Heritage Commission - Regular Meeting

I guess I should wave this way.

It sounds a little funny. I wish we had some music or something. That's right.

Quite a bunch.

Yeah.

Maybe if we had like a little intro song, like a theme song, we could change that.

We could walk out songs. We could walk into the room. Yeah. Oh, is yours beat? I don't know. That's a good question. I'll have to think about it.

Well, I think we've got enough folks to at least start. Also, in that case, I will call our June Heritage Commission meeting to order. I think roll call is our first thing on the agenda. All right. Roll call. Commissioner Cotter. Present. I know that Commissioner Bowman is going to pay excuse for today. Commissioner Steadman.

Here.

Commissioner Patrick. I see Commissioner Patrick in the attendees, so I'll loop back. Commissioner Shepard. Commissioner Kimball.

Here.

Thank you. Commissioner Nace. Commissioner Foster and Commissioner Patrick.

Oh, no. I'm trying to promote the other presence of

Melissa, as a panelist. Melissa, let me know if you need a different setup. Okay. We've got the attendance.

Great. So the next thing is approval of the agenda. And we usually give people a minute or two to just look at the agenda and see if there's anything they want to discuss. My other two orders are still pretty bad, but I think this is one we can usually approve by consensus, right? Great. So if there's any opposition, otherwise we can approve it by consensus.

Do we have to vote on it? Yeah. Cool. Next is approval of the minutes from the May meeting.

So I'll give folks a second to take a look at that as well. Okay. Do we approve this one by consensus too?

Great. I propose we approve that one by consensus as well unless anyone has anything in their Cool. Next, do we have any public comment?

I believe all of the members of the public here are presenters. There is, I guess, an attendee that is at the public. If you've got a public comment, please raise your hand, and then I can allow you to speak and raise your comment.

Okay. If not, we'll move on to announcements. Do we have any announcements this month?

No announcements that we won't cover later for other portions of the agenda. Okay.

Great. In that case, I think we're on to business items. It looks like the first one is sea level rise and cultural assets briefing.

Hi.

Hello.

Hi, Natalie.

How are you guys doing?

Good.

How are you? Good. Brittany, do you want me to share my screen and get started? Sure thing. Do I need to give you permission to do that? I don't think so.

Let me see there.

Okay, does that look full screen? Yes.

