The Bulletin
Volume LII
No. 2 The Seattle School Retirees’ Association Founded 1944 January—February 2016
February 2, 2016 Luncheon
Date: Tuesday, February 2nd, 2016
Time: Lunch at 12:00 P.M.
Place: The Canal (by the Locks)
5300 34th Avenue N.W. in the
Ballard area of Seattle
Price: $20.00 for a buffet lunch
R.S.V.P. Deadline: Monday, January 28th
Program: In honor of Black History
Month, Thomas Gray, retired Boeing employee
and World War II history buff, will do a
presentation on The Tuskegee Airman during
the war. He will emphasize the roll of local
men who played an important role in the
decorated unit, including Sam Bruce, a Garfield
High School graduate.
Please remember that The Canal’s caterers need
to get a fairly firm count for lunch 8 days ahead
of time—so please let us know that you are
coming by January 25th as well as February 22nd.
_________________________________________
March 1st, 2016 Luncheon
Date: Tuesday, March 1st, 2016
Time: Lunch at 12:00 P.M.
Place: The Canal (by the Locks)
5300 34th Avenue N.W. in the
Ballard area of Seattle
Price: $20.00 for a buffet lunch
RSVP Deadline: Monday, February 22nd
Program: Master storyteller Eva
Abram, who has long been entertaining and
teaching both young people and adults, will
present a variety of stories for our audience.
Besides her narrative skills, Eva Abram has
been a civil rights activist for a number of
years. She is adept at engaging audiences in
perceptive conversations that try to achieve
equitable as well as accommodating types of
societal goals.
•
•
•
If you do not wish to have lunch with
us, please arrive by 12:30 for each of
these two programs.
Bring non-perishable food items or
checks for Ballard’s Food Bank as well as
white socks and other personal items
for Operation Nightwatch.
If you need a ride or can offer a ride to
others please call (206) 521-5170.
_________________________
NEWS FROM
OLYMPIA
The McCleary Decision: Where
Will Our Legislators Find the Money?
by Edith Ruby, SSRA Legislative Committee
Co-Chair ([email protected])
On January 11th Washington State’s
legislators will convene in Olympia for the second
half of the 64th regular session. This will be a
short but, quite likely, a very contentious session
of 60 days. Washington’s two-year state budgets
are set during the long sessions scheduled in odd
numbered years like 2015. Short sessions like
2016’s are intended mainly to make amendments
to the biennial budget if unforeseen events have
made adjustments necessary.
This year our legislators will be struggling
with an 800-pound gorilla named the “McCleary
Decision”--hardly an unforeseen guest at their
sessions. Back in 2012 the State Supreme Court
ruled that our state has been failing to do its duty
to adequately fund K-12 education. Since then the
legislature has made minimal progress in finding
2
The Bulletin of SSRA
Continuation of Edith Ruby’s Article from Page 1
the increased funding necessary to satisfy the Supreme
Court’s decree. Some additional funds were allocated by
our legislators for transportation, building maintenance
and instructional materials. However, those funds were
“found” by denying school employees any COLA for six
years. Finally in 2015 school employees were given a
small COLA that was not nearly enough to make up for
what they had lost in buying power over the previous six
years. Legislators also allocated funds to lower K-3 class
sizes. After looking at how little Washington’s Legislature had accomplished, the Supreme Court lost patience
and, in August 2015, decreed a $100,000-per-day-fine to
continue each day until our legislators come up with a
viable plan for fully funding our state’s common schools.
So where will they find the money? It is estimated that fully funding our schools will require at least an
additional $3.6 billion per two-year budget cycle. In both
the 2013 and the 2015 sessions, the state’s House of Representatives passed revenue bills designed to supply some
of those funds, but all of those bills died in the Senate!
So the Supreme Court declared that the legislature’s lack
of progress cannot continue. With their substantial fines
accumulating, legislators in this 2016 Short Session must
devise a funding plan that would be acceptable to the
majority of members in both the House and the Senate.
No one yet knows what this plan will be or will include.
