Inclusivity or Indoctrination?
One Mother’s Journey Through Gender Stereotyping Policies in PT Schools

  Being an “old school” liberal, I had thought that the new ideology and its theories being taught in the schools — like Gender Identity — were just about respecting each other. Like most of our community, I tried to be inclusive by listening, learning, only...

City and YMCA Brace for Court Battle
Over Julie Jaman’s 2022 Lifetime Pool Ban

  On the afternoon of Wednesday, June 12th, attorneys for Port Townsend resident Julie Jaman filed a lawsuit on her behalf. The Center for American Liberty (CAL) registered the official complaint and demand for a jury trial in the Western District Court of...

Jefferson School-Based Health Centers:
What Rights Do Parents Have?

The Leader's April 12 front-page headline “Blue Heron Middle School awarded grant for mental health" caught my attention, reminding me of a recent conversation with a high school teacher revealing that close to half of his students are in counseling for mental health...

Jefferson County Beacon Launches Local News, Globally Funded

  Welcome to The Jefferson County Beacon, which describes itself as "a worker-directed nonprofit news outlet managed by a board of your friends and neighbors."   But who has actually financed this new “local” initiative? A little digging reveals that it is...

Lawsuit Looms Over City Mishandling of YMCA Pool Discrimination

The day they thought would never come arrived on Tuesday, March 19th, 2024, when the City of Port Townsend and the Olympic Peninsula YMCA received an unwelcome bit of news from a litigation team at the Center for American Liberty, representing longtime Port Townsend...

Concealed Public Records Reveal Affordable Pool Options

Administrators and elected officials in Port Townsend’s city hall are painfully familiar with charges of subverted public processes, and rightfully so. Sims Way poplars, the golf course, streateries, the pool — each of these controversial projects followed...
Concealed Public Records Reveal Affordable Pool Options

Concealed Public Records Reveal Affordable Pool Options

Administrators and elected officials in Port Townsend’s city hall are painfully familiar with charges of subverted public processes, and rightfully so. Sims Way poplars, the golf course, streateries, the pool — each of these controversial projects followed...

Everybody Knows Except Public Health

Everybody Knows
Except Public Health

Public comment to Jefferson County Board of Health at their January 18, 2024 meeting (slightly expanded for publication): What do you know? When covid hit, Public Health said they knew it was caused by wet market bats, and censored anyone who disagreed. But now the...

Port Townsend Is In Trouble

Port Townsend Is In Trouble

Insufficient revenues.  Increasing expenditures.  Stagnant economy.  Port Townsend is heading over its financial cliff fast. Don a green eye shade and take a flinty-eyed look at the city budget just approved for 2024. There's red ink everywhere. The vapid verbiage of...

The Pursuit of Affordable Housing in Port Townsend

The Pursuit of Affordable Housing in Port Townsend

“There are two ways of being happy: We may either diminish our wants or augment our means — either will do — the result is the same; and it is for each man to decide for himself, and do that which happens to be the easiest. If you are idle or sick or poor, however...

The $108,941,000 Pool Could Default Its First Year

The $108,941,000 Pool
Could Default Its First Year

Eye popping numbers. Red ink from the start. The city's financial analysis shows that the proposed aquatic center would not be able to pay its debt service for its first four years. That analysis is built upon a fantasy of low interest rates and a Jefferson County...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – SEPTEMBER 2023 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– SEPTEMBER 2023 –

In the spirit of offering Letters to the Editor as a traditional platform for lively, wide-ranging conversations in the public square, we invite you to write about whatever is on your mind. Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that...

Aquatic Center Feasibility Study – It Gets Worse

Aquatic Center Feasibility Study – It Gets Worse

The closer you look, the more problematic a new Port Townsend aquatic center appears. Operating costs would greatly exceed initial projections, according to the feasibility study prepared to boost the city's promotion of a new aquatic/fitness center. The estimated...

Mountain View Pool – By the Numbers

Mountain View Pool – By the Numbers

How many people use the Mountain View pool and who are they? With numbers like $53 million being batted around — the projected cost of building a brand new aquatic center — more than anecdotal information is called for.  To answer those questions we now have 18 months...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – JULY 2023 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– JULY 2023 –

In the spirit of offering Letters to the Editor as a traditional platform for lively, wide-ranging conversations in the public square, we invite you to write about whatever is on your mind. Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – JUNE 2023 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– JUNE 2023 –

In the spirit of offering Letters to the Editor as a traditional platform for lively, wide-ranging conversations in the public square, we invite you to write about whatever is on your mind. Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – MAY 2023 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– MAY 2023 –

In the spirit of offering Letters to the Editor as a traditional platform for lively, wide-ranging conversations in the public square, we invite you to write about whatever is on your mind. Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – APRIL 2023 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– APRIL 2023 –

In the spirit of offering Letters to the Editor as a traditional platform for lively, wide-ranging conversations in the public square, we invite you to write about whatever is on your mind. Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that...

News Briefs & Quick Takes – Ebb & Flow

News Briefs & Quick Takes – Ebb & Flow

Ebb and flow happen everywhere - in natural tidal rhythms, in social structures, and in the cycles of individual lives. Staying at high tide all the time is unsustainable. These past 3 years, deadly lockdowns and incessant propaganda campaigns have propelled the world...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – MARCH 2023 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– MARCH 2023 –

In the spirit of offering Letters to the Editor as a traditional platform for lively, wide-ranging conversations in the public square, we invite you to write about whatever is on your mind. Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that...

A 48.7% Tax Increase?  Where’s the Fire?

A 48.7% Tax Increase? Where’s the Fire?

The shell game Over recent decades, municipalities have been shedding responsibility for various community services by creating what have been dubbed ‘junior' or ‘special' taxing districts. Rationales range from increased service demands to vague descriptions of...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – FEBRUARY 2023 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– FEBRUARY 2023 –

In the spirit of offering Letters to the Editor as a traditional platform for lively, wide-ranging conversations in the public square, we invite you to write about whatever is on your mind. Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that...

Open House on Open Spaces – What’s Missing?

Open House on Open Spaces – What’s Missing?

I was among the three hundred plus citizens who packed the meeting room at Fort Worden Commons for what the city described as Open House #1, City of Port Townsend Golf Course plus Mountain View Commons Planning Effort. This meeting marked the midpoint of a roughly...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – JANUARY 2023 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– JANUARY 2023 –

Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that readers who want to speak to other important issues, events and concerns that our small crew can’t cover don’t have a place for that. We introduced this feature for readers who want to bring up...

Letters Forum: Off Topic!    – Mid-December 2022 –

Letters Forum: Off Topic!
– Mid-December 2022 –

Because we require comments under articles to be “on topic”, we found that readers who want to speak to other important issues, events and concerns that our small crew can’t cover don’t have a place for that. Last month we introduced this new feature to make a place...

Masks Again? Seriously?!?

Masks Again? Seriously?!?

It's like deja vu all over again.  On Dec. 9, NYC's health commissar advised that everyone (including 2-year-olds!) "should wear a mask at all times when in an indoor public setting." Then our state's public health leaders followed in lockstep....

Streatery for the Holidays: Alchemical Magic!

Streatery for the Holidays: Alchemical Magic!

The photo above shows the skeletal remains of a streatery tent in front of Alchemy Steak & Seafood (aka Alchemy Bistro and Wine Bar), where according to their website “A New Culinary Adventure Begins." The photograph accompanied an email to the Port Townsend City...

Introducing Our New Letters Forum: Off Topic!

Introducing Our New Letters Forum: Off Topic!

We invite you to participate in a new feature! We took on relaunching the Free Press in 2021 with a commitment to creating a space for uncensored conversation, discourse that other local media does not permit. Throughout that time, readers have asked, Do you have a...

PUD “Slowly Moving” from Jab Mandates?Not So Fast!

PUD “Slowly Moving” from Jab Mandates?
Not So Fast!

Jefferson County PUD leadership, including the General Manager, legal counsel and two-thirds of the elected commissioners (the Fab Four) have not gone so far as The Atlantic's Prof. Emily Oster in asking for "pandemic amnesty," but they share her interest in ignoring...

Port Townsend’s Fentanyl Forest: In Photos

Port Townsend’s Fentanyl Forest: In Photos

The approach to Port Townsend's gateway runs past the city's Fentanyl Forest, where addicts survive night to night, fix to fix, saying they have no drug problems unless they don't have enough to stay high. This is where campers rousted from Kah Tai Park go. Those...

Will Washington State Mandate Covid Shots for School Kids?

Will Washington State Mandate Covid Shots for School Kids?

Summer is over. The rains have begun. I am back at my desk. While we were enjoying the fine weather, our federal and state governments have continued with their plans to protect us from Covid. Let’s play a little good news/bad news and find out what they have been up...