Okay, great. Well, hi, everyone. My name is Sally Weiss. I'm the Climate Resilience Coordinator for the City of Olympia. And in part of that role, I work on all hazard mitigation. So really thinking about how we're going to adapt as a city to climate change across all the different conditions that we expect to see. And obviously a big part of that is sea level rise. So as part of my role, I also am part of the Olympia Sea Level Rise Collaborative, which is a collaborative between the Port of Olympia, Lock Clean Water Alliance, and the city, as well as other partners at the county, Squaxin Island Tribe, and some partners at the state as well. So What I'm going to be presenting to you all today is really on our sea level rise work, but know that we're doing similar type planning efforts across hazards or across future climate conditions. So just to get you oriented with Olympia, I'm sure this looks familiar to all of you, but just always like to start with a map and get a sense of the space, especially around when we're talking about sea level rise. And hopefully that will kind of put you in a different frame of reference when you see these very you know, familiar looking map. So as you know, East and West Olympia is kind of connected through downtown and right around Capitol Lake as like the heart of Olympia. Um, you'll also notice that, you know, Capitol Lake, the inlet and this kind of area of downtown is very low lying and, um, sea level rise is really going to be impacting, you know, downtown and the port and, um, It's a key issue in that it can separate east and west sides. And there's lots of just like assets downtown that are really critical, not just for Olympia, but also for the region as a whole. So really looking at the water bodies that are a big part of our identity in Olympia, but also seeing this as an increasing risk as sea level rise will be accelerating into the decades, future decades. So before we can talk about what we're doing and where we plan to go, we should get grounded in the history of sea level rise and how we got to the place that we are today. So as I'm sure most of you know, the downtown area and the port used to all be an estuary. It used to look very similar to the Nisqually Refuge, which I know that there's someone speaking after me about the Nisqually Delta. So, you know, very similar topics here. But on the left side here, you can see a map of the historic shoreline of Olympia, this kind of like dark black color. And then the gray are all of these fill operations, which essentially took sediment from West Bay and East Bay, placed it where the port is, and slowly created this marine terminal in the port of Olympia. That's how we ended up with the downtown and the peninsula as we see it today. And then in Capitol Lake, this used to be connected to natural tidal flows, but we constructed the Capitol Lake Dam which then created Capitol Lake and kind of like cut it off from these natural tidal flows. And I think the big story here about like our geophysical history is really, you know, this used to be a place where there was water and water wants to return there. Another thing that's really interesting as we talk about sea level rise is, you know, our really unique tidal range. So something that I've learned is in my work here is that Olympia has one of the biggest ranges between low tide and high tide of anywhere in the continental US. So this is really kind of cool and something that you may have like intuitively known, but not like factually known. But what this means for us is that when we think about and see the maps of sea level rise, we're really focused here on the highest of high tides and this high tide flooding that will impact Olympia and the downtown. You can see here, most of Olympia's downtown is somewhere around 14 to 16 feet. Our highest tides come in ever on record was just around that elevation. It came in at 18.1, which is around 14 elevation, and that overtopped the shoreline. But very quickly those waters recede and you go back to these extremely low tides that aren't really a risk for Olympia. So the main takeaway here is that we're really talking about the extreme scenarios and even in those scenarios, the water will recede just because of this extreme tidal range. And it won't be like permanent inundation essentially. So just like, you know, these are more familiar pictures for all of us. You know, you go out to East Bay, super, super low tide. There's no water there. You could imagine along the shoreline here, you add 10 feet of water, you might be further up the bank. You can also see here at Percival Landing, this was a king tide, I think, this year. Or maybe this was the 2022 king tide this year. We're really, really high up, almost at the shoreline. You can see the kind of like how much space we have, the residual space that would be, you know, overtaken with sea level rise. But again, you would return to low tide soon afterwards. So what the city is doing, we came together with law and the port to create the sea level rise response plan back in 2019. This provides all of the, you know, baseline projections, the vulnerability assessment, and really lays out this phased adaptation approach that we're taking all the way until 2100. An exciting thing about this plan is that it's the longest range plan that the city has done, so all the way out to 2100, and really outlines how we're going to tackle different levels of sea level rise and increasing levels of investment and adaptation, both like thoughtfully and adaptively as the trends accelerate. So this is really our foundational document that we're still following pretty much to the book, even six or seven years later. Coming out of that plan, we developed the Sea Level Rise Collaborative that I mentioned a little bit earlier, but really focuses on the key partners that own assets downtown. What's really Also unique about our situation is that almost all of the shoreline is in public hands. So you could