Further complicating our legislators’ job are new
decisions by voters in the 2015 elections and by the Supreme Court. In August a majority of our state’s voters
passed Initiative 1366, written by Tim Eyman, mandating
a cut of 1% to the state’s sales tax if the legislature does
not pass a constitutional amendment that would require a
two-thirds vote of approval by legislators for any tax increase. A 1% sales tax cut would knock a $1.6 billion per
year hole into our present state budget. Added to that, the
Supreme Court, shortly after the 2015-2016 school year
started, ruled that use of public funds to support charter
schools violates our state’s constitution. Some charter
schools are already in operation, and their supporters are
putting tremendous pressure on our legislators to find
some way to legally fund them.
It seems that in this session that begins in January
our legislators face two choices—either agree to raise
significant additional revenue OR completely eliminate
nearly all social services for our state’s neediest residents
plus further gut higher education’s funding. Such cuts
might also affect public education retirees. How? Well,
legislators may opt to reduce or eliminate state retirees’
$150 per month Medicare-Eligible Healthcare Benefit.
January-February 2016
SSRA Leadership for 2015-2016
President………………………………………….Sue Battin
President-elect………………………………………..OPEN
Immediate Past Presidents….Sharon Green and Phil Konkel
Secretary………………………………………………OPEN
Treasurer…………………………………….Paul Anderson
Committee Chairs
Archivist……………………………………..Eleanor Toews
Budget/Finance……………………………….Jim de Jarnatt
Communications………………………………….Ron Cygan
Community Services……………………….Margaret Nelson
Drawings and Baskets……………………….Marilyn Miller
Friendship……………………………………………..OPEN
Historian……………………………………….Dan Peterson
Health Services………………………….Barbara McHargue
Legislative……………………Edith Ruby and Mary Wallon
Member Services………………………………….….OPEN
May Luncheon…………………………………Don Meehan
Membership…………………..……..Frieda Kirk and SSRA
Parliamentarian………………………………….Edith Ruby
Programs…………………………………………..Pat Cygan
Resolution/Bylaws……………………………………OPEN
Retirement Seminar Planning…………………………OPEN
Scholarship………………….………….Patricia MacGowan
BurbankRideout SEED………………………….Phil Konkel
Nellie Sterrett…………………………..………Don Meehan
Welcome/Name Tags……………………………Phil Konkel
WSSRA-PAC…………………Mary Wallon and Edith Ruby
NOTE: If you are willing to take on one of these OPEN
positions or know an SSRA member who would likely be
that special addition needed on SSRA’s Board, please call
Sue Battin at our office number of 206 521-5170.
They may also step back from their recent commitment to
fully fund each year’s actuarially recommended pension
payments to the state’s pension funds.
Thus we all have a stake in the decisions to be made
in Olympia this winter. Each of us needs to let our legislators
know our concerns. If they hold community meetings, attend
them and speak up. Write letters or emails to tell them how
you hope they will vote on revenue proposals. Contact information on each legislator is available at www.leg.wa.gov.
Mary Wallon, Patricia MacGowan and I will also lobby them
twice with other WSSRA members during this short session.
The Bulletin is published five times per year by the Seattle School Retirees’ Association. Membership meetings are held on
the first Tuesday of each month from September through May (except January) with a buffet lunch served at twelve noon; then
a meeting and guest speaker/program follow our buffet luncheon at The Canal Restaurant located at 5300 34th Ave. N.W.
Office hours vary but telephone voice messages are checked periodically: 206 521-5170. Email: [email protected]
The Bulletin of SSRA
January-February 2016 3
The President’s Mess
by Sue Battin, SSRA President
First, I would like to wish everyone the best for this holiday season. We continue to work on setting up the
website for our organization, and I want to thank Patricia MacGowan for all her work and effort on this project. We
will keep you posted as to when it will be up and running for your use.
The SSRA Board continues to look for volunteers willing to fill several vacant positions. I am especially
anxious to find a Recording Secretary since I’ve been trying to do that job as well as my own. We need someone to
serve as an Assistant Treasurer to work alongside SSRA Treasurer Paul Anderson to learn the intricacies of his job
before he “retires” from that his position he has so ably filled for many years.. If you are willing to take on one of our
OPEN positions or know someone who may be interested, please contact me or any Board member by phone or e-mail.
