In 2006, the rate was forty-four percent working during the summer.   A recent study by researchers at Drexel University Center for Labor Markets and Policy in Philadelphia showed that only about thirty percent of all teens will have a summer job in 2019. Continue Reading

Spring Street International School Presents: The Field Project
Directed by Krista Strutz

The Field Project consists of a play and a comedy sketch:

The Wolves and Who’s on First?

The Wolves, by Sarah Delappe: Left quad. Right quad. Lunge. A girls indoor soccer team warms up. From the safety of their suburban stretch circle, the team navigates big questions and wages tiny battles with all the vim and vigor of a pack of adolescent warriors. A portrait of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for nine American girls who just want to score some goals.

Who’s on First? is a comedy routine made famous by Abbott and Costello. The premise of the sketch is that Abbott is identifying the players on a baseball team for Costello, but their names and nicknames can be interpreted as non-responsive answers to Costello’s questions. For example, the first baseman is named “Who”; thus, the utterance “Who’s on first” is ambiguous between the question (“Which person is the first baseman?”) and the answer (“The name of the first baseman is ‘Who'”).

Thursday-Saturday, April 18-20, 7:30 pm & Sunday, April 21, 2:00 pm

Tickets: $10 Adults $5 Students

Buy Tickets Now

Congratulations to the 28 community members who completed 60 hours of classroom and online training on vegetable and fruit gardening, use of native plants, forestry, ornamentals and landscape gardening, composting, plant problem diagnosis, pest control and integrated pest management, soils and more to become WSU Master Gardener Interns. As Interns, volunteers contribute 50 hours of service to the community, in many gardening and horticulture-related activities.

After a year of internship, they become certified WSU Master Gardeners.

Welcome to our following new interns:

• Orcas Island: Emmett Woods, Karen Meng, Lene Symes, Michael Boero, Robert Love, Valerie Woodruff
• San Juan Island: Beth Larson, Cammille Layton, Carol Kibble, Cathy Larson, Cristin Felso, Debbie Warren, Diana Warner, Dianne Moeller, Elaine Frazel, Hillary Eggers, John Lueders, Karen Breedlove, Kat Rose, Linda Dunaway, Lindsey Holloway, Liz Smith, Nancy Campisano, Nancy Detterbeck, Sandra Wilson, Shannon Kelley, Steven Larson, and Teresa Smith

These interns join the 65+ current San Juan County WSU Master Gardeners, who serve their communities through horticultural education and outreach. Master Gardeners are involved in the following: Continue Reading

FHHS band at WWU Performing Arts Center – Contributed photo

Friday Harbor High School’s Band students earned three superior ratings at the San Juan Music Educator Association Large Group Band Festival at Western Washington University on March 28, 2019.

Sixty high school students from the school’s Jazz band, the “Zero hour” band, and the Concert band classes traveled to Bellingham for one of the two days of the festival. This annual regional festival includes schools from Mount Vernon to the Canadian border.

The San Juan Music Educators Association is located in the Northwest Puget Sound region. According to their website, “Music is an important part to the students in and out of our classrooms, and we advocate for support of music in our schools.”

There were close to 30 Bands that participated. A superior rating is the highest rating bestowed upon a band for performance.  

Cart Nelsen, FHHS Band Director, exclaimed “It was a full and busy day, listening to several groups, even an all-girl Soshin School from Yokohama, Japan. Our students’ effort was outstanding. It was a great day!”

Melodious Notes – Contributed photo

Classical delights are headed your way this Saturday, April 6, at 7:30 pm with Melodious Notes Over the Harbor at San Juan Community Theatre!

This will be a lovely chamber concert and will include the favorite “Moonlight Sonata” by Beethoven, played by Kay Zavislak, part of the Chopin “Cello Sonata” with Sasha Von Dassow, and part of the Hummel “Bassoon Concerto” with Pat Nelson. There is a delightful trio by Auric for flute, clarinet, and bassoon.

Our island composers have given us “Desert Thoughts” by Alex Shapiro, with lovely pictures, and Richard Hieronymus has a fun piece titled “Night Rain Over Hilo”.

We are very happy to have the following musicians playing in in this performance of ensemble pieces: Elizabeth Schaltenbrand, piano; Kay Zavislak, piano; Kim Breilein, flute; Sue Collado, clarinet; Pat Nelson, bassoon; Hannekke Klein Robbenhaar, violin and viola; and Sasha von Dassow, cello.