Where’s the Emergency?Only in Jefferson County

Where’s the Emergency?
Only in Jefferson County

Jefferson County will be alone in its own private State of Emergency if commissioners approve its 13th temporary Covid-19 response policy emergency declaration at their October 24 board meeting.  Meanwhile, Washington State and all its other counties (including...

Will a Smart Meter Harm Your Health?

Will a Smart Meter Harm Your Health?

“I cannot sleep… and I am feeling so fatigued and muddle-brained that I can barely think straight and even have trouble standing up straight. I have literally done nothing since [the Smart meters] have been put in and feel achy all over and disoriented, slightly...

City Officials Lead Hate Campaign Against Women

City Officials Lead Hate Campaign
Against Women

Until a few short weeks ago, I’d never heard the slur “TERF”. Until the story of Julie Jaman’s ban from the YMCA pool broke, I had no idea that so much trans-activist venom and vitriol had infected our community. Or that people we have invested with positions of power...

Came to Listen, Sickened by Mob Violence and Hypocrisy

Came to Listen, Sickened by Mob Violence and Hypocrisy

Monday, August 15. I hadn't initially planned to go to City Hall at all that evening — I had obligations at home and mixed feelings about both sides in this conflict — but the issue was looming large in the community, and I wanted to witness the further unfolding of...

Reporting from the Frontlines of the Woke Battlefield

Reporting from the Frontlines of the Woke Battlefield

How to share an evening from hell. This is my dilemma, as I attempt to regain balance after witnessing what I’d previously considered fellow human beings descend into hate-filled and menacing nihilists who felt such righteousness of cause, any questioning of method or...

Mountain View Pool No Longer Safefor Many Women and Girls

Mountain View Pool No Longer Safe
for Many Women and Girls

A heterosexual male is authorized by the YMCA to enter the women's showers and dressing area at the Mountain View pool while women and girls are naked.  Clementine Adams, who also goes by "Clem," though he wears a woman's bathing suit on the job at the pool, is...

Council Watch August 1 – Road Repair vs Calming

Council Watch August 1 – Road Repair vs Calming

Mayor David Faber opened the Port Townsend City Council's August 1 meeting by moving public comments to the top of the agenda in consideration of the many members of the public present intending to comment. Nearly an hour of comments concerned YMCA management of...

Censored: Men’s Eyes in Women’s Shower Room

Censored: Men’s Eyes in Women’s Shower Room

Editors Note: In the Free Press's ongoing efforts to expose censorship by local media, we are publishing a letter to the editor written to The Leader by long-time Port Townsend resident Julie Jaman. The letter, printed in full below, was submitted on July 28th...

Jefferson Healthcare’s Pie in the Sky?

Jefferson Healthcare’s Pie in the Sky?

This article is the first in a series that will shine light on the inner workings at our local hospital system. Administrators at Jefferson Healthcare would have us believe that all is well within their institution, particularly as they return to the taxpayers, hat in...

Council Watch July 5 – “I Can’t Drive 25”

Council Watch July 5 – “I Can’t Drive 25”

The Port Townsend City Council's July 5 meeting centered around a potentially wide-reaching project to calm speeds by replacing double-lane streets with single-lane two-way "edge lane roads", following a revealing Public Works experiment performed on Blaine Street....

Council Watch – June 6, 2022

Council Watch – June 6, 2022

The Port Townsend City Council opened its June 6 meeting by hearing new police hire Officer Chase Stanton take his Oath of Office. In public comments, Julie Jaman spoke to the Gateway and Boatyard Expansion Project being hornswoggled by the project mantra "the poplars...

Diving Deep into County Health Claims

Diving Deep into County Health Claims

In early December 2021, I submitted a Public Records Request to Jefferson County seeking concrete data on how many COVID-19 cases were in the fully vaccinated, partially vaccinated and unvaccinated categories. In April, I received a redacted spreadsheet containing...

Things That Took Less Than Five Years to Build

Things That Took Less Than Five Years to Build

Above is a glowing view of San Francisco's gorgeous Golden Gate Bridge, constructed in under 5 years from 1/5/1933 to 5/28/1937. What other architectural wonders took less than 5 years to build? A Free Press reader sent us the following list. (Note: The Cherry Street...

Uptown Streateries: A Reality Check

Uptown Streateries: A Reality Check

In a letter to the Port Townsend City Council on May 2, 2022, I wrote: “There is apparently a vision to eliminate or at least reduce use of the 'personal automobile' in our commercial districts... Those of you and others you know who are sold on this vision of a...

Poplars Stakeholder Committee:Hand-picked, with a Documented Bias

Poplars Stakeholder Committee:
Hand-picked, with a Documented Bias

The following is an update from the Poplars Alliance, sent May 7th to the City's Engage PT, Port and PUD electeds, The Leader, and the Port Townsend Free Press —————————————— Dear Engage PT and Elected officials, Thank you for the opportunity to comment. It appears...

Who is City Council Serving in Their Push for Streateries?

Who is City Council Serving
in Their Push for Streateries?

“I don’t really see the need for streateries in our code. Many of the restaurants already have courtyards or some kind of space outside. We’ve spent a bunch of energy putting together public spaces where people can take take-out food and sit next to the water. I...

Out and About in the Time of Lockdowns

Out and About in the Time of Lockdowns

I was never locked down. I designated myself an "essential worker" and continued my office IT job as always, as did all my coworkers.  I continued shopping at the Food Co-op, where no one wore masks during those early months and few if any got sick (borne out by food...

Public Streets and Public Process Subverted

Public Streets and Public Process Subverted

The streatery pictured above is in the lot off Tyler Street, behind the Mount Baker Block building.  The city gave a no-cost temporary lease to the Cellar Door in February 2021.  City officials told the owner they would likely allow the streatery to remain after Covid...

Segregated Port Townsend

Segregated Port Townsend

A community divided by class and social status. In the 19th century there were two distinct Port Townsends. In Uptown and Morgan Hill, the prim and proper wives of captains, bankers and customs officers never had to rub elbows with the roughnecks and Chinese along the...

Strangulation by Streateries?

Strangulation by Streateries?

Political players at the City of Port Townsend have made no secret of their desire to eliminate vehicular traffic in the city’s primary business districts in favor of a more walkable, bike-able, maybe even pedestrian-only commercial hub. When John Mauro was hired as...

Masks: The Great Face-Covering Psyop

Masks: The Great Face-Covering Psyop

“i get to have a face. you do not.” —————————————— Spring of 2020. Mere months before the Leader began censoring all perspectives that did not align with health department messaging, I wrote a concerned, fact-based letter to the editor challenging the mask campaign we...

Public Discourse and the Totalitarians Next Door

Public Discourse and
the Totalitarians Next Door

Author’s note: This article uses the term public discourse to describe a specific type of communication used to gain understanding about matters of shared public concern. Public discourse is a process that involves dialog among trusted parties to discover the best...

Website Under Reconstruction

Website Under Reconstruction

Dear Port Townsend Free Press readers: As you know, the censorship window has been closing on all forms of free speech and alternative views for some time now.  You may not know that the Free Press website mysteriously crashed on Thursday, March 17th. Anyone who...

Slur Trek 2: The Wrath of Mann

Slur Trek 2: The Wrath of Mann

Senior Leader columnist Bill Mann is at it again, unleashing his second wave of trash-talk against so-called "anti-vaxxers", calling them "stupid", "idiots", "foolish", "deniers", "clueless", etc., etc., etc. In a bizarre reversal of reality, Mann blames lockdown...

PUD Mandates Spark Higher Costs Amid Integrity Crisis

PUD Mandates Spark Higher Costs
Amid Integrity Crisis

In the realm of policymaking, global to local, predicted costs of measures taken today often bear little resemblance to the reality that unfolds. In the case of Jefferson County Public Utility District (PUD), poor policy choices have resulted in additional costs to...

The Arrest of Rachelle Merle: Case Dismissed

The Arrest of Rachelle Merle: Case Dismissed

Arrested for refusing to wear a mask. The charge was trespassing, but it was really about a woman's refusal to wear a mask while shopping in the Port Townsend Food Co-op. With the end of the statewide masking mandate approaching, we've been asked, "What happened to...

Changing the Narrative: Homeschooling 

Changing the Narrative: Homeschooling 

Homeschooling is being chosen by more and more parents both nationwide and locally since the beginning of the Covid lockdowns in 2020. Faced with shuttered schools and small businesses, many parents found both time and incentive to explore schooling their children at...

The Sound of Silence at the Board of Health

The Sound of Silence at the Board of Health

Let me relate a poignant personal awakening I experienced after delivering the following public comment to the Jefferson County Board of Health at its February 17 meeting: My comment is about recent statements made by Health Officer Berry. I appreciated her telling...