If you didn’t attend either our November or our December luncheons, you missed two outstanding programs set
up by our Program Chair Pat Cygan. In November we heard from Marc Taylor, a member of the Lummi Nation, who
discussed how history and destructive U. S. government policies impacted Native Americans and how those influences
affect our native peoples today. We all left Marc Taylor’s presentation with a better understanding of Native Americans’
horrific experiences as well as meaningful group bonding efforts. December’s luncheon featured Gabriel and Sarah
Chrisman. They live a Victorian lifestyle, which was featured in a recent article in The Seattle Times. The couple
brought replicas of bicycles used in the 1890’s and explained how they worked as well as the bicycle’s evolution from
the 19th century to more recent times. They discussed the importance of sports in the Victorian period and how the
Victorian Age’s sports differ from sports today. As a finale, they rode their two sex-appropriate Victorian bicycles
around the restaurant’s parking lot.
Our next luncheon will be on February 2nd when we will reminisce about an American foot soldier’s roles in
World War II by historian-raconteur Bob Harmon. Remember, we will meet at noon at The Canal Restaurant in
Ballard. Mark you calendar. It should be a wonderful time with great food, good conversation and an excellent
program. Please make your reservations at least a week before we meet on Tuesday, February 2nd, so we can have an
accurate count for the luncheon.
And, finally, I would again like to wish you the best for this holiday season and throughout 2016!
SSRA’s Committee Reports
•
Health Committee
Barbara McHargue, Chair
The WSSRA Health Committee is spearheading a project this year focusing on collecting eyeglasses and cases.
Members can bring these items—in good condition—to our luncheon meetings and they will be turned over to
organizations like the Lions’ Club for distribution to different charities.
I already have a bag ready of used eyewear, and I hope you will follow suit.
•
S.E.E.D. Grants
Phil Konkel, Chair
Congratulations to Olympic View Elementary School. Pam Heindl, SSRA member and primary teacher at
Olympic View School, is a winner of a S.E.E.D. Grant. She will use her $200 grant for mathematics instructional
materials for her classroom. She plans to share these materials with other teachers in the building. Patricia MacGowan
presented the check to her at an all-school assembly on December 7th.
•
Scholarship Committee
Patricia MacGowan, Chair
Remember, there are still scholarship opportunities for Seattle High School seniors and for regional teacher
interns.
The Lynn Fuller Memorial Scholarship provides a great opportunity for any SSRA member to nominate a
student who is graduating OR has graduated from the Seattle School District and is interested in pursuing the field
of elementary education. All that is required is a brief letter explaining why the nominator thinks the student is worthy
of this scholarship and a short essay by the student explaining his or her goals in the field of elementary education.
Nominations are due MAY 31st and recipients will be notified by June 15th. The $1000 award is sent directly to the
recipient’s post-secondary institution.
The SSRA Teaching Intern Scholarship will continue. This year’s award, as announced in the last Bulletin,
went to Janae Brown who is working on her Secondary and Middle Level Certification M.Ed at the University of
Washington in Bothell.
4
The Bulletin of SSRA
January-February 2016
Continuation of Patricia MacGowan’s Scholarship Committee Report from Page 3:
This scholarship is for future teachers who will be student-teaching during the academic year 2016-2017
through a college or university program in Washington State; they must be working on initial certification in an
educational field to be eligible for this $5000 award from SSRA. Applications are due September 1st of 2016.
Scholarship applications are available from the SSRA office or from Patricia MacGowan by phoning 206 851-0232 or by email at [email protected].
•
Community Services
Margaret Nelson, Chair
Thanks to all of you that have brought clothing items and/or checks for Operation Nightwatch as well as
food donations or checks for any local food bank. All of these were much appreciated during the holiday season.
Since I am a new chair for this committee, I would like to hear ideas from you as to how SSRA can help
those in need in the Seattle Community. Please let me know what changes you would like to see in our group’s
Community Services outreach. I will discuss those ideas at our SSRA Board meetings throughout the year.
