WASHOUGAL — There must be more to life than designing printers, Dave Pinkernell decided. He took an early retirement buyout from Hewlett-Packard after 32 years and started considering what’s truly most important to him: the well-being of local children and the whole east county community.
Pinkernell quickly fell victim to the same hazard that snags many eager and good-hearted volunteers: The board he’d gotten onto started looking for a new president, and Pinkernell’s hand was the only one that went up.
That board guides the Camas-Washougal Community Chest, an umbrella charity that does a lot with too little, said its now-President Pinkernell. The homegrown nonprofit agency’s mission is to fund grant requests from other nonprofits in Camas and Washougal, and Pinkernell is determined to raise its profile and its income, so it can increase the amount it distributes in grants every year.
The Community Chest this month announced 15 grants to 14 local organizations totalling just over $69,000. Those grants are estimated to ultimately touch as many as 15,000 people. But $69,000 is a big decline over previous years. In 2014, the Community Chest distributed nearly $83,000 in grants. Pinkernell said he’s not exactly sure why individual and corporate charitable donations in east county have slumped even while the economy is improving. East county’s need for charity certainly keeps growing regardless, he said.
The combined population of Camas and Washougal is approximately 36,000, according to the state of Washington, and according to the U.S. Census Bureau, just under 12 percent of Washougal’s population and exactly 6 percent of Camas’ population live below the poverty line. Those figures don’t include the nearby populations outside those cities’ boundaries. According to the Office of Public Instruction, 21 percent of students in the Camas school district and 40 percent in the Washougal school district qualify for free or reduced-price school lunches.
“The economy may be growing, but there is a lot of hidden need in Camas and Washougal,” Pinkernell said. “We’re a little alarmed that we fell short this year.”
The proposal by Tesoro Corp. and Savage Companies to build an oil transfer terminal in Vancouver has commanded a lot of attention, and for good reason — if built, it would be the largest facility of its kind in the United States.
But the plan continues to overshadow a smaller proposal that’s approaching a key decision point this spring. The fate of that project now largely rests in the hands of one person at Vancouver City Hall.
Senior Planner Jon Wagner doesn’t take that responsibility lightly.
“You’re making a decision that’s going to impact a lot of people,” Wagner said. “You want it to be the right decision, and a lot of times things aren’t black and white. … It’s difficult.”
NuStar Energy L.P. wants to convert its existing facility at the Port of Vancouver to handle about 22,000 barrels of crude oil per day. The site would receive oil by rail, store it temporarily, then transfer it to marine vessels on the Columbia River.
The Tesoro-Savage plan would put a separate oil-by-rail facility at the Port of Vancouver. But that project would handle an eye-catching 360,000 barrels of crude per day, or about four full unit trains. (Two to three oil trains already roll through Clark County and Vancouver daily en route to other facilities.)
As it pursues its own plan, NuStar received permits from the Southwest Clean Air Agency last year. The company is now asking the city for its approval to convert and expand its facility. NuStar has handled methanol, jet fuel, antifreeze and other products in Vancouver before, but not crude oil.
The city could simply say yes to the plan, approve it with conditions, reject it or ask for a more detailed environmental review, Wagner said. That decision will happen in early April, he said, and will be based on information learned in the coming weeks — not one person’s thoughts.
Launches at the Kaiser Shipyard were some of Vancouver’s biggest events during World War II. But when the first vessel was launched in 1942, journalist Leverett Richards was not among the crowd along the north bank of the Columbia River; he was above it.
The Oregonian reporter was in a plane over the river, taking aerial photographs of the event. Richards was piloting the plane, by the way, when he snapped those photos.
“He leaned out the window” to take them, historian Mary Rose said.
Two of the photographs taken by the longtime Vancouver resident on that launch day in 1942 are part of an exhibit that opened recently at the Fort Vancouver National Historic Site.
“News Aloft” shows how aviation influenced Richards during a reporting career that touched seven decades. Richards died in 2000 at age 92.
“The idea is to show how aviation and aerial photography broadened the news,” Rose said.
With Richards’ aerial photos of the Cascades, “People who lived here all their lives saw mountains from above,” Rose said.
The interpretive panels are on public display at the office of Confluence, in the historic Pearson Headquarters Building just west of the Pearson Air Museum.
Daniel Barich, 18, made a 3-point shot for Fort Vancouver High School’s Special Olympics Unified basketball team. His mom, Trish Smith, captured it on video on her smartphone.
The game was like any other basketball game with artful 3-pointers and plenty of high-fives.
Yet, it was different. More heartfelt. An athlete who made a basket stopped to hug the referee. Players passed the ball and made sure everyone got a shot.
Saturday’s basketball tournament at Fort Vancouver High marked the debut of Special Olympics Unified Sports in Clark County. Teams from Fort, Hudson’s Bay and Skyview high schools played two Unified teams from Puyallup.
Although Special Olympics has been active in Clark County for some time, its Unified Sports program is new. Unified teams combine an approximately equal number of Special Olympics athletes and their partners, who are other students without intellectual disabilities. Males and females play on the same team. Each team played three Special Olympics athletes and two partners.
Before each 20-minute game, the Fort Vancouver High School pep band played Queen’s “We Will Rock You” in the darkened gym. The athletes’ names were called, and a spotlight focused on the players as they ran through a line of screaming cheerleaders.
“We treat these athletes like any other team,” said Mick Hoffman, director of safety, security and athletics at Vancouver Public Schools. “We like this to be as authentic as any other sporting event. It’s not about who wins or loses, but it is competitive. We do keep score.”
More traffic signals in the city of Vancouver are being updated with flashing yellow left-turn arrows, according to the Department of Public Works.
The work at 16 intersections began Friday and will take about a month to complete, according to a news release.
Instead of the typical green ball with a “Left Turn Yield on Green” sign, the new signal head will show a flashing yellow arrow to indicate left-turning traffic may proceed after first yielding to oncoming traffic.
Some intersections in Vancouver are already equipped with these flashing yellow left-turn arrow signals, which are becoming more widely used throughout the country.
Work to convert the traffic lights will take place mostly between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. While the signals are being reprogrammed, signals will either be turned off or blink red in all direction. Flaggers will be in place to direct traffic. Some lane closures are possible. Each signal should take a day or less to convert.