“Masks Are Never Completely Going Away”

“Masks Are Never Completely Going Away”

"I'm going to continue to mask, I'm going to continue to distance. It's just not safe out there.” Public Comment, 2-14-22 BOCC meeting ------------------------------------ What will it take to break the mass delusional psychosis perpetrated on the public? For...

Truck Wars 2: The Empire Strikes Back

Truck Wars 2: The Empire Strikes Back

While the Empire’s police were busy confiscating fuel from Freedom Convoy truckers in Ottawa (photo above), last Saturday's mini-convoy from Port Angeles to Port Townsend indeed came to pass. About 50 folks in 25 vehicles (plus more on overpasses and streets), joined...

Time to Join the Worldwide Freedom Convoy

Time to Join the Worldwide Freedom Convoy

The Clallam County lawsuit against Health Officer Allison Berry's restaurant/bar vaccine mandate orders was settled February 2, but these unfounded and discriminatory mandates will "continue for at least several weeks."...

Can The Port Townsend School Board Protect Our Children?

Can The Port Townsend School Board Protect Our Children?

Three months have passed in my efforts to make a change locally. As I mentioned in a previous article, I was concerned with Washington State mandating Covid-19 shots for any child attending public school. California had mandated this policy so Washington couldn’t be...

Have You Had the Omicold?

Have You Had the Omicold?

"By the time weekly boosters are mandated, symptoms will be reduced to a mildly ticklish nose & a vague feeling of being conned.” comment below a YouTube video —————————— I’ve just recovered from the Omicron variant of Covid. Because common Covid tests do not...

Safest Counties Now Are Those With Least Restrictions

Safest Counties Now Are
Those With Least Restrictions

Get Out of Clallam and Jefferson Counties if you're worried about OMG! Omicron! Counties with the least restrictions seem to be doing the best during the Omicron "surge." Clallam County, struggling under Dr. Allison Berry's exclusion of the unvaccinated from dining...

Cherry Street Project Vandalized

Cherry Street Project Vandalized

"Mom! They're throwing a refrigerator out a window!" Teenagers easily gained entrance to the derelict Carmel House and trashed it. Almost every window has been broken. Furniture, light fixtures, random kitchen utensils, a door and, yes, a refrigerator were hurled...

TOP TEN 2021 Spin Doctor Disinformation Statements

TOP TEN
2021 Spin Doctor
Disinformation Statements

“The welfare of the people, in particular, has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving  the servants of tyranny a good conscience.” — Albert Camus ------------------------------------ What a year 2021 was for health...

Money Talks, Lombardy Poplars Fall

Money Talks, Lombardy Poplars Fall

In early October 2021 the Leader reported that the Lombardy poplars along Sims Way were to be cut down. Subsequently we have learned that a three-pronged project is underway moving at precipitous speed. It was initiated in August 2021, receiving approval from the Port...

Two More Deaths from Heart Failure Following Pfizer Vax

Two More Deaths from Heart Failure Following Pfizer Vax

Two surviving spouses have come forward to describe their beloved mates’ deaths following Pfizer injections. Our last reporting on heart damage from the shots focused on the increasing incidence in young people. Those mounting injuries and deaths are underscored by...

Another Fairgrounds Tragedy

Another Fairgrounds Tragedy

A year ago, Jammi Lee Oxford killed herself. On December 17, 2020 she took her life at Morro Bay, California, in the same spot where her mother had committed suicide before her. Jammi had been living in a Chrysler minivan at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds. She fled...

IN YOUR OWN WORDS: Covid Cancel Culture

IN YOUR OWN WORDS:
Covid Cancel Culture

As the Covid crisis has unfolded in Jefferson County over the last two years, a slick, relentless, well-orchestrated fear narrative has created the greatest divide many of us have ever seen in our diverse, once-tolerant community. And with the arrival of experimental...

Suffer the Little Children

Suffer the Little Children

At the October 4th meeting of the Jefferson County Board of County Commissioners, Department of Emergency Management Director Willie Bence provided the following update: “We’re unlikely to do any more large clinics for the Pfizer booster dose population. Our next...

Walkouts Worldwide Wake Up PT

Walkouts Worldwide Wake Up PT

Worldwide Walkouts swept America on November 3 from Berkeley to Miami, from New York City to Honolulu, from Las Vegas to Chicago, and even the sidewalks by the Ferry Dock of benighted Port Townsend. What's this all about? People have been battered during the epidemic...

The Truth That Must Not Be Spoken

The Truth That Must Not Be Spoken

Do you know of local people who have been injured by (or died from) the Covid injections? You’re surely not hearing about vaccine injuries or deaths from any other local media. Obituaries about previously healthy residents who died following their jabs never mention...

County Kills Housing in Order to Save It

County Kills Housing in Order to Save It

After declaring a housing emergency in Jefferson County, public officials have now taken action to make the situation worse. On October 4 the Board of County Commissioners declared a new emergency establishing a moratorium on processing housing...

Will local school boards say “NO” to draconian mandates?

Will local school boards say “NO”
to draconian mandates?

On Thursday, October 7th, I attended the Port Townsend High School board meeting. Earlier in the week the Governor of California proclaimed that his state will require children to get the Covid-19 shot to attend school in person. I believe a similar mandate for...

Health Enforcers Catch Misinformation Fever

Health Enforcers Catch Misinformation Fever

The Jefferson County Board of Health on September 16 unanimously adopted a resolution "declaring health misinformation a public health crisis." They urge all "to use reliable sources of data that follows the preponderance of evidence" because "there are some people in...

Vax Mandate Protests – Just Exactly Why the Insults?

Vax Mandate Protests – Just Exactly Why the Insults?

[This piece was submitted to the Leader and rejected by them. Writer Brett Nunn explains, "I first offered it to the Leader hoping to reach a certain audience and start a civil conversation. The editor wrote back "it's not experimental and it's FDA approved.”]...

The Leader Promotes Hate Speech,  Censors Thoughtful Community Voices

The Leader Promotes Hate Speech,
Censors Thoughtful Community Voices

County residents picket the Leader building holding signs with messages like “Censorship means being over the target” and “The Leader Lies" ———————— HAVE YOU BEEN CENSORED? Click to see this special message! ———————— For nearly a year, the Leader, the Peninsula Daily...

Turning the page

Turning the page

Like you, we want Port Townsend Free Press to continue! The Port Townsend Free Press has been a precious window into the unreported corners of our fair (and sometimes not so fair) City of Dreams, as well as an outlet for voices not well served by local media and...

Long Live the Free Press! A New Team Steps Up

The specter of totalitarianism has revived the Port Townsend Free Press. A new team is stepping up to keep this exercise of First Amendment rights and free thinking alive. The Jefferson County Board of Health has declared that "misinformation" is a public health...

Adios and Thanks

It is time to close out this endeavor. I want to thank all our contributors and readers over the past almost four years. Together we brought new voices into the public dialogue, and reported facts the public has a right to know. We made some mistakes. We learned a lot...

The Politics of Alarmism

The Politics of Alarmism

Why are we constantly being hammered with climate alarmism, Covid alarmism and racial alarmism? The journalist and social commentator H. L. Mencken explained it decades ago: “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to...

The Food Co-op on Trial

The Food Co-op on Trial

The Food Co-op insists it is not pressing charges against Rachelle Merle. It is soley the prosecutor who's pushing this, they have asserted in correspondence with Co-op members. But, this doesn't get the Co-op out of the dock. What will be its position when its...

Victory: My Lawsuit Against Jefferson County

Victory: My Lawsuit Against Jefferson County

First Amendment violations have been corrected. Policies have been changed so that Jefferson County's on-line public forum complies with Constitutional protections of freedom of expression. Last year I sued Jefferson County for violating my First Amendment rights by...

Happy Fourth Birthday, Cherry Street Project!

Happy Fourth Birthday, Cherry Street Project!

Four years and $2.3 million in the rearview mirror. And still not one square foot of "affordable" housing out of the Cherry Street Project. The Jefferson County Republican Party commemorated the project's fourth anniversary, "and the benefits of one-party rule by...

The Arrest of Rachelle MerleThe Food Co-op On Trial

The Arrest of Rachelle Merle

The Food Co-op On Trial

Calling police to arrest one of its co-owners for trespassing has put the The Food Co-op on trial. On April 5, 2021, Rachelle Merle, one of the Co-op's member-owners, refused to wear a mask while shopping in the store. The store's manager told her she would have to...

Jefferson County’s “Third” Covid Death

Jefferson County’s “Third” Covid Death

Front-page health coverage by The Port Townsend and Jefferson County Leader returns this week with news that, "The third fatality to coronavirus in the county late last week happened at Jefferson Healthcare - the first coronavirus death at the facility.  The patient...