•
Program Committee
Pat Cygan, Chair
A lot of variation defined the 2015 phase of our 2015-2016 luncheon programs. Washington State’s
2014-2015 Teacher of the Year Lyon Terry, who just happens to teach at Lawton Elementary here in Seattle, was
our guest on September 1st; then Stage Designer and Artist Bruce Jackson, who also scored well with our lunch
guests because he is also SSRA President Sue Battin’s husband, “presented” a far-ranging overview of his career
on October 6th; next up was local Lummi activist and head of Seattle’s Indian Health Board Marc Taylor, who
reviewed U.S. History’s impacts on Native Americans for us on November 3rd; finally on December 1st Gabriel
and Sarah Chrisman, a Port Townsend couple who are living a Victorian lifestyle—and writing and talking about
as well as demonstrating that lifestyle in the 21st Century—shared their recent Victorian-like adventures with us.
2016 will expose our luncheon audiences to more eclectic presenters—on February 2nd retired Seattle
University History Professor, Bob Harmon, will share some of his memories and insights about his World War II
experiences as a foot soldier fighting against Hitler and the Axes Powers on the Western Front; for the traditional
Women’s History Month of March, Rainwater Storyteller Eva Abram will weave stories about women as well as
Minority Americans on March 1st; on April 5th, a political columnist named Jerry Cornfield, who writes perceptive
political articles about our state for The Everett Herald, will appraise our state legislature’s Short Session of 2016
and any other political insights of his choice; and finally on May 3rd, we will again honor any of our attendees who
are 85 years old or older plus we will hear from another Franklin High School graduate that SSRA member Mary
Henry urged us to invite, Jeffrey Hatori, who does exemplary work at Nikkei Concerns by offering services to
clients in Seattle’s International District and elsewhere. Please join us at any of these 2016 programs; we love
seeing our regular attendees at our luncheons, and we would love to welcome many more newcomers to our Canal
Restaurant venue near the Ballard Locks for our first-Tuesday luncheons.
If you want to suggest one or more speakers or programs for 2016-2017, please send Pat Cygan an email
at [email protected] or call in the information to our office before mid-June. We usually work on filling up
our SSRA Program slots for the next year during the summer.
•
Nellie Sterrett Committee
Don Meehan, Chair
Remember: we are still offering a free lunch to those members coming to the luncheon on their birthday
month. As you sign in, simply list the month, date, and year you were born.
Also, keep in mind the upcoming May luncheon when we honor those who are 85 or more. Let us know
ahead of time if you are eligible so you may receive the special recognition and free lunch you so deserve!
The Nellie Sterrett Committee needs some new members. If you or someone else you know may be
interested in joining our committee, please contact me or someone else on the SSRA Board by calling our office.
•
Retirement Seminar
Chair Open
We are still looking for someone to volunteer to represent our Seattle unit to work with others from the
three surrounding units in King County to set up a program to give retirement and healthcare information to those
presently working in the public schools. Meetings are few and a seminar occurs usually only once a year.
The Bulletin of SSRA
January-February 2016
5
SSRA would like to extend a warm welcome to these new members:
Sue Billings, Susan Carroll, Fran Clifton, Linda Elman, Earlean
Comeaux, Gayle Flakus, Don Gillmore, Susan Hill, Aslam Khan, Leila
Kipp, Stephen Kovnat, Meredith Kurose, Susan Mather, Barbara Moore,
Nickie McDonald, Carolyn Murphy, Josie Reichlin, Lyon Terry, Shelly
Tucker, Huynh Vu, Mary Williams and Dorcas Yamashita.
Quotable Quotations
What word or concept best completes each of the following quotations? For example, Karl Marx
called _____ “the opium of the people.” Answer: religion. (Answers are on Page 7.)
A. George Meredith expected _____ would be “the last thing civilized by man.”
B. Oscar Wilde referred to _____ as “the diary we all carry about with us.”
C. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow called _____ “the universal language of mankind.”
D. Oliver Wendell Holmes said _____ is “what we pay for a civilized society.”
E. William Shakespeare referred to _____ as “a stuff that will not endure.”
F. Voltaire said that _____ was “an opinion without judgment.”
G. Herbert Spencer defined _____ as “that which man is always trying to kill, but which ends up
killing him.”
