Bremerton City Councilwoman Carol Arends continues to recover at Stafford Healthcare at Belmont from a fall in late June in which she hurt her hip.
“It was not a break, but she bruised it pretty bad,” said Lori Smith, a legislative assistant to the council.
The last meeting that Arends, 80, attended was a June 20 city council business meeting. Since that time, Smith said her office has provided regular updates to Arends on council business and correspondence.
“We still continue to provide her with a weekly packet and she watches meetings when they are televised,” Smith said. “We visit her regularly to bring her mail and keep her posted on all of the issues.”
City Council President Jim McDonald said that Arends continues to receive excused absences for meetings she misses, something required by the city’s charter to avoid a vacancy of office after more than 30 days of not being present. McDonald also noted that Arends is anxious to get back to council meetings.
“We’ve been marking them down as excused absences,” McDonald said. “We do attendance at every meeting where we pass around attendance slips and have been marking Carol as excused.”
Smith said she visits with Arends regularly and they have recently started discussions about when Arends can indeed begin attending council sessions again.
“(The council) is in the middle of the Shoreline Master Program right now and budget books are going to be distributed October 10, so we were just talking about how that might be a good point to start attending the meetings again,” Smith said.
Smith also noted that Arends has participated in city council sub-committee meetings via teleconference, something that isn’t allowed for business sessions. In the meantime, Arends is continuing with physical therapy and getting stronger, Smith said.
Arends represents Bremerton City Council District 7 which includes 6th and 11th Street, as well as the Callow and Forest Ridge Park neighborhoods. She was first elected in 1998 and is in her fourth term through 2013. She was council president in 2000, 2002 and 2003.
Arends is the chair of the Audit Committee, vice-chair of the Public Works Committee. She also serves on the Executive Board, Transportation Policy Board, Operations Committee, and Nominating Committee for Puget Sound Regional Council. In addition, she is on the Transportation Policy Board for Kitsap Regional Coordinating Council (KRCC), the Cen-Com Policy Board and Bremerton Historic Ships Association Board of Directors.
