Levels of service by Seth Truscott

VALLEY RECORD SNOQUALMIE

WEDNESDAY, OCT. 24, 2012 • DAILY UPDATES AT WWW.VALLEYRECORD.COM • 75 CENTS •

In the hot seat

State rep., senate hopefuls square off on reform, economy in Chamber forum BY CAROL LADWIG

Mount Si volleyball rising to take on top competition for postseason Page 4

&NOW

THEN

The 2012 spotlight on historic Snoqualmie Valley

PUBLISHED AS A SUPPLEMENT TO THE SNOQUALMIE VALLEY RECORD

Carol Ladwig/Staff Photo

Candidates Brad Toft, Mark Mullet, David Spring and Chad Magendanz spoke at a Snoqualmie Valley Chamber forum Friday. Toft and Mullet are running for state Senate, Spring and Magendanz, for House, Position 2.

The five candidates for three positions in the 5th Legislative District aired their views on education, reforms supporting small business, and transportation issues at a Snoqualmie Valley Chamber of Commerce lunch forum held Friday, Oct. 19, in Snoqualmie. Brad Toft (R), Snoqualmie mortgage manager and Mark Mullet (D), Issaquah business owner, are both running for the 5th District State Senate seat left vacant by Cheryl Pflug’s withdrawing from the race in May. David Spring (D), North

Inside this issue

Toft: The first dollar of our budget should be going to education. What’s happening in Olympia now is false choice being put in front of the voters. Education is being mixed in with other social services, and then we’re being told that there’s not enough money. So the dollars need to go to education first, and then we can have a discussion about raising revenues. SEE SEAT, 27

Levels of service

Historian Jerry Mader explores the faces, and the tales, behind Tolt’s first century. Page 11

Focal point Fall City’s 117-year-old Masonic Hall remains a centerpiece for Lodge, wider community. Page 12

Hops odyssey After boom and bust a century ago, wild vines linger on in Snoqualmie, and in local beer. Page 15

On the books

HISTORY

How would you fully fund education?

Fireworks, curfews, speeders—and smallpox. North Bend laws have come a long way. Page 17

Valley’s past comes to life at Meadowbrook Farm, Tolt Pages 9-20

Si View Parks ponders hard decisions as proposition goes back to voters BY CAROL LADWIG Staff Reporter

INDEX HALLOWEEN 3 5 OPINION 7 CALENDAR 21-24 CLASSIFIEDS 21 OBITUARIES ON THE SCANNER 21

Vol. 99, No. 22 Carol Ladwig/Staff Photo

A youngsters shows her drawing to Michael Bodwick, lead instructor in the Si View after-school program. About 40 students a day come to Si View after school, for snacks, play, study time and adult supervision.

Fridays are special at Si View Community Center. On Fridays, every child involved in the after-school program there, plus the ones in the satellite program at Fall City Elementary School, can go swimming, and then enjoy popcorn and a movie. That’s on top of the arts and crafts, games, snacks, homework time and, on this particular October Friday, a costume box to explore, built into every other day of the Si View Metro Parks District program. “Everybody who can hear me, put your hands on your head!” That’s program leader Michael Bodwick, trying to quickly settle about 20 youngsters from North Bend Elementary School down so he can take attendance before the buses from other elementary schools begin to arrive, about 10 minutes apart. SEE SERVICE, 6

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SPORTS

Staff Reporter

Bend activist, and Chad Magendanz (R), Issaquah software consultant, are competing for the 5th District Representative seat, Position 2. Position 1 Representative Jay Rodne (R) is running unopposed. Bill Shaw, publisher of the Valley Record, led the forum. Candidates took turns answering his questions:

6 • October 24, 2012 • Snoqualmie Valley Record

SERVICE FROM 1 “North Bend is our biggest group,” he said, later. Roll call complete, it’s snack time, and the best-behaved students get their first choice of snacks. A girl named Mia, in a gold-trimmed brown cape, skips to the snack table then back to her seat, curtsying before she sits down. She’ll wear that cape, snagged from the costume box as soon as she arrived, for most of the afternoon. Before snack time ends, another group has arrived, and the process begins again. There are 48 students signed up for today’s program, says Bodwick. Program director Jessica Fischer said “We have 120 different kids in the program between here and Fall City,” but only about half of them come on any particular day, averaging 40 at Si View and 20 at Fall City Elementary. The numbers aren’t huge, not when compared with the 550 students who participate in one or more of Si View’s basketball programs each year, or the nearly 800 who attend day camp, but the program is significant, and its loss would be more so. No one wants to eliminate the before- and after-school program, says Park District Director Travis Stombaugh, but dropping property values and Si View’s low position in the rankings for a share of property taxes levied may force the district to consider program reductions. “We would have to look at everything and see what we could provide the public, but there would have to be reductions,” Stombaugh said, if district voters don’t restore Si View’s funding by approving Proposition 1 on the November ballot. The Si View Metropolitan Parks District receives about 51 percent of its $2 million budget from property taxes – the other 49 percent comes from user fees. As a junior taxing district, Si View is in the third round of distributions of