Petty Tyrants Coming To A Location Near You

Petty Tyrants Coming To A Location Near You

For years I have been making the Port Townsend to Coupeville ferry crossing often on a weekly basis. I call it the last great adventure on the west coast available to all. Wind, fog and tides often conspire to make the trip unpredictable.  Yes, it can be an adventure,...

Signs of Life: Buskers on the Block

Signs of Life: Buskers on the Block

Hooray for the the Port Townsend Main Street Program! Live music downtown is back! "Buskers on the Block" music series will bring musicians to play instruments and sing on PT's streets. The series is part of PT Main Street's "Love Where You Live Campaign." The music...

Calls to PT Police Up 38%

Calls to PT Police Up 38%

Calls to police are up 38%. Mental health incidents are up 27%. "Simmer on that for a second," City Manager John Mauro told City Council at its April 5, 2021, business meeting. But not a question was raised, not a word of concern was uttered from any of the...

Weekly Rallies for Freedom Come to Port Townsend

Weekly Rallies for Freedom Come to Port Townsend

The Great Reopening! Get Off Your Knees! The cries of the Worldwide Rally for Freedom were heard in Port Townsend on Saturday, March 20, 2021. About 40 people gathered on the plaza at Tyler and Water Streets without masks, but with musical instruments and songs and...

Cherry Street Handover: Red Flags About Bayside Housing

Cherry Street Handover: Red Flags About Bayside Housing

Should taxpayers have concerns about handing over the failed Cherry Street Project and another $300,000 to Bayside Housing? So far taxpayers are out about $2.33 million dollars on what is now widely recognized as a boondoggle and symbol of government incompetence and...

My First Amendment Lawsuit Against Jefferson County: Update

My First Amendment Lawsuit Against Jefferson County: Update

Banned for encouraging people to never forget 9/11. Sanctioned for mentioning Jefferson County’s terrible meth problem, chronic unemployment, shrinking job base and high poverty rate. That’s what I’ve learned about how Jefferson County operates the public forum of...

Of Covid Testing, “Misinformation” and Censorship

Of Covid Testing, “Misinformation” and Censorship

"Locke...is concerned about a Jefferson County group that may be spreading misinformation concerning the accuracy of the tests, claiming incorrectly that up to 90 percent of COVID-19 tests provide false positives.”  [Peninsula Daily News, 2/7/21] "Public naysaying on...

Jefferson County Still May Have No Deaths From COVID

Jefferson County Still May Have No Deaths From COVID

"Second person in Jefferson County dies from COVID-19" trumpets the January 13 Leader's front-page headline. https://www.ptleader.com/stories/update-second-person-in-jefferson-county-dies-from-covid-19,73202 She was "an 80-year-old woman who was being treated in a...

Adios, Hasta Las Vista for Now…Again

Adios, Hasta Las Vista for Now…Again

Port Townsend Free Press is going quiet for several months. The editor, Jim Scarantino, as in 2019, has to get to work on business responsibilities here and on the East Coast. Due to the COVID lockdowns, there's a significant backlog needing attention. Plus, he's...

Jefferson County Sheriff’s Foundation Steps Up to Help

Jefferson County Sheriff’s Foundation Steps Up to Help

A community partnership between retired law enforcement officers and civilians has been educating seniors and property owners about scams and crime prevention, bringing cheer to those needing a little love, and helping active-duty deputies do their jobs safely. The...

Evergreen Fitness is Open for Business

Evergreen Fitness is Open for Business

"Let's do this!" says Michelle West, owner of Evergreen Fitness in the Glen Cove area south of Port Townsend. "Starting 5:30 a.m. Monday January 11, we are open." Under the guidelines for fitness establishments announced by Governor Inslee on January 5, Evergreen...

Zoning Changes Threaten Hadlock Sewer Project

Zoning Changes Threaten Hadlock Sewer Project

I am the chair of the landowners committee pushing for construction of the Port Hadlock sewer. I am very worried the county is getting set to undermine everything we’ve hoped for and the financial commitment we’re ready to make to build the sewer. We are seeing the...

Are Your Children Getting The Education You Paid For?

Are Your Children Getting The Education You Paid For?

When the Port Townsend School District reopened the doors in September 2020 my family opted out of in-classroom learning. We opted back in at the beginning of November. My youngest was happy to return to Blue Heron Middle School even if it was for only two days a...

The Power of Christmas

The Power of Christmas

Unimaginable horrors taught my grandfather the power of Christmas.  Vincenzo Scarantino was 18 years old in 1915 when police swept through his remote Sicilian village rounding up conscripts to throw against Austrian fortifications. He spent the rest of his youth in...

Fairgrounds Police Log

Fairgrounds Police Log

Drugs, violence, crime, overdoses, chronic alcoholism, medical emergencies...and madness. Port Townsend police generated over 250 pages of reports on calls to the Jefferson County Fairgrounds from March through October 2020. The incidents range from calls to help one...

Fort Worden PDA Out of Money, Must Privatize to Survive

Fort Worden PDA Out of Money, Must Privatize to Survive

“We really don’t have a future if we try to remain status quo,” David Timmons, Acting Executive Director of the Fort Worden Public Development Authority told its Board of Directors at their December 9, 2020, special meeting.  The PDA will run out of money in several...

A Grim Existence at the Fairgrounds

A Grim Existence at the Fairgrounds

Mud and cold rain. Life in an always damp tent or unheated RV. Puddles for a front porch. No place to hide from the wind, or escape the sounds of fighting, incoherent muttering, screaming and partying  in the growing squatters camp at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds....

Trickle Up Poverty in Jefferson County

Trickle Up Poverty in Jefferson County

We have all heard of Trickle Down Economics. But, there is another concept called "Trickle Up Poverty." In Trickle Down Economics the concept is that the rich and/or the government basically spend or invest their money. That in turn allows development to occur where...

The Violence That Cost Port Townsend A Man Who Saves Lives

The Violence That Cost Port Townsend A Man Who Saves Lives

Violence ended the career of Port Townsend Police Officer Mark DuMond. After sustaining severe head injuries preventing an assault that could have killed a Jefferson Healthcare nurse he was never able to resume his full duties. DuMond knew the man who injured him. All...

Squatters Camp Grows at Fairgrounds: Photo Essay

Squatters Camp Grows at Fairgrounds: Photo Essay

The homeless/transient camp at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds has doubled in size since this summer. I am adding the descriptor "squatters camp" because that is what this is. The occupants of the tents and RVs, whatever the reasons for their circumstances, are...

Good News on the COVID Front–If You Want to Hear It

Good News on the COVID Front–If You Want to Hear It

In April of 2020, a professor of medicine at Stanford University led a study to determine what percentage of the population had actually been exposed to COVID 19. He was testing for seroprevalence, or evidence of COVID antibodies in a person’s blood. He was able to...

The Four Keys to Unlocking Affordable Housing

The Four Keys to Unlocking Affordable Housing

"There wasn’t a county in the U.S. where a minimum wage worker clocking in 40 hours a week could afford to rent a two-bedroom apartment in 2019.” That’s according to a report by the National Low Income Housing Coalition. This seems to be a sad reality. Right here in...

My Sincerest Condolences on the Death of Your Turkey

My Sincerest Condolences on the Death of Your Turkey

In case you weren’t paying attention, on November 16 we began the eighth extension of Governor Jay Inslee’s extra-legal Wujan Flu dictates first initiated way back on March 23rd.  The Legislature has let the Governor do what he wants. In Jefferson County all progress...

Why I’m Suing Jefferson County

Why I’m Suing Jefferson County

Rights not asserted are rights lost. If we acquiesce in abuses of governmental power, we become complicit in those actions. And then one day we wake up and wonder, "Where did America go?" I am suing Jefferson County because it is violating my First Amendment rights to...

Support Our Local Gyms

Support Our Local Gyms

Our local gyms are struggling. If you want them around when the Governor lifts his lock down order, you need to support them now. The Port Townsend Athletic Club has been closed since March. It is in such dire straits the owner has established a Go Fund Me campaign....

Criminal Investigators Called into Fort Worden PDA Mess

The following is an mail shared with us anonymously that has been sent from the co-chairs of the Fort Worden Public Development Authority to the Mayor of Port Townsend. Due its anonymous origins it went into our spam box and we did not discover it until this evening....

Fort Worden’s Promised Financial Oversight Never Happened

Fort Worden’s Promised Financial Oversight Never Happened

Promises to the State Auditor that an audit committee would provide enhanced financial oversight were broken. The Fort Worden Public Development Authority's audit committee was not formally created until earlier this year, and it has rarely met. Even after revelations...

