Opinion

Veteran Pamala Heydt is all smiles as she shows some of the Christmas cards and ornaments that came in for her card-campaign Operation Christmas Love. With friends

Thanks to readers, Kent Christmas-card campaign will bring joy to area veterans: Editor’s Note

Earlier this month, Pamala Heydt was telling me about her dream for Christmas. The veteran - who can best be described as “effervescent” - wanted to collect a major batch of Christmas cards to take on a goodwill call to injured veterans receiving care at our local V.A. hospital. “It’s Christmas time and it’s my way of giving back to soldiers what they’ve given to me,” said Heydt.

Veteran Pamala Heydt is all smiles as she shows some of the Christmas cards and ornaments that came in for her card-campaign Operation Christmas Love. With friends

Police chief: Balance emotions with logic when discussing police and use of deadly force

If you took a speech or rhetoric class in school you might remember the styles associated with persuasion, from the Greek ethos (appeal to character and credibility), logos (appeal to logic and reasoning), and pathos (an appeal to emotion).

  • Dec 22, 2010
  • BY Wire Service
Kent firefighters

Toys for Joy could use more joy – and more donations

A Kent Fire Department tradition that has been helping families for years could now use some help itself. The clock is slowly ticking toward Christmas, and the Kent Toys for Joy Program is slowly plodding along. Donations to this family-friendly program are down – and considerably.

Kent firefighters
U.S. Sen. Patty Murray

Sen. Patty Murray: Republicans’ political games held middle class hostage

(U.S. Sen. Patty Murray on Dec. 13 released the following statement about the Senate vote to extend tax cuts. Murray, who voted twice this month for tax packages to extend middle-class tax cuts, today voted to move forward with a compromise package that extends current tax rates for two years. The package extends important tax cuts for middle class Washington state families, includes an extension of our state sales tax deduction and extends unemployment insurance for 13 months for out of work Washington state workers.)

  • Dec 13, 2010
  • BY Wire Service
U.S. Sen. Patty Murray
Kent teenager Jayne Johnson holds the two bags of umbilical cord blood Dec. 6 that it is hoped will help her grow a new immune system. The teen received the blood that day as part of a stem-cell transplant

How you can help transplant patient Jayne Johnson with her gift of life: Editor’s Note

If Jayne Johnson gets her wish, she’ll be watching the Seattle New Year’s fireworks from a very special vantage point. It won’t just be the room she’s in. It will be because Jayne, 16, will have survived the most intense medical procedure of her life.

Kent teenager Jayne Johnson holds the two bags of umbilical cord blood Dec. 6 that it is hoped will help her grow a new immune system. The teen received the blood that day as part of a stem-cell transplant
Pamala Heydt and her friend Will Zastawnik

Disabled Kent veteran collecting cards for fellow soldiers: How you can help make Operation Christmas Love a success

I met Pamala Heydt for the first time this week. It was a cold, rainy Tuesday morning at Kent Station. Considering what she had just been through, Heydt should have been angry. She should have been steamed. The disabled veteran, who lost 40 percent of her vision during basic training in the Army and who now is unable to drive, had been waiting for a bus that morning, with her friend Will Zastawnik and boyfriend David Conlin. She wanted to take the bus from the top of Kent Hill, to come talk to me about her hopes of collecting several thousand Christmas cards, to give to veterans in two area VA hospitals. The bus apparently passed them by.

Pamala Heydt and her friend Will Zastawnik

Goodbye to Mariners legend Dave Niehaus

Rest in peace, Dave Niehaus. The Mariners voice for 33 years died of a heart attack the evening of Nov. 10. He was 75 years young. He was an idol of mine for all of those years; I always enjoyed listening to the play-by-play guys since I was old enough to work my AM radio. When I was a kid I did a pretty mean impression of Howard Cosell, and at my first Trailblazer game my first autograph was not for a Blazer, but for Blazer play-by-play man Bill Schonely.

Beer samplers for Christmas? Editor’s Note

Here we are, parked at the start of a holiday season. That said, you can basically put the entire human species into one of two camps: • Those who started shopping for presents the day after last Christmas; and • Those who will start shopping for presents by Christmas Eve.

This traffic stop beat the alternative: Editor’s Note

I had a real-life experience similar to that recently described in the Kent Reporter, where a woman was pulled over for drunk driving, but was in fact sober. A couple of years ago, I was pulled over on Interstate 5 by a Washington State Patrol trooper, for what he suspected was drinking and driving.