In Memoriam
We are saddened to learn that the following members have passed away:
Richard Alsleben, Roy Barnes, Jean Kato, Kenneth Moen, Don Murray and
Harriette Smith. Kermit Franks also passed away; his obituary was in OUR
last Bulletin; WSSRA also ran his obituary in their new Journal since he was
a state president.
__________________________________________________________________________
We would like to thank AAA Mailing for doing the
printing and mailing of The Bulletin. They do an outstanding
job and provide a quality product.
_________________________________________________________________________________________
Don’t Forget the PAC
Make sure and read the article on the WSSR-PAC in the most recent edition of The WSSRA
Journal. The article was written by Edith Ruby, WSSR-PAC Vice President, and Mary Wallon,
WSSR-PAC Secretary, and contains important information regarding the new legislative session.
6 The Bulletin of SSRA
January-February 2016
Seattle’s “Hooverville” Then . . . And SSRA’s New Office Now
by Pat Cygan, Retired Seattle Social Studies Teacher And District Social Studies Curriculum Consultant
Pacific NW, a regular Sunday magazine supplement in The Seattle Times, featured an interesting article by
Paul Dorpat on December 20, 2105. “Uncovering Seattle’s Hooverville History” showed us two pictures of an area
near what is now Seventh Avenue South and Forest Street in south Seattle—one picture was THEN (1937) and the
other, NOW. His accompanying text gave us historical background about that place. The first picture Dorpat used
depicted some of the people of Seattle’s “Hooverville”—a Depression-era encampment for Seattle’s homeless who
lived inside patched cardboard boxes with iron roofs. These temporary shelters were built on the outskirts of downtown Seattle in the 1930s and 1940s. I was excited to note that the area depicted in Paul Dorpat’s first picture is
actually located in what we today call “SODO”—and that it is the area where our new SSRA office is located!
Paul Dorpat typically finds a pivotal picture from archival records for his first [THEN] picture. In this case
Dorpat used one from the Post-Intelligencer Collection at the Museum of History and Industry. It shows us a group
of unemployed men searching through garbage that would later be used for “fill” on Seattle’s tideflats; the men carry
large bags to hold whatever useful or maybe profitable finds they might locate. Today that scene is to be found in
the operations facilities for the light-rail division of Sound Transit. In the upper left corner of the picture is the Sears
department store, which is now Starbucks’ headquarters—and located about a block or so away from the AAA
offices where Eric Johnson (SSRA member Mary Johnson’s son) rents SSRA its office space. Quite a “find”!
In many U. S. history textbooks, pictures of Seattle’s Hooverville are commonly used to illustrate how
wretched the Great Depression was. Some years ago in the 1970s or 1980s, I chaired a meeting of Seattle’s Social
Studies department heads from our District’s junior high/middle and high schools, which Paul Dorpat attended because he was seeking likely audiences for the Washington State history pictures that intrigued him—like the ones he
now routinely uses each Sunday in Pacific NW Magazine. He hoped we would find noteworthy connections in what
was then as well as now. He went on to author books illustrating his view that places change but always matter.
About the same time, the Seattle Times hired him to show their readers Seattle Then And Now as a weekly feature.
Paul Dorpat’s 12/20/15 article chronicled how in 1934 a University of Washington Sociology major bought
a shack for $15 so that he could research the people who lived in “Hooverville,” which became one of several similar
places for homeless Americans during the Great Depression that were named after Herbert Hoover, who was
President of the USA when the stock market crashed on Black Friday, 1929—a major precursor for the horrific
conditions of The Great Depression. That UW student, Donald Francis Roy, mapped and numbered the 500 or so
shanties in what Roy described as an “unblueprinted, tincanesque, architecturaloid” community. Roy’s research led
to a book that became a classic called Hooverville: A Study of A Community of Homeless Men in Seattle. The
1940 Federal Census used Roy’s white-painted addresses on Hooverville’s shacks to gather its residents’ statistics.
Eighty years later in 2014-5 an Everett history teacher, Randal Gravelle, used Roy’s seminal thesis and the
1940 census to help him write his new history about the Great Depression--Hooverville And The Unemployed.
Dorpat’s NOW picture shows author Randal Gravelle with a Sound Transit operations superintendent in SODO.