Fort Worden Glamping A Soggy Mess

Fort Worden Glamping A Soggy Mess

Someone left the cake out in the rain. Fort Worden's $2 million glamping project is a soggy mess. I walked the hillside where the glamping project was supposed to have 19 luxury tents completed by June. The clouds were spitting rain and the wind cut like a knife. I...

There Will Be No Healing

There Will Be No Healing

I’m not conceding this election AT ALL. Unless you can show me evidence of President Dewey and President Gore, you will understand that the media does not choose our president for us. They called those elections, too. They both flipped. But that’s not what I want to...

Unmasking False Climate Alarmism

Unmasking False Climate Alarmism

In a June 30, 2020 article in The American Thinker Charles Battig  points out that Planet of the Humans, the recent film produced by Michael Moore, shows how the reality of needing to provide 24/7 reliable electricity to consumers requires that fossil fuels remain the...

The Cost of Monopolized Politics

The Cost of Monopolized Politics

Democrats rule supreme and Jefferson County is paying the price for their almost two decades of monopoly power. Just look at the city and county elected officials in every office. Only one is not a Democrat. All the various boards of the county and city are appointed...

Thanksgiving at Tri-Area Center Will Be Drive-Up

Thanksgiving at Tri-Area Center Will Be Drive-Up

Thanksgiving will not be stopped by COVID. The Tri-Area Community Meals Team will have hot meals available for pickup. Count on the same wonderful turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, cranberry sauce and roll they been serving up every year to people...

Fort Worden Hit By Cherry Street Project Disease

Fort Worden Hit By Cherry Street Project Disease

Fort Worden is in big trouble. The public development authority that runs the commercial operations at the state park is teetering on the brink of financial collapse. This should not have come as a surprise to the people charged with the fiduciary duty of overseeing...

America on Course for Greater Conflict

This election will not heal wounds or build bridges. The half of the country that does not want socialism and refuses to surrender its fundamental rights will be subjected to increasing oppression and restrictions by the ascendant Democrats nationally and on the state...

Election Fraud: A Vivid Memory from South Philadelphia

Election Fraud: A Vivid Memory from South Philadelphia

Election fraud in Philadelphia could determine who is the next President. That's what we're hearing from analysts war gaming the Electoral College and concluding that the White House could go to the person who wins the Keystone State's 20 electoral votes. Donald Trump...

Jefferson County’s New Activists

Jefferson County’s New Activists

2020 saw young conservatives emerging as activists in Jefferson County. They had not previously been involved in politics of any kind. They are fearless, motivated and already making a mark on their community. They have deep roots here, all of them having grown up in...

Aiding and Abetting Biden Crimes

Aiding and Abetting Biden Crimes

As voters, are we complicit to a crime if a candidate has become compromised beyond a shadow of a doubt, yet we continue to support his campaign in an effort to secure his ascension to higher office? Pulitzer Prize winning author David Mamet states in his book, The...

Transient/Homeless Village Grows at Fairgrounds

Transient/Homeless Village Grows at Fairgrounds

It looks like a scene from Seattle. A transient/homeless village of at least 35 tents, RVs and vehicles has taken over the Jefferson County Fairgrounds. "I've been here 12 years," says Terry Berge, the Fairgrounds campground host.  "I've never had a a year like this....

Racist, Heal Thyself

Racist, Heal Thyself

The Board of Health needs to look in the mirror. They have declared "systemic racism" a public health emergency. Do they realize that they are that system? The Board of Health is a composite of Port Townsend's political and economic elite. Only one of of its members...

To Catch a Thief–$100 Reward

To Catch a Thief–$100 Reward

Who is this sign thief? She was photographed just after she stole a Trump sign. The location was Irondale Road at the bottom of a driveway, close to where 7th Street turns off. The sign had been standing along the road near the bottom of a drive for a single wide that...

Local Democrats Help Explain Iran’s Support for Biden

Local Democrats Help Explain Iran’s Support for Biden

Iran is actively supporting Joe Biden's run for the White House. Both the FBI and the Director of National Intelligence have confirmed that Iran is attempting to interfere in the election to favor Biden's candidacy. The latest covert actions to surface were fake...

Cherry Street Project Handover “Not a Done Deal”

Cherry Street Project Handover “Not a Done Deal”

Bayside Housing has not yet committed to taking on the failed Cherry Street Project. "First, let me tell you this is not a done deal," says Gary Keister. He is serving as the acting managing director of Bayside Housing. It has been without a permanent managing...

Board of Health Ignores County’s Suicide Crisis

Board of Health Ignores County’s Suicide Crisis

Jefferson County has a suicide rate far above the state average. Port Townsend's suicide rate is staggering. The Jefferson County Board of Health has spent more time on climate change, nuclear disarmament and wordsmithing a resolution on "systemic racism' than it has...

Sue Forde on the Issues

Sue Forde on the Issues

Sue Forde is running to represent the 24th Legislative District in the Washington House of Representatives. Forde (R) is challenging the incumbent Michael Chapman (D). We recently reported how Chapman's campaign is funded almost entirely, more than 95%, by lobbyists...

Don’t Nuke Library Books, Thank You!

Don’t Nuke Library Books, Thank You!

A plea from librarians not to overreact to COVID is now included with Jefferson County library books. It seems some nervous bibliophiles are going to extreme measures to sanitize library books. Like Jay Inslee's lockdown, their cure could be doing more damage than it...

Who is John Mauro, Port Townsend’s City Manager?

Who is John Mauro, Port Townsend’s City Manager?

Something was off. The email exchange, the tit-for-tat, was not what I would have expected from a man reported to have managed almost a quarter of a billion dollar budget and been a high level executive with a large staff. That's what had been reported about John...

Latest Cherry Street Giveaway Hits Taxpayers Harder

Latest Cherry Street Giveaway Hits Taxpayers Harder

$2,329,961 to remodel and finish 8 modest, low rent apartments in an old building. So far. At least another $1 million will be required before the first tenant moves into the Cherry Street Project that's been sitting empty and decaying on a Port Townsend hillside...

Jay Inslee Makes Death Harder

Families' ability to mourn and remember, to honor and celebrate lost lives is being crippled by the Governor's arbitrary rules on funerals. Funerals of more than 30 attendees, regardless of where they are held, inside or out, are prohibited. You can assemble hundreds...

Good News On the Pandemic Front

Good News On the Pandemic Front

It's not a pandemic pandemic. This has not been the mother of all biological nightmares. Right off the bat the projections of millions dead were regularly revised downward, though Joe Biden keeps saying things like 200 million Americans will be dead from COVID by the...

Port Townsend’s Hatred and Intolerance Problem

Port Townsend’s Hatred and Intolerance Problem

Diversity not welcomed. Dissent and free speech punished. Different cultures, values, and faiths oppressed and marginalized. You've got to watch what you say and nod your head at the right time. Or else. That is what Port Townsend is becoming. This truth came to light...

Lines Form in Battle for Future of Fairgrounds

Lines Form in Battle for Future of Fairgrounds

The homeless and their activists on one side, homeowners and concerned parents on the other, and the Jefferson County Fairgrounds caught in the middle. Lines are forming in a struggle for the future of this piece of open land in the heart of Port Townsend. The...

Massive Back the Blue Rally in Port Townsend

Massive Back the Blue Rally in Port Townsend

About 400 cars, trucks, and motorcycles. A line 6 miles long that took an hour to drive to the end of Water Street and turn around. A massive Back the Blue Rally organized by the wives of law enforcement officers stretched from Chimacum through Port Townsend on...

Port Townsend Antifa, Easy as 1-2-3

Port Townsend Antifa, Easy as 1-2-3

Start your own Antifa group. Easy peasy. As our Concerned Citizen of Port Townsend has learned, like making bombs, the instructions are available on the Internet. For those slow to recognize sarcasm, this is sarcasm. But it shows us what the people burning our cities,...

A Tale of Three Cities: Poulsbo, Sequim and Port Townsend

A Tale of Three Cities: Poulsbo, Sequim and Port Townsend

Poulsbo, Sequim and Port Townsend. Many differences and many similarities exist between these cities. Let’s start with similarities. Population, from the 2018 U.S. Census: Poulsbo 10,927 people. Sequim, 7,481 and Port Townsend, 9,704. Retail sales for 2018: Poulsbo...

Bumping Along Port Townsend’s Busted Up Streets

Bumping Along Port Townsend’s Busted Up Streets

WHAM! GRIND! SCRAPE!! Grrrrrr. I had scooted across 19th Street, going north on Landes after leaving the Safeway. When I got to the other side my front tires dropped, the road came up, and I was scraping the bottom of my car across the blacktop. I disembarked to...

Burn Everything Down

Burn Everything Down

On Friday, July 24th the citizens and businesses of Seattle were told by their police chief Carmen Best that because of Seattle City Council decisions, they would be without law enforcement protection if a peaceful protest/riot occurred in their neighborhood. “City...

