by Jim Scarantino | Aug 20, 2020 | General
Is ejecting a man from a yoga class because of the color of his skin color a racist act?
It looks like one of the lead organizers of Black Lives Matter of Jefferson County kicked a Hispanic man out of the yoga class he leads at Fort Worden because the Hispanic man’s skin was not dark enough to meet some racial standard and he did not choose to label himself “BIPOC.”
Here’s what happened. It involves Cameron Jones, one of the two or three leaders of Black Lives Matter of Jefferson County.
Mr. Jones teaches a yoga class for the Mystic Monkey Yoga studio in Port Townsend. The class is entitled, “Yoga for BIPOC: Mindful Movement for Black, Indigenous and People of Color.” To participate in Mr. Jones’s class you book a spot and pay through the Mystic Monkey website. Then on Sunday afternoon at 3:30 p.m. you look for Mr. Jones at Fort Worden State Park where he holds his class outdoors.
On this particular Sunday, a Hispanic man new to the group spread his yoga mat on the ground and sat down. Mr. Jones in an August 7 Facebook post described what next occurred:
“I didn’t know this person and one of the other students commented on their approach with…apprehension…and why’d they be coming to class because this person was very, very light skinned….The person who came to class, an apparently cis-white male came ‘in’ (we were outside) placed their mat down and was ready to begin. Not that I expected this, but there was no preamble, no prior connection, seemingly no awareness as to the discomfort of others present. So I asked them their name and if they knew this was a BIPOC class. They responded yes. So I asked if they considered themselves BIPOC, they said, ‘well, my dad was Mexican.’ Ok. Cool. At this point there was still a low level of discomfort, so I asked if they identified as BIPOC. Their response was, ‘I really don’t believe in labels.’ This, for lack of a better word, triggered me. And I asked them to leave. They were visibly frustrated at always being perceived as a cis-white man and ended up leaving in frustration and anger. As they were leaving I attempted to invite them back so we could all sit and talk about what transpired, but they were too upset. Understandable.”
Understandable? What an understatement. Is this not an overt, rather aggressive display of bigotry that resulted in injury to a man who only wanted to participate in a yoga class?
Mr. Jones actually blames the victim for having helped “incite the event.” The “event” was that Mr. Jones and others did not approve of the color of this man’s skin, and it took off from there.
Nobody would or should tolerate a commercial enterprise offering a service only to White people. Nobody would or should tolerate a White instructor grilling a customer because of apprehension about their skin color. Nobody, regardless of who they are or the nature of their business, is entitled to treat any person differently because of the color of their skin.
The right to be free from discrimination on the basis of race and color is one of the most fundamental and protected civil rights under Washington law. Our state guarantees the “right to full enjoyment of accommodations, advantages, facilities, of any place of public resort, accommodation, assemblage or amusement.” This law was enacted in 1890 as the result of the efforts of a towering figure in Washington state history, William Owen Bush, a Republican and the first Black elected to state public office. (On a side note, Democrats opposed this bedrock civil rights law and Democrat legislators continue to defeat periodic efforts to honor Mr. Bush by naming an area of the Capitol after him.)
Perhaps the Mystic Monkey business is unaware that its teacher excludes and gives a hard time to anyone who does not have the right skin color. But there is no need to wonder. The owner of the Mystic Monkey business applauded Mr. Jones for his actions. The very first comment to Mr. Jones’ account of how he ran this Hispanic man off came from Jason Caslyn, who owns the business:
The Jefferson County Board of Health is expected today to declare systemic racism to be an emergency in Jefferson County. The preamble to the proposed resolution does not set forth a single instance of racism in Jefferson County among the justifications for their declaration. Maybe they’re looking for racism in the wrong places and among the wrong people.
by Z Cerveny | Aug 15, 2020 | General
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.
Landes at 19th
Landes Street
Landes Street
I disembarked to inspect for damage. That plastic part below the bumper was cracked. I didn’t see oil leaking. But I did see a road that looked like it had been paved by Jackson Pollock–the artist who had a laugh at the world making millions by splashing paint onto big canvases. Somehow he must have gotten the contract for applying tar to Landes Street. It has so many chaotic patches it looks like a gigantic abstract composition.
