Reader feedback

A little bit of this …

If I had a private museum and few wanted to utilize it, it would go bust – no matter how interesting and worthwhile to some.

The same goes for our Marine Science Center. It’s a lovely notion that a small area like this can’t support unless we squeeze cash out of unwilling taxpayers. I disagree with annexing to support this twice failed museum. We have a magnificent center in Seattle which can be frequented via school field trips.

When the city council announced we could “afford” a $16 million city hall, what exactly did they mean? If we can find $4 million more than a year ago, why can’t we supply the Port of Poulsbo with that money to replace the breakwall which you state is in “desperate need?”

LN Salsbury

Poulsbo

Harrison Medical Center

Letter writer was misunderstood

I’m writing in response to Ronine Riggins’ letter of Wednesday, Aug. 20 where she apparently thinks I don’t believe people should have convenient cancer treatment. I questioned whether the mayor and Poulsbo city council should be able to sell the city-owned 10th Avenue property to the first interested buyer, Harrison Hospital, without making a thorough search of potential buyers.

I applaud anyone who gets treatment and beats cancer, including our governor, Christine Gregoire. The monies used to purchase the 10th Avenue property by the city of Poulsbo are the taxpayers’ dollars.

If Harrison Hospital wants property for a cancer treatment center, then why not let them buy it at fair market value on the open market.

The 10th Avenue property has wetlands that came to light when a new city hall was proposed, making development there very questionable.

The Olhava development is a much better choice for the kind of facility that Harrison Hospital is proposing.

I applaud Ronine Riggins for her devotion to her fellow human beings with her volunteer work. I spend a great deal of my time doing things on a volunteer basis for my fellow human beings.

My point is that the mayor and city council shouldn’t engage in a sweetheart deal of convenience and sell the 10th Avenue property to Harrison Hospital or any potential buyer unless the citizens’ tax dollars that went to purchase the property in the first place are receiving full and fair value, open-market value, for the property.

Because the new Poulsbo City Hall construction is experiencing cost over-runs and financial miscalculations, that is no reason to abandon responsible financial stewardship, denying the common good of Poulsbo’s citizens full value for their tax-invested dollars.

John Eastman

Poulsbo

Bikes for Education

Island, Poulsbo met the challenge

In 2006 we shipped our first container of nearly 300 bikes to Togo, West Africa. We distributed them to 14 villages in the northern region near Sokede. Bicycles For Education has continued to collect bikes on Bainbridge, Olympia, and Seattle. In July, three containers with more than 1,200 were shipped to Togo for arrival this September.

We would not have been so successful without the help and support of the Bainbridge community.

We would like to thank many of those who supported us in so many ways, including: Reliable Storage and their manager, Curt Bondurant, who has generously given us two units for the past three years; Safeway and store manager Duane Vickery, who allowed us to do a bike drive in their parking lot, where we collected over 75 bikes in four hours; Brenda Prowse and Hugh Nelson, owners of Prowse and Company, who loaned us their moving van countless times to take the bikes to Olympia; Detective Mo Stitch, Ken Lundgren, and Tammy Gilbert of the Bainbridge Police Department, who routinely call us when they have unclaimed bikes; Island Family Eye Care has given us over 500 eyeglasses in the past three years, which we will give to a clinic to distribute; Classic Cycle, (Jeff Groman and Kevin), and Bainbridge Cycle (Tom Clune) for supporting us with donations of bikes as well as much needed parts; the Kiwanis Club gave us bikes, and the Rotary allowed us to have the bikes and parts when the Rotary Auction finished; Zeph and Deb Watkins, and Heather Campbell for organizing the Safeway Bike Drive and continuing to support our project; Evan Hodos, who for the past three years has helped with this project whenever we needed help; Carl Shorett, who drove down to Olympia and helped us take the pedals and front tires off of hundreds of bikes; Micheal Chikamura, a graphic Designer on the Island, who helped design a nonprofit flier; The Alternative Gift Program, which for two years has supported and helped educate islanders about our project. Special thanks go to Raleigh Ballou, who lives in Poulsbo and has donated hundreds of bikes; we couldn’t have done it without him. and thank you to the hundreds of people who have donated bikes, helmets and parts.

I plan to go to Togo in mid September, with my daughter, Brittain, to help distribute these bikes. My son, Adrian, who helped form this nonprofit, will unfortunately be back in college when we go.

A bike enables students to stay in school, as many have to walk over 11 miles one way. Forty-eight percent of students in Togo drop out of school before the sixth grade. With an education they are able to break the cycle of poverty. For more information, go to our website, GACE (Global Alliance for community empowerment), www.empowermentalliance.org. The project’s name is Bikes For Education.

Again many thanks for your encouragement, bikes and support.

Maria and Adrian Mason

Bainbridge Island