by Jim Scarantino | Nov 8, 2019 | Politics
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 moons or pentangles or ankhs and wrapped around the necks of frogs.
On November 11, 2019, at 49 minutes to noon, Port Townsend witches will seek to seal shut Joe’s mouth, and numb the fingers of P.J. Sullivan to silence voices that ripple the calm waters of their gauzy world.
They will summon the dark god of silence and doom named Zuckerberg to bring down the dreaded Jefferson County Washington Facebook page.
Get it? 11/11 at 11:11 a.m. A time intentionally selected, as organizers have admitted, for its supernatural powers. To witches and Wiccans, 11 is a master and very spiritual number. The space between the numerals is a portal. As the Wiccan website BlackWitchCoven.org explains, In moments the time, or numbers 11:11 are noticed, one should make a wish and know it will come true. As previously discussed, a connection between the spiritual and physical worlds comes through this portal, so basically anything can be manifested from the spiritual into the physical and the number 11 resonates with this energetic connection. It should be accepted as a confirmation from the universe!
In an open letter to Joe D’Amico, they boast of the power of their “magic” that will bring him to his knees, or at least shut him up. Poor Joe. He’s up against confirmation from the universe!
Joe D’Amico, owner of Security Services Northwest, once one of the largest private employers in Jefferson County (until he was virtually driven out), employs Sullivan as a communications director of sorts. Sullivan writes the Jefferson County Washington FB page posts. Sullivan spent nearly three decades with The Port Townsend and Jefferson County Leader, as reporter and finally its editor. His is the only sometimes hourly source of information in Jefferson County that offers reports throughout the day and evening about car accidents, fires, public hearings, and other developments. The site is followed by over 7,500 people and makes clear it is not the official governmental information outlet of county government, but is “intended to convey what it is like to live, work and play in Jefferson County.” The site provides a link to the official Jefferson County website. It has been up and growing for seven years.
Sullivan’s alternative news and information page has hundreds more followers than The Leader. D’Amico is in almost constant conflict with local political elites over his business and demands for transparency and public records. The fact that an alternative to the Leader has become the leading source of information in the county–and that they cannot control or influence that outlet–drives the In Crowd nuts. So crazy, that both county and city governments have made attempts to shut down Sullivan’s page, including, as Sullivan has reported, the city demanding surrender of the site in exchange for settling a zoning enforcement action against a property owned not by D’Amico, but a member of his family.
They have lost their minds. They are now conspiring with witches. Port Townsend Deputy Mayor David Faber–whose distaste for D’Amico and campaign against Sullivan’s reporting is spread across his own Facebook page and on comments he intemperately posts elsewhere–has endorsed the diabolical ceremony. He posted on his Facebook page that the witches’ anti-Joe Black Sabbath “seems worthwhile” and shared the link inviting seekers of Power over the First Amendment.
Faber and others are inviting folks to join the Wiccan sacrifice of D’Amico and Sullivan’s freedom of speech by making false reports to Facebook and generally engaging in coordinated harassment. The event was originally organized by an anonymous FB page called “Port Townsend Troll Control.” (That page first appeared around the time this site was calling out Port Townsend Planning Commissioner Paul Rice for, in his words, “f—k–g around” in our comments). Troll Control describes itself as a janitorial service and has attacked various individuals around town the anonymous author(s) didn’t like. “Janitorial service”? Not too subtle. They get rid of trash, which is anyone who disagrees with them.
Promotion of the event has been taken over by another coward posting anonymously as “the 11/11 Project.” This could be same coward behind the Troll Control mask, or it could a new coward, or a group of cowards who cast stones and spells from under hoods and sheets with holes cut for their eyes.
These people may think there is power in the numbers they worship. I don’t know about 11:11 except it adds up to 22 and is about the time in the morning I start thinking seriously of lunch. But here are some numbers with real proven power behind them: 42 U.S.C. Section 1985. That is the federal civil rights statute that gives D’Amico and Sullivan a private right of action to sue in federal court for a conspiracy to deprive them of civil rights, which includes freedom of expression. That statute not only grants damages, but also attorney fees. More powerful numbers for conspiring witches to ponder. Those numbers come with lots of zeroes.