The Real Epidemic in Port Townsend: Addiction

The Real Epidemic in Port Townsend: Addiction

Fortunately COVID-19 has not killed anyone in Jefferson County, but addiction sure has.  We don't really need the CDC to validate those numbers. But they have: more young people have died of drug overdoses and suicides since this pandemic began than of COVID-19. For...

Land Regulations Holding Back Jobs, Affordable Housing

Land Regulations Holding Back Jobs, Affordable Housing

Most everyone has heard that Jefferson County is interested in creating affordable housing and jobs. We have heard that over the past 15 years, at least. But housing costs continue to escalate and jobs are scarce. Our children know this. They mostly have to move away...

Reckoning with “The Reckoning”

Reckoning with “The Reckoning”

The KPTZ program called "The Reckoning," was supposed to be a moderated conversation between Jefferson County Sheriff Joe Nole and a Native American woman, an organizer of Black Lives Matter of Jefferson County and an Hispanic man, with Port Townsend's Mayor jumping...

Thank You!

Thank You!

It is time for us to say, "Thank you!" We started this modest effort at citizen journalism a little over two years ago. We were forced to take last year off to deal with personal and professional business matters, and just resumed active publishing in January of this...

City Council Threatens Port Townsend’s Public Safety

City Council Threatens Port Townsend’s Public Safety

No police brutality. No court judgments for racial profiling or wrongful arrest. No Department of Justice investigations or complaints by civil rights groups that our police have systematically, even occasionally targeted minority citizens. It is widely recognized...

Crime and Violence in Port Townsend

Crime and Violence in Port Townsend

More than one violent incident a day. Reading The Leader's cutesy police blotter feature you wouldn't know it. But statistics released by the Port Townsend Police Department in a presentation to City Council show our city has more violence--and more crime--than many...

Coronavirus Alarmism Is Running Rampant

The media is reporting "More virus cases", "Cases surge", and raising other terrifying alarms. Or as Chicken Little would say: "The sky is falling, the sky is falling."  But emphasizing just the number of "cases" is very deceptive. There are key questions that should...

Wondering About Black Lives Matter

Wondering About Black Lives Matter

The other day in Port Townsend as the Black Lives Matter march passed through Uptown. I saw many people I know, good people, thoughtful people, marching with this group.  I wondered to myself why these people would show their support for an organization whose name...

Black Life Mattered to Port Townsend Police

Black Life Mattered to Port Townsend Police

A young Black man could be dead if not for Port Townsend police. The story has received no coverage by local newspapers. Nothing from Black Lives Matter of Jefferson County. None of the high school kids who blocked traffic while shouting "Black lives matter!" have...

1,200 Miles Through Washington’s Phase 3 Counties

1,200 Miles Through Washington’s Phase 3 Counties

Time is of the essence. That was the single most important observation gleaned from 1,200 miles of travel through Washington’s Phase 3 counties. To get to them we had to drive through Phase 2 counties and some still in a variation of Phase 1.  These "phases" refer to...

Jefferson Community Foundation Plays Victim…And Bully

Jefferson Community Foundation Plays Victim…And Bully

A local businessman has left Jefferson County after false accusations of racism incited by the Jefferson Community Foundation. And a small business already devastated by the Governor’s shut down order is the talk of protests and boycotts that could finish it off....

Masks Forever

Masks Forever

As of Friday, June 26th, 2020, according to Executive Decree 20-03 from the Washington State Secretary of Health, “Every person in Washington State must wear a face covering that covers their noses when in any indoor or outdoor public setting.”  Initially it was just...

Recognizing Commissioner Greg Brotherton

Recognizing Commissioner Greg Brotherton

"Best commissioner in years." "A breath of fresh air." "Someone who is actually trying to help." I've been hearing from quite a few people in Jefferson County that County Commissioner Greg Brotherton is being extremely helpful and responsive to those struggling to...

The Fabricated Ferguson Fable

The Fabricated Ferguson Fable

What's with white kids and their parents getting down on both knees on our streets and sidewalks and raising their hands over their heads? And this repetitive call-and-answer chanting of "Hands up!", followed by "Don't Shoot!" What's that all about? Its practitioners...

Be The Change You Want To See In The Police

Be The Change You Want To See In The Police

It is easy to lay down on a street for a few minutes, to rage and swear at police, to accuse them of all sorts of despicable actions and evil attitudes and toss off demands for sweeping systemic reform. It is especially easy with the police protecting you from getting...

Unmasking Masking Mendacity

Unmasking Masking Mendacity

Jefferson County has gone all in on community masking. On June 5 Dr. Thomas Locke, Jefferson County Public Health Officer, issued a directive requiring that masks be worn in all indoor spaces. Just wander around town and look in the windows and on the doors of local...

Will Port Townsend’s Next Demonstration Be Peaceful?

Will Port Townsend’s Next Demonstration Be Peaceful?

Port Townsend has avoided the mayhem and destruction that has hijacked many of the otherwise civil demonstrations against the murder of George Floyd. Another George Floyd demonstration is planned for Friday, June 5. This event, entitled "Justice for Black Lives:...

No COVID Spike From Anti-Lock Down Protests

No COVID Spike From Anti-Lock Down Protests

Once again the experts were wrong. We were warned that those reckless and irresponsible people on the steps of the Capitol in mid-April protesting the statewide lockdown would cause a spike in COVID cases. Unmasked cries of "Give me liberty or give me death!" would...

Masks: Nope and Hope. Two Views.

Masks: Nope and Hope. Two Views.

NOPE    By Brett Nunn Masks. Some people are wearing them. Some are not. Some of the people wearing them are proclaiming that maskless people are ignorant at best, and “Killing People!” at worst. The people not wearing masks are confounded by the people who are...

Fear and Loathing in Port Townsend

Fear and Loathing in Port Townsend

The woman driving the shiny black Range Rover let go of the wheel with both hands. She flipped her middle fingers at the young mother standing at the curb with her children and a sign reading, “Let Me Work.” The woman in the Range Rover was about 60, had her windows...

The Informants of Jefferson County

The Informants of Jefferson County

Who has been informing on their neighbor? An enterprising citizen journalist has enabled a searchable database that answers that question. Allegations of violations of the Governor's "Stay at Home" and "essential/non-essential" business list have generated thousands...

Yes, Dr. Locke Could Be Wrong, Very Wrong

Yes, Dr. Locke Could Be Wrong, Very Wrong

Questions unasked. Statements and predictions taken at face value. Vague data, ambiguities, and contradictions unaddressed. Whatever happened to "Question Authority"? Jefferson County Public Health Officer Dr. Thomas Locke has a huge responsibility and huge powers due...

Port Townsend’s Selfish, Cruel Old People

Port Townsend’s Selfish, Cruel Old People

We are triaging the young and healthy for the sake of the elderly and already sick. We are not all in this together. It is families and people who need to work paying the cost in terms of lost jobs, crushed hopes and lost homes so old people can feel safe. We are...

Protest Against Lock Down Grows In Port Angeles

Protest Against Lock Down Grows In Port Angeles

"Reopen Clallam County" has seen its numbers of protestors continue to grow. Every Thursday at 4:30 p.m. the group assembles on Lincoln Street, Port Angeles, by the courthouse to protest Governor Inslee's "Stay at Home" order. They have also been sharing information...

Default the Cherry Street Project Now

Default the Cherry Street Project Now

Port Townsend should immediately declare the Cherry Street Project in default and save taxpayers a little over $316,000. That is the balance of cash remaining on the city's loan to Homeward Bound Community Land Trust, the volunteer organization behind the stalled-out...

Port Townsend City Council M.I.A. In Time Of Crisis

Port Townsend City Council M.I.A. In Time Of Crisis

No sense of urgency. More discussion of plastic bags and Earth Day than doing anything to alleviate the economic crisis already devastating our community, destroying lives and sowing despair and anger. That sums up the Port Townsend City Council's weekly meeting on...

Jay Inslee is Losing Control

Jay Inslee is Losing Control

He has only himself to blame. Senseless, irrational, and transparently political decisions have undermined the integrity of Governor Jay Inslee's "stay at home" order. Protests and defiance are building. A protest against his order is set for this Sunday, April 19,...

How’s Jay Inslee Doing as Dictator?

How’s Jay Inslee Doing as Dictator?

We face great dangers to life and liberty, not just from a novel virus, but also from political leaders who too quickly embrace the role of dictator and abuse their power. That's how it goes with dictators. And that's how it's going with Jay Inslee. On one hand,...