Cinema verite, too. This could be a multi-media production. I can’t imagine how shaky a hand-held video would be driving along these blocks. Potholes, rivets, ridges, gullies, and just failed paving make for one bumpy, jolting ride. It goes on for blocks.
After that day I started paying attention and realized failing streets are everywhere!
How did the maintenance of our streets fall so far behind? I had always thought that providing transportation infrastructure, a fancy phrase for city streets, was a basic service of a municipal corporation. Prior generations of city leaders laid out our street plan and upgraded them from dirt horse tracks with all the things that go into constructing a modern means for automobiles on rubber tires to move about. All that critical work, surveying, grading, compaction, base course and chip seal (I Googled road building) was done years ago. The current state of our streets looks like we’re having trouble hanging onto a tattered inheritance.
I thought Landes was bad. Then I went to visit a friend who told me to take Center Street to get across the valley. I took a right off San Juan and stopped. Maybe I’m now obsessed. But the deterioration of this residential street made me get out with my camera and walk. It gets worse and worse as you start climbing to Redwood, block-long sections of pavement barely held together by ugly, misshapen and sloppy splotches of cracked tar. And more than a few legitimate potholes.
That photo at the top of this story is Center Street, as is the one to the left and these, as well.
I got back in my car and rattled along until I got to Redwood. But this jolting journey isn’t over. I will be sharing more photos from around our town showing just how bad things really are.
I’m no highway engineer, but I’ve been told, and it’s common sense, that when roads are neglected like ours are they only get worse and worse. Prolific and poorly applied patching is less than a temporary band aid. It may actually contribute to accelerating the deterioration with the freeze-and-thaw cycle and rain getting into and under what was once a uniform asphalt surface.
You roll and rock along the same streets as I but maybe don’t get out and snap photos. What’s that lady doing stopping in front of the house again, taking more pictures of potholes? Don’t worry, that’s just sweet Z and her trusty Nikon.
I’m sending my work to Port Townsend Free Press in the hope it gets attention and encourages action. I observed that the editor teased my forthcoming stories on their Facebook page and used a couple photos I took of decaying, deteriorating, degenerating, dearly beloved Discovery Road. A couple weeks later the city announced it was seeking federal funding to do something about that grand boulevard. But first they will put in a bike lane on broken pavement. I guess that’s our PT Vibe applied to the art of road maintenance.
Until our next outing, happy trails, mon amis.
by Gabrielle Guthrie | Aug 11, 2020 | General
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 as long as I can remember that’s been the story in Port Townsend, too. People have been dying of drug overdoses, car crashes, or suicides, a reality that has only gotten worse and more pronounced.
Addiction comes only to steal, kill, and destroy. Those who get caught up in it don’t just hurt themselves, they destroy the lives of all around them. Children lose their parents, parents lose their children. There is more than enough misery to go around, so much suffering that it is often generational, this inheritance of grief, despair, and dysfunction that gets inflicted on the next generation.
It’s an invisible epidemic in the sense that nobody really wants to talk about it. Our local political leadership speaks in vague innuendos about “the homeless” or “mental health issues.” We all care so, so much about those protected classes but not enough to actually diagnose the problem properly and to name it for what it is. And certainly not enough to declare it the public health emergency it really is.
It’s a vicious cycle: our depressed economy, lack of good jobs, lack of housing, lack of political leadership, lack of opportunities, and a pro-drug culture make breaking the addiction cycle even more challenging. It’s a multi-faceted problem. Limited economic opportunities often lead people to resort to selling drugs. An inability to find a future and hope in life often leads to using them.
Addicts are not victims. In fact, blaming everything but them probably helps fuel addiction, too. I am just saying it really is a community-wide disease, requiring a community-wide response, and one of the hardest things for me has been accepting that we just haven’t got the will or the desire to address it collectively. You can’t just blame individuals for their poor choices. We all create the fertile environment that produces these kinds of social issues. Addiction is a symptom; it is not the cause of the disease.
Politically, we often have a tendency to just make everything worse. We seem to diagnose the problem wrong, prescribe the wrong solution, and then throw open the barn doors. I watched Port Townsend become a hot spot for “homeless tourism.” Our leaders are full of compassion for these people, and yet give no thought whatsoever to the fact that our children here are somewhat vulnerable–either naive and sheltered, or at-risk youth–and that the professional homeless are not all just people pursuing an “alternative lifestyle,” but often, actual addicts who support themselves by selling meth and heroin.