I am intentionally not assisting the Nazi witches by providing a link to their invitation to join in a communal, oh-so-spiritual act of reprisal, suppression, and censorship. I’ve asked them to identify themselves. Shortly afterwards things started falling off the walls in my house and my cat is now speaking Druid.
But here is the link to the excellent, timely and informative Jefferson County Washington Facebook page. (click here)
D’Amico has announced his attorney is preparing a lawsuit over the conspiracy (hey, guys, you put all the evidence of conspiracy right there on the Internet, including getting conspirators to sign up and give their names to you. You can bet D’Amico’s attorney has the screen shots). You may think your identities and those you enlist will remain secret, but a federal subpoena to Facebook will lift the hoods from off your faces. Anyone who participates, who signs up, who helps organize, who helped pay for the Facebook ad to spread the conspiracy, you are conspirators and thus equally and personally liable.
So memorize the following Witches Song from MacBeth and start looking for an attorney. You might try sticking pins in a doll of the judge presiding over your case, but the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure do not provide for exorcism.
Round about the cauldron go:
In the poisoned entrails throw.
Toad, that under cold stone
Days and nights has thirty-one
Sweated venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i’ the charmed pot.
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg and owlet's wing.
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witch's mummy, maw and gulf
Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark,
Root of hemlock digg'd i’ the dark,
Liver of blaspheming Jew;
Gall of goat; and slips of yew
Sliver'd in the moon's eclipse;
Nose of Turk, and Tartar's lips;
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
For the ingredients of our cauldron.
Double, double toil and trouble,
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Cool it with a baboon's blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.
by Jim Scarantino | Oct 29, 2019 | General
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 neighborhood around it. Your tax dollars at work.
You would think this would be an issue in the current City Council races, especially in Mayor Deborah Stinson’s re-election bid. Her opponent, Monica Mick Hager, has leveled criticism about the city’s $17 million deficit and large expenditures on beautification projects while fundamental needs go unmet. She told this writer that in going door-to-door she frequently hears complaints about the Cherry Street Project. But she has not made much of an issue of it beyond those face-to-face meetings with voters.
In City Council meetings discussing the project, only outgoing councilor Robert Gray questioned the numbers and the soundness of the volunteer organization to which city leaders gave land valued at $600,000 and hundreds of thousands of dollars in nonrecourse loans, secured only by the city’s former property and the uninhabitable building itself. When he did raise a question or two, Gray almost apologized for having doubts and concerns.
The building that sat on the equivalent of stilts–known in the industry as cribbing–for over two years is finally on a foundation. But work has again ground to a halt. The only activity since the foundation was added in June 2019 has been a hurried and rather sloppy job of throwing up plywood across open doors and windows.
The surrounding area, after 30 months since the sixty-year old building was barged here in May 2017 at great expense from Victoria, B.C., continues to look like an open wound in the city’s center.
One neighbor complained to us last month:
I own the property directly in front of this building and have been completely ignored and avoided during this process the entrance and parking lot they currently proposed with no mention of my home comes across my yard and takes out part of my garage they also ffail to mention the land they are on is not nor has it ever been zoned for multifamily residential i find it absolutely disturbing that they are waiting til the last moment to inform me at bare minimal leaving me no where to turn to..where do I go for legal help?
Several times we have asked the group entrusted with the Cherry Street Project, Homeward Bound Community Land Trust, when they expect the building to be ready for occupancy. They have not responded.
Homeward Bound is the recipient of over $2 million in public support from Port Townsend taxpayers, in the nature of financial and professional services, as well as fee waivers and free utility work. Their $834,000 loan from the City contains a nearly $500,000 hidden interest subsidy that is an outright gift. They also received a direct grant of $30,000 just to get their act together.
Homeward Bound used to be transparent, providing public notice of their meetings and posting minutes on their website. That is what an entity funded nearly 100% by taxpayers should be doing. Those minutes, as we reported previously, revealed how very far the Cherry Street Project is from ever providing living quarters to any human being, and how they may not ever be able to complete the project, even with the City opening its wallet and donating its engineers and work crews.
They no longer invite the public to their meetings. They don’t post minutes. They don’t answer questions.