Jay Inslee Is A Terrible, But Typical Central Planner

Jay Inslee Is A Terrible, But Typical Central Planner

We need a Smarter Stay-At-Home Order.  Gov. Jay Inslee's current version is causing avoidable collateral damage. We get it. Flatten the curve, maintain social distance, wash your hands, don't touch your face and wipe down frequently touched surfaces. Sure, some people...

Miracle Cure Discovered Locally for COVID19 Side Effects

Miracle Cure Discovered Locally for COVID19 Side Effects

Some people are not doing so well handling the pandemic. In one sad case, a Port Townsend woman was heard screaming through her open back door. A teenage girl called out to ask if she were okay. The screaming woman answered, "Yes! I'm just letting out anger. I hope...

Cherry Street Project Welcomes First Tenants

Cherry Street Project Welcomes First Tenants

After three years and a budget of $3.2 million, the Cherry Street Project welcomed its first tenants. Not in the 70-year old building contaminated with asbestos and lead. No, these tenants are living al fresco in a homeless encampment. The photograph for this story...

Jefferson County’s Fake Climate Emergency

Jefferson County’s Fake Climate Emergency

Forget facts. Forget failed predictions. Forget the best, most relevant science. Climate fear exploiters are set to ram through a "climate emergency declaration" that will give the Jefferson County Board of County Commissioners greater powers to dictate just about...

UW Meteorologist: Washington Faces No Climate Emergency

UW Meteorologist: Washington Faces No Climate Emergency

Jefferson County will be just fine even if the models predicting global warming prove accurate. We will face no inconvenience other than more rain. Don't take it from us. Listen to University of Washington meteorologist Cliff Mass. He has been working with a team of...

Tri-Area Thanksgiving Meal: A Wonderful Community Gathering

Tri-Area Thanksgiving Meal: A Wonderful Community Gathering

The tables are set, the turkeys are roasting, volunteers are getting excited about seeing old friends and making new ones. The annual Tri-Area Community Thanksgiving Meal will return starting noon tomorrow and filling bellies and bringing smiles until 3 p.m.  Hundreds...

Nazi Witches Put Curse on Joe D’Amico

Nazi Witches Put Curse on Joe D’Amico

Somewhere in Port Townsend, little dolls of Joe D'Amico are being stuck with hat pins. Or wax Joey Dee miniatures are being cast into coal fires. Or hairs plucked from the back of Joe's head at the last hearing on his proposed gun range are being woven into triple...

What’s Happening With the Cherry Street Project?

What’s Happening With the Cherry Street Project?

Port Townsend's premiere affordable housing project is an eyesore. One of the most expensive real estate developments in Jefferson County--over $2 million in public funds for eight apartments--is boarded up, uninhabitable and detracting from the quality of the...

Happy New Year! And Adios, For Now

Happy New Year! And Adios, For Now

Thank you to all the readers who helped us exceed 60,000 page views since our first investigative report was published a short seven months ago.  Our most widely read reporting was on the Cherry Street Project--the extravagant waste of scarce affordable housing...

17 and Pregnant: The Third Trimester, Joy From Despair

17 and Pregnant: The Third Trimester, Joy From Despair

The first six months of Ravyn's journey opened with happiness and hope then crashed hard into the reality of being a teen mother.  We encouraged readers not to rule out this young couple just because of the hopelessness and despair described in Ravyn's First and...

The Tragedy of the Cherry Street Project

The Tragedy of the Cherry Street Project

The Cherry Street Project is in more trouble than city and non-profit leaders are letting on. Behind the scenes they have been wrestling with the realization that the original cost estimate appears to have been unrealistic. The fledgling non-profit group of volunteers...

Seventeen and Pregnant: Despair and Fear in the Second Trimester

Seventeen and Pregnant: Despair and Fear in the Second Trimester

(We rejoin Ravyn, who asked to share her journey with us.  In the first installment (click here), she and her nineteen-year old boyfriend decided to marry and do what it took to bring their child into the world.  Pregnancy radically changed Ravyn, a "horrible person"...

Howling Chickens! NW Discovery Lab’s Latest Adventure

We are always delighted to share news from Port Townsend's NW Discovery Lab.  The educational and life enhancement this program offers...well, we wish we'd had them as kids.  We are fortunate to have this program thriving here.   Here's the latest. Teaser: it involves...

Things That Really Work In Jeffferson County: The Recyclery

Things That Really Work In Jeffferson County: The Recyclery

[Editor's Note: Welcome new contributor Brett Nunn, a long-time Port Townsend resident, father and published author.  He wants to write to about things that really work in our wonderful community, while other contributors shine a light on some things needing a...

Standing Up To The Attacks On This Site’s Editor

Over the past few months there has been an orchestrated effort to spread defamatory and libelous information about the editor of the Port Townsend Free Press.  This information is absolutely and unequivocally false.  Some of this information was spread by Jefferson...

Deficits Loom for Jeffco Budget

The Jefferson County Board of County Commissioners has a simple but huge problem. The government is spending more than it takes in. Beginning in January we’ll see whether the board, with its newest member, is up to the challenge. Between 2011 and 2016, general fund...

A Zero-Emissions Governor

A Zero-Emissions Governor

Governor Jay Inslee can still be a climate champion on a global scale.  Sure, he didn’t get a carbon tax to hold up as an example of the sacrifice his state was willing to make.  Voters again rejected a plan he backed that would have made gasoline, propane,...

Riding Shotgun with JCSO Deputy Brandon Przygocki

It’s a tight fit – strapped in the passenger seat of a Ford Explorer Police Interceptor crammed with radios, radars, computers, keyboards, and both lethal and non-lethal long weapons. Ten-year veteran Jefferson County Deputy Sheriff Brandon Przygocki holds the wheel....

Democrats Romp In Tuesday’s Elections

Democrats Romp In Tuesday’s Elections

Energized Democrats in Jefferson County delivered commanding victories up and down the ticket Tuesday, with Greg Brotherton winning a landslide victory for the open seat on the Board of County Commissioners and Joe Nole unseating incumbent Sheriff Dave Stanko. ...

VOTE

VOTE

We'll return after the election with new stories and new contributors as Port Townsend Free Press continues to grow. Thank you!

Vote for Dave Stanko–Guest Editorial by Gene Farr

Vote for Dave Stanko–Guest Editorial by Gene Farr

On October 22, 2018, I wrote an editorial, "Sheriff Stanko, Please Stand Down," about why I believe Dave Stanko should not get another term as Jefferson County Sheriff.  In it, I asked "What's with Republicans?" Though not endorsed by the party, many prominent...

Disenfranchising District 3

Disenfranchising District 3

The people of District 3 in Jefferson County have been disenfranchised from the Board of County Commissioners for some time now. The question for today is whether their voice will continue to be disregarded by the Port Townsend political elite.  I say disenfranchised...

Windward School Students Dig For Mastodons

Windward School Students Dig For Mastodons

How cool is this? We received this press release from Windward School, one of the excellent enrichment programs run privately in Jefferson County for children and families wanting more than our public schools offer.  Here's the story, then more on Windward School:...

Reject The Port Townsend Manifesto

Reject The Port Townsend Manifesto

I give Jefferson County Democrats a lot of credit for being on the ball. When I opened my mailbox last week to find my ballot for the November 6 election, I also found a sample ballot provided by our local Democrat Party. The timing was impeccable. They were crystal...

Greg Brotherton Opposes Child Safety Cannabis Rules

Greg Brotherton Opposes Child Safety Cannabis Rules

Readers of this column know that I’ve spent a little time in politics. After having worked four presidential campaigns, scores of U.S. Senate and governorship races, and hundreds of congressional campaigns, I felt comfortable thinking I had pretty much seen it all...

Sheriff Stanko, Please Stand Down

Sheriff Stanko, Please Stand Down

I have been working my way through a long list of deputies and civilian employees of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office.  They volunteered to speak with a journalist, something I don’t get much when I am trying to pry information out of law enforcement.  I should...

Greg Brotherton’s Lack of Judgment and Maturity

Greg Brotherton’s Lack of Judgment and Maturity

It’s impossible to know what goes on in the mind of Elon Musk. The man who leads Tesla and the privately-held SpaceX Corporation is a genius and a visionary. But his judgment and maturity are now being called into question. Musk generated wide ranging problems for...

Gun Control Emerges as Issue in Jeffco Commissioner Race

Gun Control Emerges as Issue in Jeffco Commissioner Race

Initiative 1639 is not the only threat to your Second Amendment rights on the November 6 ballot. The Jefferson County Board of County Commissioners is joining the effort to keep you from exercising your constitutional rights.  The voters' decision on who...

Tweek Watch Olympic Peninsula: Facebook Crime Fighters

Tweek Watch Olympic Peninsula: Facebook Crime Fighters

A game camera is triggered by motion at 3 a.m.  A black Dodge pickup truck is photographed leaving a meth compound in Sequim.  The pic goes up on the Facebook page of Tweek Watch Olympic Peninsula where it is seen by over 2,500 people. This truck and...