imagine a place like New York City where the pieces of shoreline are carved up, have different developers, very difficult to coordinate adaptation across that shoreline. In Olympia, we're fortunate that the port, lot, and the city, as well as the state, own a lot of the land that is needed to protect downtown and allows us to really move forward in a comprehensive way without needing to acquire more land or work directly with negotiations. So what are we actually up against as we think about what sea level rise is? You can see here on the right, just like an animated GIF of what the projections will look like out until around 2050. So in the sea level rise response plan, we expect to see around 12 inches, so about one foot of sea level rise by 2050. The high range scenario is looking at more to like two feet, but that has also kind of our newer, even newer projections kind of rounds that down to closer to 18 inches now. But you can imagine somewhere between one to two feet of sea level rise by 2050, and then somewhere between three to five and a half feet by 2100. And as we look at this map to the right, you can see the blue, dark blue, is representative of the 100-year storm. So 1% chance of each year having this amount of flooding. And then light blue shows the annual king tide. So that would be the highest tide of the year there would be some level of flooding. And just, you know, thinking about where we are now, annual king tides generally do not flood downtown. So that's mostly attributable to changes in sea level. The yellow lines also show where water would be coming in from the shoreline. So this shows our lowest lying areas and where we would expect to see overtopping. So as you all know, downtown has a lot of important assets that are at risk in this area. So the first is the treatment plant. This serves 130,000 people across the region in the South Puget Sound and is located right where that number one label is. We also have transportation routes across 4th and 5th Avenue. As I mentioned before, these are really like the key connectors between East and West Olympia has, you know, critical implications for emergency transport, like EMS services. We also have storm drains that cause, you know, backups into the street if the tide gets too high. And then obviously cultural and economic resources like all of downtown and the shops on 4th Avenue, the farmer's market, and just like general waterfront access. So because we're at the Heritage Commission, I added these. additional maps, everything in red shows what I can find on our GIS layers as historic properties or historic districts, and then just overlay those on top of those. So you could get a sense of what properties would be at risk, both in 2050 and then in 2100. And I don't think this is surprising when you saw the other map, a lot of this is downtown. area. And you can really just see here, just like, again, the dark blue is looking at king tide versus light blue is the 1% flood. So really what we're talking about isn't exactly where things get flooded, but how frequently it would get flooded and for what duration as sea level rise starts to accelerate. So, you know, The obvious next question is like, these look really intense. The impacts look very serious. So should we stay or should we go? Is there some form of managed retreat that the city has considered? And in the sea level rise response plan, we really looked and saw that there are manageable adaptation strategies that are at our disposal and the cost of adaptation is far beyond are far less expensive than the cost of, you know, staying in place. So wholesale retreat, as in like literally everything in those exposed areas was deemed untragmatic and that we have the space needed to really have these adaptation and protection strategies within publicly owned property and rights. So how are we using that space to you know, guarantee protection, both in the near term, which we consider 2050, doesn't seem so near term when you like say it out loud, but long term looking out to 2100. So there's, you know, a lot of ways to go about adaptation. I think people really latch on to these like seawall looking things and these physical adaptation strategies that block water from entering land, which makes sense. But there's lots of other things that we consider as well. So we have informational strategies. These are things like having additional studies, addressing data and knowledge gaps, understanding how sea level rise happens and how we could go about better addressing that in the future. There's governance strategies. This can be different policies. More plans, different coordinations, design guidelines, you know, updating the development code, more of these kind of like policy driven measures, even considering, you know, developing a sea level rise collaborative and having this kind of like governance structure is considered an adaptation strategy. And then operational, this is really thinking about how do we respond to these high tide flooding events when they do happen to make sure that we minimize any damage and are really effective in recovery. And within each of these strategies or within each of these timeframes, we use different amount of strategies depending on what it calls for. So during the near term, you could imagine we were doing a lot more of this informational work, some governance, some operational strategies to really streamline and like plug the holes of our most immediate vulnerabilities. In the midterm, we're focusing more on these physical strategies. thinking about how to, you know, have flood risk reduction and have this like larger, somewhat larger investment in the shoreline. And then long-term really dealing with larger sets of sea level rise projections. That's obviously much more heavy on the physical investment. So as you can see, we just finished our five-year strategy period and We laid out a bunch of tasks in the sea level rise response plan and have, you