Neither The Leader nor the Peninsula Daily News have done any significant questioning of this project. Occasionally they publish a puff piece, such as their last fawning coverage that was initiated by Homeward Bound’s PR push. When would the building be finished, how much would it cost? Our incurious local papers didn’t bother to ask.
Though Homeward Bound won’t respond we will get answers to our questions. As we have been doing for the past two years, we have again filed public records requests with the City. Through previous public records requests we were able to report on the soaring costs of the project, the recognition by Homeward Bound that their cost projections and funding fell short of what it would take to finish the job and the City’s determination that it would have to provide professional project management to get the building out of the air onto a stable foundation. When we finish studying the latest communications between Homeward Bound and the City of Port Townsend, and the loan records, we will be back with some answers.
In the meantime, a picutre is worth a thousand words. The photo accompanying ths article was taken October 23, 2019, and shows what is happening with the $2 million Cherry Street “affordable housing” project.
Check out our previous reporting. You will find the factual basis for statements made in this post and more:
The Tragedy of the Cherry Street Project, December 12, 2018.
Cherry Street “Affordable” Housing to Cost More Than $2 Million, May 28, 2018
by Jim Scarantino | Dec 31, 2018 | General
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 dollars on a sixty-year old building that has been sitting on stacks of wood going on two years, providing shelter to no one as its costs have risen above $2 million.
Our reporting on how Jefferson County Prosecutor Michael Haas dumped a rape case against a man with a long history of violence against women and mistreated a victim came in second, followed by our story on the pending mass exodus from the Sheriff’s Office if the incumbent Sheriff, David Stanko, were elected. (He lost, and we are told that morale has vastly improved in anticipation of new leadership.) That one article hit 1,000 page views in less than a day, making it our single “hottest” story.
Our reporting on the rising violence among Port Townsend’s transients and close-up looks at the work of police, sheriff deputies, and jail personnel also received a strong and positive response.
We were pleased to highlight the lamentable abuse of marijuana by our county’s teens at a time when voters were putting on the county commission and giving oversight of teen marijuana prevention programs to a man with a history of violations at his marijuana store and a practice of promoting the increased use of marijuana while downplaying its known health risks.
Our other most widely read stories included good news on the opening of the Crazy Otter in Port Hadlock and Sugar Hill Farms in the old Beaver Valley store.
Scott Hogenson’s op-eds and accurate reporting regularly provoked a lot of discussion and heated debate. That’s what facts and new insights can do in the face of a local political monoculture that seeks to stifle dissenting speech and keep unwelcome truths from voters.
To this editor, the most rewarding posts came from the seventeen-year old Ravyn as she shared her most personal thoughts and feelings during her pregnancy. Readers who followed Ravyn’s story could share in her joy, springing from the depths of despair, as her young husband stepped up to the responsibility of being a man and a father and her faith in God gave her strength and hope. She has promised one last installment after she holds her new son in her arms.
Now for some less happy news.
This is a solely volunteer effort. We have done well and have made an impact with our small contributions to bring light to facts unreported, ignored or misrepresented by our local newspapers. We earned those 60,000-plus page views with primarily Facebook as our delivery system, and with the invaluable help of readers who shared our posts. We must also credit our detractors who reacted as we’d hoped and in mindless outrage spread our stories around the community. While they were attacking us, we saw our readership and Facebook “likes” and “follows” steadily grow.
We thank all our contributors–Sky Hardesty, Kara Kellogg, Brett Nunn, Mike Howard, Ravyn and the anonymous city official who spoke honestly about who the “homeless” in Port Townsend really are. Our biggest thanks goes to Scott Hogenson, a real pro, one of the smartest people we’ve ever met. His standards of excellence in journalism are sorely lacking from today’s media. We were truly honored that someone with his impressive journalistic credentials would want to provide his time, talent and wise counsel to this humble foray into citizen journalism.
There is so much more to write about, so many more voices needing to be heard, so many investigations to conduct…but we’re not going to be able to do it in the near future.
The editor has faced the fact he does not have the time, at least over the next six months, to give this project the care, attention and mental energy it needs. He has an employment commitment and an ongoing fiduciary obligation that will call him out of Washington state, as well as other personal and church obligations that leave no time for the Port Townsend Free Press.