Tickets: $20 Adults; $10 Student Reserved; $5 Student RUSH at door only

The Town of Friday Harbor will celebrate its second annual Arbor Day this Thursday, April 4, 2019. The public is invited to join in recognizing the event.

Mayor Ghatan will be issuing a proclamation for Arbor Day during the Town Council meeting and the Parks Department will plant an Easter Red Bud on Argyle Avenue near the SJC Fairgrounds immediately following.

Everyone is encouraged to support efforts to plant, care and protect our woodlands and to consider planting their own rain gardens using native trees and plants.

Congressman Rick Larsen will visit the opening of A War Never Ends presented by the San Juan County Vietnam veterans and American Legions at the San Juan Islands Museum of Art (SJIMA).

Following the exhibition tour on Saturday, April 6 at 3:15 pm, Larsen will talk informally with veterans, their families and visitors.

The images and writings in this exhibition exemplify all the photographs taken by armed amateurs during the Vietnam War. These are personal artifacts that provide literal snapshots of their transient time and experiences and serve as complicated emotional mementos.

Congressman Larsen has served on the House Armed Services Committee since 2001. He states, “The Committee has oversight of the Department of Defense (DOD) and is tasked with providing our women and men in the military the resources they need to keep our nation safe.”

He also serves on the Veterans caucus, National Defense University-Strategic Policy Forum, arts caucus and addiction, treatment and recovery caucus, as well as the Navy-Marine corps caucus, oceans and Puget Sound caucuses. Veterans make up about 10% of the population in the county, thus these are important issues to our region. Continue Reading

Yes! The beat goes on, with more hit songs from the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s. For two nights only, April 12 and 13 at 7:30 p.m., the San Juan Singers take the stage with The Chameleons, a favorite local rock band at San Juan Community Theatre.

The lineup will have you dancing in the aisles and singing along. Favorites like “We Will Rock You”; “Africa”; “Heartache Tonight”; “Landslide”; “Fly Like an Eagle”; and so many more.

The singers will be decked out in period-appropriate costumes and invite you to dig out your go-go boots, your shoulder pads, your disco duds and whatever you loved back then and wish you could wear again.

Tickets are $20 general admission and $10 students, available at the box office, online or from San Juan Singers members. Get yours early, these concerts will sell out.

Here’s an invitation for you from Richard and Sherri at San Juan Bistro (formerly San Juan Island Cheese)…

San Juan Bistro invites you to join us for a Trappist Ale Tasting on Wednesday, April 3^rd, from 5:00-7:00. Enjoy and learn about four Trappist ales and enjoy specially paired appetizers.

Why Trappist Ales?
Besides the tradition of taste and quality, it is a story near and dear to the hearts of owners Richard and Sherri Daly.
For the full story, please click here

What makes it a Trappist Ale?
Trappist Ale must be brewed by Trappist Monks or under their supervision in a Trappist Monastery. Revenue supports the monks and charitable causes.

We invite you to sample four of our favorite Trappist Ales.

Joining us will be Max Gilbertson from Dickerson Distributors to introduce these amazing Trappist Ales.

For details, please click here

Richard and Sherri hope you can join us!

Merri Ann Simonson is back with another San Juan Island Lifestyle video. This one shares winning the big pot in the St. Patrick’s Day San Juan Island Yacht Club sponsored derby…

San Juan County Public Hospital District No. 1 will be holding a Special Board Meeting jointly with San Juan County Fire Protection District No. 3 on April 2, 2019, 5:00 p.m., to be held at the Fire District offices located at 1011 Mullis Street.

The Town of Friday Harbor is also sending a representative. The purpose of this meeting will be to hear the final report of the Citizen’s Advisory Group. All members of the public are welcome, on a first come first served basis until room capacity is reached.

The Citizen’s Advisory Group webpage is http://sjcphd.org/meeting/citizens-advisory-group-cag and audio from this Board Meeting will be posted at http://sjcphd.org/meeting/meeting-minutes typically within 48 hours following the meeting.

Agenda is available at this link. The District reserves the right to update the Agenda up to 24 hours before the beginning of the meeting. Questions may be directed to our office or the Fire District.