know, since completed all of them. And we have our report. If you're interested, I can also share with this with you now. So one of the key strategies here was installing backflow prevention on some stormwater outfalls around, around downtown and yeah, just, On the stormwater alcohol so you'll see these pipes kind of like entering into about it and let and essentially what it's doing is. Releasing treated stormwater and wastewater into but it and let. What the backflow prevention does is essentially cuts off title flows from backing up into the pipe. So you can imagine if this pipe was open and it was high tide, this can go up into the pipe and that connects to our stormwater system. which is where you see like catch basins in the street and these like grates in the street. So if the water gets too high, it backs up the system, it goes into the street and causes flooding. So installing these backflow preventions is really just like kind of band-aiding the system and making it so we can't have those backups. There's these like physical trap doors in place to stop the water from entering into our combined system. Another thing that we did was really focus a lot on this operational readiness. So coordinating with our public works team, with law and the port to make it much more streamlined when flood activities or high tide events are projected to come. So we've gotten better at, you know, monitoring how the weather is doing. We've been focused on outreach for, um, letting people know about, um, when high tides are planned to occur so that they could get their sandbags ready at the beginning of the season rather than the day before. And then, you know, we have started a website that people can get just like more holistic information to protect their properties downtown at the beginning of the flood season, rather than, you know, scrambling around the day before. So this has been another key strategy. And I'm not sure if people remember, hopefully you do if you were around, but in December, 2022, kind of like in the midst of this period of us doing these band-aid kind of near the end of us doing these band-aid, you know, stop gap measures, we had the highest tide on record, um, come to downtown Olympia where we experienced overtopping at the shoreline and, you know, closed streets downtown. And from a lot of these efforts that we were doing already, um, It really minimized the flooding and made things a lot less worse than they could have been. So there was, you know, significant efforts to sandbag. This was something that was streamlined through the response plan actions. We also installed those tide gates and like looking at this picture on State 4th and Columbia. you know, this flooding would have been significantly worse if we didn't have those backflow preventions that I was talking about in place. So there weren't things moving up into the system. It's more about that was just overtopping from the shoreline right here near the kissing statue. So it's not really great to be like, look at this picture. It could have been so much worse, but that is pretty much what the story is here. You know, the adaptation strategies held and just like minimize the damage that's there. Obviously there was things to learn, you know, buildings can't move so you can protect those with sandbags, but cars can. So this really, you know, every time there's one of these events, there's things to learn, there's things to pat ourselves on the back from. So this is really kind of what spurred more of the education and outreach, trying to get the word out about when high tides will happen so people can move their cars and not get, you and their engines. So, you know, iterative process, ever learning on our side as well. So as we look out to 2050 for these midterm strategies, I'll just give you a preview of what we have planned. We're really looking at this like linked integrated system across the shoreline, focusing a lot on, you know, both nature-based solutions, making sure that we have green stormwater infrastructure, looking at some of these living shorelines where we have space raise landscaping to offer some of that additional elevation. And then in areas where there really isn't space to have these nice landscaped features, looking at more of this gray infrastructure, that would be something like flood walls or raised streets that also offers the protection we need. Like I was mentioning before, all of this can happen within the public realm, really focusing on the right of way here along Percival Landing. And then my last slide, I promise, I think. Yes, my last slide. As I hope you all know, that Capitol Lake is getting restored into an estuary. So it'll look something like what's on the right here, thinking about how the dam will be removed and this will come back into natural tidal flows. And as part of this work, they're incorporating sea level rise projections into the heritage park redesign so you can imagine where the arc of statehood is currently located that will be raised about three feet to offer us the protection we need um out until i think it's like 2070 but think about like mid-century um it offers us that protection in heritage park that aligns with our sea level rise projections while also offering this like lovely habitat berm that is scheduled or like scheduled in to be the estuary. I also realized I breezed over this, but this is essentially what the city's plans are. So this is run by the state because they own Heritage Park. And this is the city's plans where we'll have this linked kind of raised tide gate system in the right of way. So you can imagine like really well engineered planters and then tide gates that could be, or flood gates that could be deployed to create this kind of like interlocking system that would be, you know, public access in all times except for a flood. And then it could offer, you know, a watertight kind of wall along the shoreline here across city properties. And that is my last slide.