We’ll keep the site up as an archive of our work. It can be always be reactivated, if the need arises.
With that said, we wish all of you a successful, happy and healthy 2019. Thanks everyone. God bless you all.
by Jim Scarantino | Dec 12, 2018 | Politics
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 the City of Port Townsend wants to build the apartments lacks construction expertise and has been shedding officers and board members. Things are so bad the city is stepping in to provide project management in hopes the building can be “stabilized.” It has been sitting on wood blocks since arriving by barge from Victoria, B.C. approaching two years ago.
It is not an “affordable housing project.” It is an extravagant waste of money that has provided shelter for no one with no clear date as to when it may ever be occupied. The waste of money, time, and energy–the lost opportunities to accomplish something that might actually help the housing crunch in our town–has been tragic.
Unrealistic Cost Projections
In April 2018, based on cost projections prepared by Homeward Bound’s volunteer project manager, the city council voted to issue a bond so that a line of credit in the amount of $834,000 could be extended to finish the project. The city had already lent Homeward Bound $250,000 to purchase, transport and set up the old apartment building on wooden stacks known as “cribbing.” In addition, because Homeward Bound was not a viable organization, it granted the group $30,000 to get itself organized and train its leaders. Plus, the city threw in a $451,115 subsidy buried in the loan documents because otherwise Homeward Bound would not be able to meet its full debt obligations for the next forty years.
We reported on May 28, 2018, that the costs of the Cherry Street project had ballooned to $2,006,355. (click here for article). This made the eight projected apartments some of the most expensive real estate in Jefferson County. The actual cost was somewhat higher because we were unable include the value of the free utility work performed by the city or the permit fee waivers extended to move the project forward.
Even these astronomical costs for what are supposed to be eight “affordable” apartments may fall short. As disclosed by the Homeward Bound treasurer at the city council meeting on December 3, Homeward Bound has been incurring rental costs for the “cribbing” supporting the building over the past twenty months. That contractor has also returned to the site to service those supports. The Treasurer mentioned other debts the group would clear with the city’s money…once it signed the loan agreements.
That’s right. As late as December 3, the group had still not signed the loan documents that would release money to fund the project. Nonetheless, city council authorized the city manager to provide project management by city staff–another direct expense to the city.
But more importantly: the original cost projection has now been acknowledged by Homeward Bound to have been unrealistically low.
We obtained this information from Homeward Bound board minutes and city documents produced in response to a public records request. Neither the city nor Homeward Bound responded to our email questions.
At the September 8, 2018, meeting, in discussion of whether the group should sign the loan documents, this entry was recorded in the group’s minutes: “Get a general Contractor: who should then create a realistic budget…then we would sign the loan.”
This desire for a “realistic budget” reflects a realization that hit the Homeward Bound board months before during their July meeting. Cost changes due to delays and market conditions required them, just a couple months after city council approved the loan, to have suppliers rerun the numbers behind the cost estimate.
A November 13, 2018 email from Mark Cooper, Homeward Bound’s treasurer, to City Manager David Timmons and others states, “I’m also convinced the budget proposed by Mike Szatlocky [the former project manager] isn’t sufficient to cover the project. We must discuss how we might finance the gap.” Cooper further stated that Szatlocky “has convinced some board members that they will be held personally liable if there is a shortfall in the project and HB is forced to withdraw at a later date. This needs to be added to the discussion. Is there a way to formally exempt the board except in the case of financial fraud?”
The Treasurer’s concern about a funding shortfall is serious enough that he has asked the city about the possibility of the apartments being sold as condos so that the sale proceeds from the first sales in the uncompleted building could finance construction of the rest of the project:
Thanks to the city’s assistance, a general contractor has agreed to take on the work, but on a time and material basis, not on a fixed bid. Pacific Environmental Services Company of Port Townsend will serve as general contractor. They are widely known for their work with the petroleum industry in the Pacific Northwest.
As City Manager Timmons reported at the December 3 council meeting, the first stage of work will be to “get a foundation under the building” to “stabilize it.”