The opioid epidemic, the sudden availability of insurance and healthcare, and the ease with which people could get either prescriptions or street drugs also fueled the problem.
I was really sad and yet so very grateful when the Boiler Room saw fit to shut itself down. I watched heroin and meth sweep through this town and I watched young person after young person get caught up in it.
There is help available. There are people who care. We have drug courts and treatment options and a thriving recovery community. But we don’t have a collective community-wide response, a strong political will, and a willingness to name this epidemic for what it is and to say “no.” Not another life.
I have a sister out there on the streets using, a daughter in recovery, and a good 40 years of just watching friend after friend play the revolving-door-game-of addiction, the hospital, jail, and all those 2 am phone calls until one day they just weren’t there anymore. But what I really have is this simmering rage, this deep seated resentment towards a community that cares more about it’s political ideologies than it does about its people, and this keen awareness that no, not all lives matter at all.
by Jim Scarantino | Aug 10, 2020 | General
The following letter was hand-delivered late last week to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office. The writer indicates it was also delivered to Port Townsend’s Chief of Police. We obtained this letter from a member of the law enforcement community.
Good morning,
I have written what has been on my mind. I have written it to get my thoughts out so | don’t have to dwell on them all the time. I wrote it as an anonymous person and give you full permission to share with whoever you feel could benefit from reading it. I don’t know if you or anyone else will agree with my writings but it makes me feel better to put it out there. Share it or shred it, it’s totally up to you. Please only share it if you think it will make a difference. It won’t hurt my feelings if you don’t. My hope is that if you do find it useful you can get it into the hands of those who make decisions for public safety. Commissioners, board members, whoever could benefit from hearing a different opinion. I have left one copy with the Sheriff and one with the Chief of Police in Port Townsend.
Thank you
To anyone who will listen,
During these last few weeks I have found myself heartbroken and frustrated. Doing a hard job that I worked so hard to get is now demonized and perceived by many as unnecessary. I get the impression that the loudest of people are fighting to be judged as individuals and not by class, color, sex, etc. I can agree with this however it seems that the narrative includes all but those who choose to serve and protect. It appears as though some people have forgotten that we too are people from communities just like theirs. Everyone deserves to be judged as an individual based on their character and their actions. Everyone.
As I hear about racism and brutality I think hard about examples that I have seen. I have worked for two departments and with dozens of different officers/deputies. I have seen so many different situations and seen the best and worst of people in our community. What I have not seen is what is being portrayed by the media. No evil cops. No racism, no brutality. Only men and woman in uniform dealing with situations that they have been called to handle. Why is it that all who wear the badge must be shamed and ridiculed for the acts of a few? Does the act of one bad officer outweigh the acts of those who are good at their job? And do people know what that job is? Do people think our job consists only of what they see in the news or in movies? Do people even care to know? How many have taken the opportunity to ride with an officer?
Defund the Police. Who will replace us? Who is going to check on Grandma when you haven’t heard from her in a few days and you live in another state? Who is going to summon aid when she is found alive and injured? Who is going to investigate when she is not? Who is going to take the photos and document? Who is going to live with those images of death and decay? Who is going to tell the loved ones that she has left this world? Who is going to give them comfort in that moment when their world has changed? Who is going to look for your toddler who wandered away? Who is going to search miles of roadway when you are entrapped in an upside-down vehicle? Who is going to stop the bleeding until aid arrives? Who is going to search for the drunk driver who put you there? Who is going to stop that drunk driver before he runs into you? Who is going to interview that child who has lost their innocence to true evil? Who is going to live with that child’s story playing over and over in their mind? Who is going to do have the courage to complete this task again and again? Who is going to search for the Alzheimer’s patient who went for a walk in a winter’s night? Who is going to come when there is a bump in the night? Who is going to light up the darkness when you fear what lurks in it? Who is always going to be ready to help you?