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and mark their votes on Proposition 1. A 60 percent yes vote is needed for Proposition 1 to pass, along with a minimum voter turnout of 2,347. If either requirement isn’t met, Stombaugh and the Si View commissioners will have some very difficult decisions ahead. Stombaugh said the district does have $75,000, roughly a few months’ worth of operating costs, in reserve, which “would buy us time to make the necessary reductions in the level of service that we provide.” He was reluctant to speculate on possible program cuts, saying the commission would have the final vote on them, but some programs are more likely than others, based on participation and on “cost recovery,” or how well they pay for themselves. Carol Ladwig/Staff Photo “You might have a combination of less open Counting off her Kindergartners, after-school program instructor Lisa Bryant gets ready to take time. Maybe the community center closes earher group into the Fireside Room, for age-specific activities. The older students will stay behind lier, or the pool doesn’t open as early… Maybe for more free time, games in the gym, and then spend some time on homework. we cut back on all programming that’s less property tax money. Entities like cities and the Proposition 2, approved by 75 percent of than 85 percent cost recovery,” he said. The pool, offering swimming lessons to county are first in line for the funds, capped voters , authorized the district to levy for the more than 300 children each session, operates by state law at $5.90 per $1,000 of assessed rest of the 53-cent Si View levy. value. As assessed values fall, their tax rates rise This year, another Proposition 1 is on the at only 65 percent recovery. Also, he said, the district delayed hiring a to compensate, leaving almost nothing of the ballot, to restore the amount of the Si View recreation program coordina$5.90 for the junior districts. levy not covered by the six tor last year when the funding In other words, “The pie is only so big, and year levy approved in 2011. crisis began. He had hoped to it used to be that the pie was big enough that “It should be no more than fill that position this year, but everybody got a slice,” said park district com- 27 cents,” said Stombaugh, that might be put off again. missioner Mark Joselyn. although the final number will By next year, however, Last year, when Si View learned that it would be calculated next year when Stombaugh hopes they won’t get only about 9 cents per $1,000 as its share of the taxes are actually levied. be asking the voters to again the levy (an amount that had dropped to zero It’s not a tax increase, he maintain their tax levy. Si by the time of the elections as Joselyn recalled) says, “it’s a renewal.” View is partnering with sevit responded the only way it legally could – by “The important point of Mark Joselyn, eral other metropolitan parks asking the voters for help. this is it’s not an increase. Si View Parks Commissioner districts to lobby the legislaProposition 1 in 2011, approved by about 88 We’ve been very mindful of ture in its next session, for a percent of voters, protected 25 cents of Si View’s spending our patrons’ dollars more reliable funding source, funding. In effect, it allowed the district to levy wisely,” said Joselyn. 25 cents per $1,000 throughout its district, On that point, Stombaugh points out not just for parks districts, but for all junior including in the district’s unincorporated com- that “We don’t take our max.” Since voters taxing districts. “We’re not an island out here,” he said. munities that had already exceeded the cap, for resoundingly approved the creation of the Joselyn said the commission is also doing its the next six years. parks district in 2003, “we have always been best to increase funding. For example, the 2013 authorized to take 75 cents per thousand.” Stombaugh says he is optimistic that the vot- budget projects a 10 percent increase in serers will restore the parks district funding again vices and user fees, but no increase in staffing. “We need a sustainable long-term funding this year, although he is concerned about being “drowned out” by all the other items on the mechanism,” Joselyn said. “The 5.90 cap does ballot in a presidential election year. He hopes not enable revenues that are generated locally voters will remember to turn over their ballots to be spent locally.”

“We’ve been very mindful of spending our patrons’ dollars wisely.”

don’t wait too long.

www.siviewpark.org / 425-831-1900

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