Another recurring problem has been Homeward Bound’s inability to secure the services of an attorney to advise them regarding the loan documents and other matters. The volunteer attorney who was helping earlier this year backed away and board members have reported calling multiple attorneys and not receiving return telephone calls. Board members have wanted legal advice before they signed documents obligating them to a large loan and potential personal liability.
An Unstable Partner
When the City started the project, Homeward Bound was in mothballs. It had only one board member who signed the documents to accept the sale of the $600,000 property for $1 and obligate Homeward Bound to a $250,000 loan for the building’s purchase and transport. The city wanted a non-profit land trust in the area and it wanted this to be their first project. So it resurrected Homeward Bound. The $30,000 organizational grant was supposed to create a viable organization that could see this and other projects through.
Things started on an optimistic note. Homeward Bound attracted enough interested people to elect a new 12-member Board of Directors on October 5, 2017. Shortly after, they elected officers. Announcements promising forward momentum on the project hit the Homeward Bound Facebook page and local newspapers. In March 2018 the Board completed 16 hours of training. Outreach events were held at the Finnriver Cidery and the Quimper Unitarian Universalist Fellowship. An outside source of donations, called the Nest Egg Project, was founded to help bring in funding.
The city and the group predicted in April 2018 that the project would soon get its “stabilizing” foundation. That has not happened.
Somewhere along the way things began to fall apart.
Board members began resigning. The president, elected in October 2017, was replaced in June 2018. Her successor President was replaced only a few months later. Board members took their complaints about fellow board members and volunteers to Timmons, including a concern that one board member was actively attempting to undermine the project and that the volunteer project manager had “not been friendly to the project.”
As Homeward Bound’s Treasurer informed City Manager Timmons, by November 2018 the group was down to only two people who could give time to the project. Shortly afterwards Timmons informed the city council that no one in Homeward Bound had the ability to serve as a project manager and proposed having the city serve in that capacity.
Homeward Bound’s annual meeting took place December 5, 2018. They announced in advance they were seeking four new members. They got two. Those two people are activists known for Democratic Party involvement and promotion of a local or state income tax. They are not people with backgrounds in construction or finance.
What Were City Leaders Thinking?
The city brought the building from Victoria before it had a plan on what to do with it. It gave it to an organization that existed only on paper and which, even in its most robust days, had never built anything like this. Neither the city nor Homeward Bound had any permits, architectural drawings or engineering plans in advance; they designed the plans and sought the permits after the building was already on site. They went at it backwards.
Without knowing who would eventually be Homeward Bound’s leadership, the city decided it was going to rely on them to complete and run the project. It decided that for the next forty years it would rely on these unknown individuals and an organization that had already once folded. Forty years is the length of the city’s loan to the group.
The city knows this is a difficult project with “a lot of complex financial arrangements,” Timmons has said. What the city put in motion is far more complicated than if the land had been sold and the $600,000 estimated value applied to buying and rehabbing run-down properties. Alternatively, the more than $2 million going into possibly eight apartments (the number remains uncertain for a variety of reasons, ranging from legal codes to financial concerns), could have put a lot of people into used or new manufactured housing. As we pointed out in an earlier report, a newer, larger apartment complex in Port Townsend could have been purchased for less money. It would right now be housing several dozens of people, not the few the Cherry Street project may one day hold.
Overwhelming the volunteers and supporters of Homeward Bound with a complicated construction project is not helpful to anyone or the cause of affordable housing. They are now the recipients of a political football. What has become an embarassment to city political leaders will become their long-term liability. Instead of accepting full responsibility and seeing this project to completion, city leaders have shifted responsibility to a fledgling organization that has already cracked under the first year’s uncertainties and pressure. Guess who gets the blame if the project fails?
Just last month, the Treasurer of Homeward Bound asked Timmons if the city would consider taking the project back. That is not likely to happen. The city’s decisions are now being driven by politics. In the council meeting that approved the city absorbing project management costs, the sole consideration discussed was public appearances. “This is all over Facebook.” “I am being asked about this all the time.” “We need a win.” Those were the justifications given. Not one question was asked about the viability of Homeward Bound. Nothing was discussed about the acknowledgement that the original cost projection might be inadequate and more public money would be required. How much more will it cost to get this done? When will it be finished? Not a single council member wanted to know.