I often remind people when I respond to a certain house or neighborhood that I was called to be there. There is likely a million other things I would rather be doing but someone asked for help and it is my job to serve. And when I am on patrol and not responding to a specific call I find myself like many others, spending time in certain neighborhoods. It is not because I have a prejudice towards anyone. It is purely because the best part of my job is preventing a situation before it starts. When you have been called to the same house or the same neighborhood dozens of times you feel the need to give it more attention. It is not because of the bad people in that particular neighborhood. It is because of the good people in that neighborhood who deserve our attention and deserve to feel safe.
With the badge that some of us pin on in the morning comes an accepted risk. This risk is outweighed by the pride that comes with knowing you stand between what is right and what is wrong. Protecting those who cannot protect themselves. A criminal accepts a certain amount of risk as well. This risk is outweighed by the possible gains taken from others with the least amount of work. A selfish choice to take from others so that they need not work for it themselves. This choice can take property. This choice can cause physical pain. This choice can cause mental pain. This choice can take innocence. This choice can take lives. This choice can destroy communities. This choice can destroy futures.
The risk associated with both paths are accepted on both sides. It seems that those who see it from a distance can have a difficult time processing this. Does an officer need to be shot to shoot? Do we need to be bloodied to fight back? Are our lives valued less because we choose to wear the badge? Is it an acceptable loss for you because we signed up for it? What about the criminal who also signed up for it? Do our families deserve to have us come home any less than those whose family member chose a different calling?
De-escalation is in everything we do. An officer does not go a day without de-escalation. It’s pure and simple. A million officers and millions of contacts with the public. Rarely do people call when they are at their best. Whatever situation they have been dealing with has escalated to the point of calling 911. De-escalation works. We know it and we get trained to do it. But the unfortunate fact is that it doesn’t always work. People can’t always accept reason. Mental health and substance abuse can cause this disconnect. De-escalation works until it doesn’t.
Violence and instinct. I can only think of few professions that require as much violence and instinct as law enforcement. In a moment’s notice a calm situation can turn to chaos. I have had people try to bite me, spit on me, swing at me. How do I describe the feelings you get when a 6’6 man who is spun up on meth decides he wants to slam his head into yours? The same man who just left his victim bloodied moments before, and you were somehow able to sneak him into handcuffs before anyone else got hurt. A split second does not allow you to think about that man’s skin color, sexual orientation, or political views. It only allows you the time to protect yourself or receive what is coming. Violence has many levels. Violence exists and at times it must be met with violence. Violence is not pretty in any form. It is a cause for chaos and at times the only solution to that chaos. It is not a fact that feels good. A perfect world would not contain this violence but we do not live in a perfect world. Some people create violence. Others are called to handle it.
I want each person who has a strong opinion about our current situation to ask themselves if they have the information needed to have a strong opinion. Do you know an officer or deputy? Have you ridden with them? Have you seen what they see? Do you care to have an informed opinion? Please ask us why we do what we do. Please
don’t assume when you can actually see it for yourself. And please remember that these are people from your community. And please consider the fact that however you feel about them and however you treat them, if you need them they will come.
Sincerey,
An individual from your community.
by Jim Scarantino | Aug 3, 2020 | General
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 in at the end. It was announced as “an open conversation about racial prejudice in policing, especially in our county.”
The show aired for two hours on Thursday, July 30, 2020. The moderators were far from impartial. One of them, KPTZ radio show host Paul Rice, has encouraged activists to pursue and harass a local law enforcement family and in the past has himself attempted to injure the reputation of at least one other law enforcement official. This program was created and sold as a kind of set-up of our Sheriff. It fell short. Instead of a set-up, it was pathetic.
“The Reckoning” was hardly a conversation about prejudice in policing in Jefferson County because the panelists offered nothing on the subject that could be substantively discussed. They threw around vague, sometimes vicious allegations against no one in particular. They never offered proof or evidence for their wild claims.
Much of what the panelists said was irresponsible, intending to fan the flames of racial tensions rather than making it possible to achieve any sort of understanding and accord.
First some facts on the Sheriff’s office:
The Jefferson County Sheriff has had no officer involved shootings since the 1930s. No complaints of racial prejudice have been filed against any Sheriff’s deputy in recent memory. There has been civil litigation over the years over everything from the death of a violent prisoner with a bad heart racing on meth to public records act disputes. As far as I know, though, the Sheriff’s Office has not had any court judgments against it nor settled any claims based on charges of racist behavior. It has not been the subject of any investigation for abuses of force or racial misconduct by the Washington State Attorney General or the U.S. Department of Justice.