happy to answer any questions and yeah thanks for thanks for having me thank you so much natalie i have one question and hopefully it's not a super silly one but um i was curious to know more about i guess the impacts of the deschutes estuary project and i'm curious if there are obviously that's going to have an impact on like heritage park, but does that impact any of the projections that the city has done in their sea level rise plan? And like, since the state is moving forward with that estuary project, is the city having to like kind of revisit anything that it has done with respect to sea level rise?

Yeah. So when the plan was made, we did know about the estuary project. So it was fully integrated into the plan and they're following what strategies they were you know, slated to do in, in the plan, but really there's nothing that will make things worse. And, you know, really what we have been focused on is that the flood pathways in from heritage park, it's one of the lowest lying areas in downtown. So having that raised burb across where the arc of statehood is really is all that was called for within the plan. And we worked with them and their design team at the beginning of the process to make sure that the height was aligned with the projections. And I will also add, they have like secondary plans on top. So ways to add additional height down the road to be like adaptive in case you know, the projections are the worst, they, the worst, worst case scenario. You know, you can add additional, they have other designs to add additional fee as needed and as kind of conditions evolve later in the end of century, like 2080.

Cool. Thank you. I guess I have one other quick question. So I know that you've completed like the initial five-year report. I'm curious, was the amount, the amount of like potential rise that was projected, was that Was that, did rise go past that? Was it below what was projected?

Yeah, that's a great question. We get this one a lot. So it's really difficult with the sea level rise projections because it takes like almost two decades of data, collected data to truly know what the rise is just because of like natural atmospheric processes. Like the earth is on a 19 year cycle. So it's hard to tell, without many many decades of data to truly know what that change is um and we don't really have like decades to wait and be like was it six inches or was it eight or was it ten or was it five um but from what i've seen and what some researchers researchers have shown is that it is like in this region it was around six inches um from the baseline so it is about what what we had expected and what was projected, but it's not like, it's very complicated. And like, there isn't a straight answer to that, but it is.

Is it us or is it? I'm not sure. Maybe it's Natalie's connection. I see other folks moving.

Hi, sorry. Did anyone else have any questions?

I don't want to take up all the air.

I did have a question if no one else has any questions. So Natalie, if you have this information, that would be cool. And if you don't, I'd love to know if you have a recommendation on where I could learn more. Could you speak to some of the general ways that new construction is designed to accommodate for sea level rise? And if you think it's possible to retrofit buildings to slow or mitigate the potential flooding?

Yeah, that's a great question. So we adopted a code back in 2016 that's called the seal rise flood risk reduction ordinance. And it's part of the like buildings chapter of the land use code. Um, and what that does is requires any new construction or, you know, substantially improved construction that's lower than 16 feet elevation. Um, which if you look, remember those like time charts, that's the level that we would expect flooding to be, kind of around 2050 timeframe. So anything that's under that elevation has to either raise their building or dry flood proof the building so that it's more protected to these like future sea level rise flooding hazards. So long story short, it is in the code for new construction, that you have to raise or flood proof or have tied gates to protect the property. In terms of retrofits, it is possible to flood proof things, flood proof like historic properties. I don't know how financially feasible it is, but I'm sure it is possible. Yes, it's kind of a matter of like where they're located and how much they would need to be flood proofed. It might not be. Yes, I can get you more information on this. It is possible, but I'll I'll send you some resources after this as well.

Thank you.

Any other questions? Awesome. Well, if not, thank you so much, Natalie. This was really interesting.

Yeah, of course. Let me know if you have any questions. I'm sure Brittany gave you my contact information or whatever. But feel free to reach out anytime. Awesome.

Thanks, Natalie.

Yeah, thank you. Bye.

Okay, great. So our next item on the agenda is a presentation from Janine Gates on saving the Nisqually Delta. Thank you.

Okay.

Can folks online let me know, did I just change the settings so that the PowerPoint is still visible but The screen for the presenter is focused on us more than the full panelist size. Like are we spotlighted larger than the other video? No. But you can still see our video.

I see everyone equally and then the presentation below us.

Okay. I'm not sure what setting that was, but at least you're still, you'll be visible and your PowerPoint is visible.