Trouble Lurks in the Financial Pro Forma
The loan agreement between Homeward Bound and the city gives the group a two-year grace period at the start during which it will not have to make loan payments. In that time, the pro forma projects the group will begin accumulating enough rent revenue to address its inability to regularly service its debt at the front end of the loan term.
That assumes that the project will be completed very quickly after the loan agreement is signed and Homeward Bound draws its first dollar. The track record on this project shows that delays are ingrained and inevitable. With a struggling volunteer board, no executive director and complete reliance on the city for intermittent project management, more delays can be expected. The date of receipt of the first rental payment will likely be pushed closer to the date the loan service starts, giving Homeward Bound less time to accumulate any kind of surplus to defray projected deficits.
This analysis does not even address the fact that the cost projections underlying the pro forma are now recognized to be unrealistic.
The city’s project management commitment extends only through installation of the foundation. It does not encompass managing any the project’s remaining needs. City council will likely be called upon to again authorize the contribution of more public resources.
by Jim Scarantino | Dec 6, 2018 | Local Businesses
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 long-duration space travel, robots, a high-tech treadmill and LEGOS. Click here for a cool video to give you a visual on what the kids are up to.
Lego robotics team goes INTO ORBIT with Infinadeck
NW Discovery Lab’s veteran FIRST LEGO League team, The Howling Chickens, will compete for its third time on Bainbridge Island this Saturday, December 8. The competition, a regional qualifying event put on by FIRST Washington, is part of the nationwide FIRST LEGO League challenge, an annual competition designed to inspire youth in science and technology.
Each year, FIRST issues a challenge: a problem for teams to solve. This year’s challenge name is “Into Orbit.” It consists of two parts: the Robot Game and the Project. The first part, the part that often draws kids into FLL in the first place, is the Robot Game. The team must build and program a robot that can complete a number of tasks (or missions) on a set field for points. The more missions the robot completes, the more points the team earns. The second part of the competition is the project. This year, teams must IDENTIFY a physical or social problem faced by humans during long-duration space travel, DESIGN a solution to that problem, and SHARE the problem and solution with others.
The two parts are of equal importance: a team cannot win a competition if it doesn’t perform well in both aspects of the competition. It must also embody and demonstrate the FIRST philosophies of Gracious Professionalism and Cooperation through its Core Values: Discovery, Innovation, Impact, Inclusion, Teamwork, and Fun.
This year, the Howling Chickens brainstormed several problems and their solutions before finally settling on the problem of astronauts’ physical and mental health during long-duration space travel. The team spent weeks researching the challenges that astronauts face, which include accelerated bone loss and muscle atrophy, and depression. After researching how NASA and other space agencies currently fight these challenges, the team decided that the most efficient solution would be for astronauts to use a VR headset to simulate earth’s environment while moving on an omnidirectional treadmill.
Thanks to generous local sponsors, the team was able to purchase an Oculus Rift VR headset. They reached out to Infinadeck, creators of the world’s first true omnidirectional treadmill (similar to the one featured in the blockbuster “Ready Player One”). Infinadeck was enthusiastic about the Howling Chickens’ solution, as it is one they’ve been pursuing as well. Company CEO Benjamin Freeman and Infinadeck inventor George Burger were gracious enough to meet with the team via teleconference to introduce them to the Infinadeck treadmill and answer questions.
The Howling Chickens asked the gentlemen a series of questions about how they envisioned the omnidirectional treadmill working in space, and how they could design a system based on the treadmill. They confirmed that the kids were on the right track with their creative solution.
“It was really interesting talking with George Burger and Ben Freeman,” said Ike Banks, 13, a Howling Chickens team member. “I didn’t realize they were going to have the treadmills in gyms and arcades so soon.”
NW Discovery Lab hopes to team with Infinadeck again in the future, knowing that the “cool factor” of the omnidirectional treadmill is a perfect device to inspire kids in STEM education.
ABOUT NW DISCOVERY LAB:
The NWDL is a Port Townsend based non-profit dedicated to STEM education on the Olympic Peninsula. Find more information at www.nwdiscoverylab.org.