Now, on to the panelists:
Cameron Jones, one of the leaders of Black Lives Matter of Jefferson County, claimed that 30% of Jefferson County’s Black citizens have been imprisoned in the county jail in a single year. Where in the world did he get that from? Jefferson County in the 2010 census had about 30,000 people, 1% of whom were Black. That would mean that 100 Black residents of Jefferson County (1/3 of 300) were in our county jail that year. There would be a list of those 100 Black inmates–if those alleged prisoners existed. Jones did not offer or claim to have such a list. He never explained the source of the information for his wild allegation.
Sheriff Nole told Jones he was absolutely wrong. Jones might be confusing our small jail with the STATE correctional facility at Clearwater on the west side. That large facility holds people from all over Washington. And there’s that little problem of size: our county jail cannot hold 100 people.
Later Jones challenged Sheriff Nole to explain what he was doing about the “white supremacy and vigilante groups operating” in Jefferson County. He also suggested that somebody had lynched five Blacks in Jefferson County. Yes, Sheriff Nole said, over a number of years there have been five Blacks who died by hanging in different areas of the county. Nole said each sad, tragic case had been investigated and no evidence of any malicious activity had been found. These were suicides. We do have a serious problem with suicide that we don’t like to acknowledge. We have also had several White people who have hung themselves in recent years.
Jones said “someone in our group” had been researching the cases and found suggestions of foul play. He didn’t say what that evidence was, who was doing this research or offer to share it with the Sheriff so the cases could get another look, if warranted.
Jones also didn’t offer any evidence–not a single specific instance–of any activity by “white supremacist and vigilante groups operating in Jefferson County.” Who are these groups? I emailed Jones to ask what information he had on them and what they had been doing. This is something law enforcement, city, local, state and federal should know about. He did not answer my questions. It is not unreasonable to conclude he is just making this up in an effort to paint Jefferson County as some sort of Klan infested, deep South backwater from last century. That misperception helps his group’s political activities and fundraising but disserves a county of good, decent people who would not tolerate such organizations in their midst.
Jones also said “people of color are afraid to move here “because we don’t have a multi-cultural community center” and Port Townsend has Victorian architecture. Seriously, he said this.
Jones leveled hearsay allegations by an anonymous source that ten years ago a former school resource officer–now Port Townsend’s Interim Police Chief–had “acted with petulance toward youth of color,” whatever that means. And he complained about an ongoing case in which a Black man called law enforcement to report his truck stolen. It was located by deputies and found to have been burned. The complaint by this man is that police “questioned him aggressively” and “showed up in excessive force.” Not that they used excessive force. He just believes too many police responded to the call and he is upset they did not immediately believe him. No allegation of deputies using racially pejorative terms has been raised.
On his Facebook page the owner of the burned truck alleges that, though he does not know who allegedly stole and burned his vehicle, he believes he was the target of racial animosity. BLM of Jefferson County says of this incident, “The escalation continues,” though they don’t know what happened. A Go Fund Me campaign has attracted over $8,000 to help this man buy another vehicle. This is an active, unsolved case for which I am trying to obtain records. From what I can gather at this point, the question of whether a theft really occurred remains unanswered.
Jones read a statement by Paris Jade, a Black woman. She had three incidents to report. She said that in the first three to four months she moved here she was followed by the same officer “almost every day on my way home, and out and about and especially at night.”
This officer must have been working a double shift for 3-4 months, and not doing anything else but following Ms. Jade. One also must wonder how could she know it was the same officer behind her…at night?
She was never stopped, never arrested. She was never questioned. She never filed a complaint. But suddenly and without explanation it all stopped and she’s still here. She mentioned no other contacts with law enforcement in the past three years.
From my ride-alongs with police, I know they are in almost constant contact one way or another with a network of law enforcement resources. Officers and deputies can see on their computer where other units in service are and know generally what they are doing. I might be overstating that a bit, but officers are not free without explanation to follow a car for any signficant length of time, over and over, day and night, for more than 120 consecutive days. It might be possible that what Jade claims happened happened. It is highly improbable.