Gravelle’s 285-page history notes that by 1940 most of Hooverville’s residents in Seattle--mostly middle-aged men
unable to find steady work--were evicted from Hooverville. A former World War I shipbuilding site, its huts were
burned to the ground to make room for new buildings to construct armaments for America’s next big war.
When Paul Dorpat asked history-teacher/author Randal Gravelle what the pickers in his March 6, 1937
picture had been looking for, Gravelle answered, “ Almost anything that could be recycled or consumed. At the
time, 100 pounds of cardboard returned 20 cents and paper twice that.”
Some Quotations That May Assist Voters in Assessing The Long Stretch Called the 2016 Presidential Election
(1) “Human beings are perhaps never more frightening than when they are convinced beyond doubt that they are
right.” Sir Laurens van der Post, S. African author (2) “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little
temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” Ben Franklin, Scientist (3) “This country is governed for the
richest, for the corporations, the bankers, the land speculators, and by the exploiters of labor . . . the majority of
mankind is ground down by industrial oppression so that the small remnant may live in ease.” Helen Keller, Author
(4) “We are all lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusions is called a philosopher.” Ambrose Bierce (5) “War
is the unfolding of miscalculations.” Barbara Tuchman, American historian (6) “The reason a lot of people do not
recognize opportunity is that it usually goes around wearing overalls and looking like hard work.” Thomas Edison
The Bulletin of SSRA
January-February 2016
7
Answers to the Quotable Quiz from Page Five:
A. woman B. memory C. music D. taxes E. youth F. prejudice G. poverty
________________________________________________________________________________________
Changes Afoot at SSRA
by Ron Cygan, SSRA Communications Chair
As you have probably heard or read, SSRA has been dealing with a fair amount of change in recent
months.
One major change involved moving the SSRA office. This was accomplished mostly over the
summer. A number of SSRA volunteers helped in the move from the PEMCO building where we had an
office for decades. Jim de Jarnatt headed The Moving Committee which dealt with the myriad issues
involved. Phil Konkel, Sharon Green and Eleanor Toews along with Cynthia Brown and Dan Peterson
helped organize the office materials in preparation for the move. It also took considerable effort to find new
office space. Mary Johnson saved the day by letting us know that her son Eric, owner of AAA Mailing, had
an available cubicle at one of his facilities. After some negotiating, SSRA agreed to rent the space for our
new office. President Sue Battin and her husband Bruce Jackson along with Ron and Pat Cygan, Eleanor
Toews and Patricia MacGowan helped out with the tasks of moving office equipment and documents to the
office in Sodo. Marilyn Miller, Barbara McHargue and Margaret Nelson also worked with others on the SSRA
Board to complete the transition. Paul Anderson, SSRA Treasurer, decided to do much of his work at home
and set up his work there. There is no permanent office manager at the Sodo office, but SSRA has volunteers
checking periodically for phone messages and the U.S. Mail as well as e-mails. Phil Konkel is doing much of
this at present. It has taken some time to set up everything in our new office and we ask that members be
patient until we work out all the glitches.
Also new will be the upcoming website for SSRA. Patricia MacGowan is heading this with help
from yours truly. We are working with GraphicOne, a professional website designer. One result of this will
be The Bulletin which will be attached to the new site. In order to do this, we have used a new computer
program for The Bulletin that will make the newsletter more colorful and attractive. The Bulletin will be
available on the SSRA website in color with a black-and-white version for regular mail. This requires
reformatting each page plus adding graphics and color for the website version. One reason this edition is a bit
late is all of this extra work. The end result will be a more attractive and readable newsletter. We will let
readers know when the website is up and running so you can access the web version of The Bulletin on the
internet.
Other changes needed at SSRA involve filling the number of open positions on The Board. We need
more volunteers for doing the jobs necessary for the organization to grow and change. If any of you would
like to help out, either by volunteering yourself or by suggesting the name of another member who could
help, please let a Board member know.
One good piece of news is that the SSRA Board has approved subsidizing the cost of our luncheons
by five dollars throughout the rest of the year. We hope this will encourage more of you to join us for the
luncheons and to enjoy our variety of programs. We hope to see you soon at The Canal for our next meeting
and luncheon.
Thanks to all who helped in the
Move of the Century.