King County Sheriff Sue Rahr

Sheriff Rahr: The outcome of budget cuts on King County law enforcement

(These are speaking notes from a press conference that King County Sheriff Sue Rahr delivered Nov. 18, to lay out the budget impacts to her department, and how her office is responding to those cuts.)

King County Sheriff Sue Rahr

Kent Police Chief: Making bullying a thing of the past

Do you ever have one of those “Wow, I can’t believe it used to be like that” moments? I was watching the 1980s movie “Black Widow” a few weeks ago. Debra Winger plays a reporter, and her boss is in the office massaging her shoulders at her desk, while asking her when she will start dating him. I was thinking to myself that there were about six different workplace violations in that one scene. When I started as a police officer, we had dispatchers in a certain room, and whenever you would walk in, the cigarette smoke in the air would gather and hang about three feet down the ceiling. Twenty minutes spent just talking in that room was the equivalent of smoking five cigarettes vicariously. Here’s one more example for you. When I was a high school resource officer, I vividly remember the students, both male and female, whose lives were impacted by bullying over who they were: unpopular, looked different, didn’t have the money to get certain clothes. It may seem a little quaint to think that anything could be that serious in high school, but it was. High-school students sometimes take things very seriously. A break up with a boyfriend, or bullying, or what we would consider temporary problems can result in permanent outcomes, like suicide. We have all heard a lot about teen-suicide rates, and the intensity of feelings we all had in high school is one factor.

  • Nov 11, 2010
  • BY Wire Service

Julia Patterson Column: Putting a damper on public smoking

According to the World Health Organization, tobacco use kills more than five million people every year – more than HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria combined. If current trends continue, tobacco could be responsible for more than eight million deaths per year by 2030 – nearly the equivalent of the entire population of New York City.

Kauffman thanks supporters

Thank you all for your support over the past four years. With the majority of the ballots counted, it appears that I will not be returning to the Washington State Senate for a second term. We fought a hard campaign, but as we’re seeing all across the state and the country, it was a tough election year for incumbent Democrats.

Note to Mariners: Let the kids play

As I write this your Seattle Mariners are wrapping up a dismal year, losing 100 games and now planning golf vacations.

The Kent Reporter’s endorsements for state Legislature

The opinions expressed below are the collaboration of Kent Reporter Publisher Polly Shepherd and Editor Laura Pierce. Send your letters and comments to Laura Pierce at lpierce@kentreporter.com

Letter from Kent Chamber of Commerce to City of Kent: Reconsider Transportation Impact Fees

The Kent Chamber of Commerce appreciates the City’s interest in receiving input regarding potential funding mechanisms for transportation improvements. We have enjoyed a continuous relationship with City of Kent officials regarding transportation projects and funding. In July of 2009, after extensive meetings with City of Kent leadership, the Kent Chamber of Commerce wrote a letter offering our review of the City of Kent’s Six Year Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP) and identified those projects that we believed were the highest priority of the business community. We gave priority to those projects that addressed freight mobility and congestion issues, which directly affect retail, commercial, manufacturing and industrial enterprises. We also put forth funding mechanisms such as Local Improvement Districts (LID) and Voter Approved Levies. In this recommendation we specifically warned against Impact Fees on new development for the following reasons:

Kauffman misleads the voters – Fain the right choice

I recently read the letter to the editor from Rich Wagner and strongly disagree with the claim that Senator Kauffman “is one of the few fiscal realists in the Democratic Party.

  • Oct 26, 2010
  • BY Wire Service

A love letter to women during Breast Cancer Awareness Month

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and I hope that my story will inspire women to do everything they can to ensure that breast cancer is not on their lists of regrets.

The Kent Reporter’s editorial stance on state initiatives

This year the Kent Reporter is offering the following suggestions on some of the high-profile state initiatives on the November ballot. The overviews are the consensus of Publisher Polly Shepherd and Laura Pierce.

Important Questions to Ask about Referendum 52

This election, citizens in Washington will consider Referendum 52, a $500 million bond measure to fund energy retrofits on public buildings. Voters should consider several key questions as they cast their ballots: ● Will the measure create or kill jobs? ● Will savings be greater than costs? ● Will we improve the learning environment of our schools? ● Should we ignore other education needs to fund this project? R-52’s sponsors promise the measure will create new jobs and improve the health of schools by providing grants aimed at reducing energy costs. A closer review, however, shows R-52 is unlikely to live up to these promises, and will cost taxpayers a total of $937 million over the life of the bonds.