17 and Pregnant–A Story in Three Parts

17 and Pregnant–A Story in Three Parts

The First Trimester Stories not being told, voices not being heard.  Port Townsend Free Press set out to address that shortcoming in our local journalism scene. That means more than politics and investigative reporting, if we are to meet the goals we have...

Fake Democracy in Jefferson County

Fake Democracy in Jefferson County

 I had a brief and cordial correspondence recently with Port Townsend City Councilman David Faber about the way commissioners are elected in Jefferson County. With the race for District 3 County Commissioner perched atop the local ballot, I asked him how he felt about...

Reefer Madne$$

Reefer Madne$$

Reefer Madness is gripping America. I’m not talking about the 1936 cult movie classic that so many of us rolled our eyes at as teenagers. I’m talking about the billions of dollars that are flowing into U.S. and Canadian stock markets to buy shares of companies that...

Knowing “The Homeless”

When we see a homeless person “flying a flag” (panhandling with a cardboard sign), we react with sadness and empathy, followed by a gift of money.  It may make us feel better.  But are we making things worse? We live in a society with plenty of opportunity. Employers...

Answering Criticism About Brinnon Group Column

Answering Criticism About Brinnon Group Column

One of my favorite responsibilities as a news executive was to serve as an ombudsman. When readers express complaints about a news organization’s coverage of an issue, it is the ombudsman’s role to publicly and constructively respond to these complaints, and explain...

From Russia With Love…And Respect For The Law

From Russia With Love…And Respect For The Law

It would have been easy to break the law.  My Russian fiancé Elena and I, along with our new baby, could have easily obtained a Canadian tourist visa, hopped the ferry in Victoria, B.C., and illegally set up home in sanctuary city Port Townsend.  In this city that has...

Now Showing – Desperation Over Pleasant Harbor

[The South Speaks Back: Quick Retort from the Brinnon Group]  One way to gauge desperation is through rhetoric. The more unhinged someone’s language, the more they know they’re losing. Facts are supplanted by accusations. Emotion displaces intelligence. We’ve all been...

What Trump Should Have Said in Helsinki

I really enjoy writing about politics in Jefferson County. The opportunity to learn and better connect with the people and issues that matter to us is deeply appreciated and I have mostly resisted the urge to write about national politics. But after a...

A Dope Dealer on the County Commission?

A Dope Dealer on the County Commission?

Greg Brotherton Undermines Youth Prevention Efforts Greg Brotherton owns Sea Change Cannabis, the first pot shop to open in Jefferson County.  He promotes the expanded use of marijuana through his website and movies he has written and produced.   He puts...

The Government We Deserve

Philosophers and political thinkers have observed rightly over the centuries that people get the government they deserve. But a couple of news items over the past week got me wondering whether Jefferson County really deserves such bad government. First...

DISTRICT 3 COMMISSIONER RACE: JON COOKE ON THE ISSUES

We asked all candidates in the race for the open seat representing District 3 on the Jefferson County Commission the same four questions.  Monday, we published Craig Durgan’s answers.  Today it is Jon Cooke’s turn. “Growth, Opportunity,...

DISTRICT 3 COMMISSIONER RACE: CRAIG DURGAN ON THE ISSUES

We asked all the candidates running to represent Jefferson County Commission District 3 several questions which highlight the challenges of the position.  We will be running their responses this week. Craig Durgan is an engineer and it shows in his mastery...

Jefferson County’s Hierarchy of Needs

Jefferson County’s Hierarchy of Needs

Had anyone told me last year that I’d be writing about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs as it pertains to Jefferson County politics, I would have told them they’re nuts. But having made a passing reference to it a few weeks ago, and having listened to local...

Pressure Mounts for Action on Hadlock Sewer

Pressure Mounts for Action on Hadlock Sewer

77% of Landowners Petition Jefferson County Commission Landowners representing 77% of the areas of Port Hadlock zoned for commercial, industrial and multi-family units on June 18, 2018, delivered to the Jefferson County Board of Commissioners their...

A SPECIAL INDEPENDENCE DAY FOR PUBLIC SECTOR WORKERS

Port Townsend and Jeffco Contracts Requiring Payment of Union Dues Now Unenforceable  Pop quiz: If you belong to a collective bargaining unit in Jefferson County, and if that collective bargaining unit took money from you to support the reelection of...

A BLOODY AFTERNOON IN KAH TAI PARK

A BLOODY AFTERNOON IN KAH TAI PARK

A 911 call:  assault in progress, Kah Tai Park.  On their way police listen to an open line, a second call originating from inside the park.  A man screams for help.  Then another voice comes on and shouts, "Give me that phone!" The line goes dead. A...

GLIMMERS OF HOPE FOR THE HADLOCK SEWER

GLIMMERS OF HOPE FOR THE HADLOCK SEWER

Large Federal Infrastructure Bills Could Provide Funding Local and state governments have been unable to pay for the critically needed Port Hadlock-Irondale sewer project.  At least another $30 million must come from somewhere.  It could come from...

Is Opposing Donald Trump’s Economic Policies Racist?

Port Townsend’s Women’s March: Bigoted or Detached from Reality?   [Editor's note:  We have notified the Port Townsend Women's March organization that we would be happy to publish their response to this commentary] The Congressional Black Caucus is...

CANDIDATE FORUM LONG ON GRIPES, SHORT ON ANSWERS

CANDIDATE FORUM LONG ON GRIPES, SHORT ON ANSWERS

The big thing that emerged from Sunday’s Honesty Forum in Port Ludlow, where all four candidates for the open seat on the Jefferson County Board of Commissioners appeared on the same stage, was that most of them are better at griping about problems than...

SUGAR HILL FARMS OPENS ITS DOORS

SUGAR HILL FARMS OPENS ITS DOORS

Photos by Kara Kellog A sweet spot on SR 19 is bringing smiles to Jefferson County. Brenda and Mike Hill on June 12 opened business as Sugar Valley Farms in the old Beaver Valley Store. Inside awaits what one customer described as “simple extravagance.”...

GOVERNOR INSLEE RESPONDS

GOVERNOR INSLEE RESPONDS

Do Black Lives Matter When It Comes To Green Cars? Electric cars run on the suffering of Black children living like slaves.  Dangerous, toxic mining conditions in the Congo cause death, disease and birth defects at alarming rates.  The cobalt from...

The Bernie Problem

I like Bernie Sanders. He’s something of an anomaly in American politics because he’s one of the most honest politicians on the scene, not just today but going back decades. It took a lot of courage for Sanders to declare himself a Socialist when running...

HAAS FACES SECOND COMPLAINT

HAAS FACES SECOND COMPLAINT

Prosecutor's Odd Response Repeats Charge He Let A Serial Rapist Go Free Jefferson County Prosecutor Michael Haas has been hit with another complaint for unlawful use of his office in his campaign for re-election.  While the alleged infraction may be minor,...

Do Black Lives Matter When It Comes To Green Cars?

Do Black Lives Matter When It Comes To Green Cars?

Electric cars run on the suffering of Black children living like slaves. Amnesty International exposed this painful truth in 2016.  You can read their report by clicking on its title, "This is What We Die For." Most of the world's cobalt comes from the...

Lights in the Darkness

Lights in the Darkness

The young man was dead. He lay on his back, eyes open, skin the color of ash, no sign of breathing.  It looked like he had fallen off a new Cannondale road bike.  The bike--carbon fiber, electric transmission, high-end wheels--was on his chest.   He wore...

THE CRAZY OTTER OPENS IN HADLOCK

THE CRAZY OTTER OPENS IN HADLOCK

Three years after starting negotiations to buy the notorious Zoog's Caveman Cookin', followed by years of remodeling, construction and engineering, partners Ashley Emery and Brent Garrett today opened their Crazy Otter to its first customers. "We're in the...

Jefferson County’s Conflicted Democrat Party

Being relatively new to the Olympic Peninsula, I confess that my institutional knowledge of local politics is not terribly comprehensive. But I think it fair to observe that we owe a modicum of credit to the all-Democrat County Board of Commissioners for...

Moon Over Port Townsend

The Battle of the Sexes has reached new depths of confusion. Not a day passes without some person being accused by some other person of some form of unseemly behavior, invariably linked to sex or something like sex. Some cases are very serious, like the...

ABOUT IPA, AND INTRODUCING OUR FIRST COLUMNIST

We rate everything from Port Townsend Brewing as quaffable, top-notch suds.  That is our considered position on local beer and we’re sticking to it. So much for a beer tasting review.  This is really about the last group of dancers in the Rhody...

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