Her misperception, overreaction, whatever you want to call it, to the two other incidents she brings up undermine her crediblity on this claim of being followed almost every day and “especially at night” for up to four months. In the first, she saw someone wearing a MAGA hat and, in the second, she saw another person wearing traditional clothes of a culture not their own. This is being exposed to racism, she claims.
If this is all the “racism” she has experienced in PT in more than three years of living here, it is a pretty solid acquittal of our community.
Though other panelists poured out subjective feelings and spouted political theory, including calling for the destruction of capitalism and insisting that “the people” can police themselves (good luck with those midnight domestic violence calls, robberies, burglaries, car chases, rapes, agg assaults, and murders), they cited not a single instance of racially prejudiced police misconduct.
At the end of the discussion, Port Townsend Mayor Michele Sandoval weighed in. She had powerful evidence of racism to offer. Here it is: she lost by 150 votes when she ran for county commissioner twenty some years ago. She emoted for several minutes, but never mentioned a single instance of racism by police or another member of a community that has kept her in office as Mayor or City Councilor for the past two decades. (Was the fact she was not elected unanimously in each of those elections evidence of racism? Is it racism if someone simply disagrees with her?)
Sandoval ended in tears and the broadcast was promptly wrapped up. Listeners were left at a loss to understand what she was crying about because in all the time given her she did not describe a single experience where someone hurt or discriminated against her or anyone else because of race or ethnicity–except maybe those 150 people twenty years ago who voted for someone else.
One could say that this was an unproductive waste of time and a cynical attempt by some to widen racial divisions with rumor and innuendo. But it did show that we don’t have a racism problem with law enforcement in this community. On the other hand, we do have a problem with people who desperately want to believe they are surrounded by racism when they are not.
by Jim Scarantino | Jul 31, 2020 | General
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 year. Nonetheless, we passed the 100,000 page-view milestone several thousand page-views back.
Our daily numbers on our WordPress and Facebook platforms are way up. We had to upgrade the website this month because the additional traffic was slowing things down (especially on our end when it came to editing). Where we once were pleased with getting a hundred readers per article, we are now regularly seeing readership for major articles in the thousands.
This is all thanks to you. You stuck with us through an effort in 2018 to drive us off the Internet. You backed us up when we were getting personal threats. You waited out our dormant year until we returned. You have shared our articles and spread the word.
People are reading our work regularly even though they won’t show up on our pages for fear of retaliation in a community that too often punishes diversity instead of celebrating it. I have spoken with public officials who tell me, “I read you stuff, but don’t tell anyone. They’ll get mad.” At a restaurant, where I had met with one of our new copy editors, after my credit card was run the owners came out from the kitchen to thank us for our work with the words,”No one else is speaking up for us.” We are getting more and more direct communications from people wanting us to write their stories–stories the Leader ignores or distorts. We wish we had more contributors so we could do a better job of stepping up to the challenge.
I want to thank our contributors so far in this adventure. They make it possible to say “we” and “us” and they have brought the very sort of diverse voices missing from our local newspapers. That was our goal from the beginning:
Brett Nunn
Mike Howard
Scott Hogenson
Sky Hardesty
Ravyn
Gene Farr
Jim McEntire
Craig Durgan
Tod Brundage
Kara Kellogg
And a new contributor, Z Cerveny, who has been documenting the sad state of Port Townsend’s streets. Her work will begin appearing next week as we sort through the mass of images she sent us.
A special note of appreciation goes to two people who had something to say, and no place to say it except here. While we prefer to publish contributors under their real names, we understand why in such a small, insular, politically unbalanced community it may be necessary to use a nome de plume to say something that needs to be said. Thank you, therefore, to the city employee who contributed years of knowledge and experience on identifying and understanding who the homeless in our community really are. And thank you to “A Concerned Citizen of Port Townsend” who, curious about just what the Black Lives Matter organization is, took the time to do research and share the results with our readers. When she sent us her article she probably did not expect it would go viral and be read across the nation.
Last, thanks to the unseen people behind the scenes: Dynamic Graphics of Sequim, which moved us from our old BlogSpot home, designed a new website, and manages our technical matters; and our volunteer copy editors–man, do we need and appreciate your help.
We are always open to new contributions. You know your community better than the itinerant reporters who come and go quickly from The Leader. You know how to reach us.