It's important. I don't think I need that, right? Oh, yeah, you don't need that. Well, thank you for having me. I used to attend these city meetings all the time, but I've been away for six years because I wrote a book called Saving the Squally Delta, and that took a lot of my time and energy. And I suspect a lot of you are new to the community, perhaps, certainly to the position since I don't know any of you. So this is a chance for me to introduce myself. I was the only one here when you're reviewing the Carnegie application with the joint committee with the design review. And I guess that's kind of typical. I'm often sometimes the only one to attend these meetings, but they're so exciting and so informative like that one. So I've lived in Olympia for 43 years. I'm a community organizer, a journalist, photojournalist, a caregiver for seniors full-time in their homes. I'm a mom and a grandma of two little ones. So I've researched and written a lot about the heritage of our city and our South Sound community. And in my latest book tour, I discovered that there are a lot of newcomers. And so I made this especially for you. Yes. It's brand new. Whoops.

Let's see. Try it out.

There we go. Okay. I like to collect postcards because it kind of makes everything bright the way the building was full of hope and promise, right? So I thought we'd have a little fun looking through the old days with some postcards I've collected and some of my personal pictures. I have the chalet from Priest Point Park, Main Street in 1907, and the Golden Gavel on Capitol Way when it was shiny in 1959. So I'll throw in a little... The chalet was a gift to the county by Leopold Schmidt and has been part of and was part of the Olympia Brewing Company display of the 1905 Lewis and Clark Exposition. The city acquired this area in 1905 to prevent the county from selling it off to developers and that's when the city annexed that area all the way out to what is now Squatson Park. The chalet was demolished in the 60s, so to say. So I served on the Olympia Historical Society and Bigelow House Museum for four years as secretary, and I got to check out a lot of historic properties, including the inside of the Carnegie Library when it had been vacant for many years. And I have lots of ephemera. at my house, including a bookmark from when it used to be the Four Seasons bookstore. But many of us have memories from when it was a restaurant and we had first dates there, engagements, celebrations of life accomplishments. So a lot of folks in the community have good memories of the Carnegie Library. That's me. In 1989, with my little daughter, we used to live downtown, as you can see, across from First Christian Church near the Carnegie Library. I didn't know how to drive, didn't have a car, and I walked to Yardbirds for everything I needed and to Market Foods, which is now Bayview. So now I'm a homeowner on the east side, just up the street, and I've lived there for 26 years, and I bought my house from the family of the Morelands who owned the Holly Motel. Yeah, which is on Old Highway 99, now Martin Way. So it was built in 1949 and boasted 30 first-class units, furnished with beauty rest furniture and of course a swimming pool that has since been filled in. Here's just a little collection from my photo albums at home. I've always been a photographer. My dad and my grandpa were photographers so it runs in the family. I have some captions here. I don't think I need to read through it but And this is part of our culture and our heritage. Of course, this is the historic building, the American Legion Building downtown. This is after the February 2001 earthquake, the Griswold Building on fire, which used to be the Avalon Theater. Fourth Avenue Bridge, again, after the earthquake was rebuilt and opened in 2003. Again, some postcards. I've always liked creating a shared sense of place, whether through my photography or writing or planning community events. And in 2009, I started my blog called Little Hollywood, which is still available, www.janineslittlehollywood.blogspot.com. And it's still up and used as a research tool for folks whenever we have a notable community member who's passed away. You know, my numbers on the blog behind, I don't look at it anymore, but I periodically do and notice that people are looking for information in my articles pop up. So my blog was hyperlocal, named Little Hollywood after the shantytown that used to be down at Capitol Lake. between the 30s and the 50s. It was our Hooverville during the Great Depression. So I wanted to shine the light on our stars, especially those who are not often heard. I wrote a lot about sea level rise. In fact, that might have been my picture, I have to say. So I'll check, of course. But the city often asks me for my photography, especially the sea level rise pictures, because I would dash down there and know when to be there. That one might have even been from 2015. I was looking through some of my copies. In 2015, the high tide was 16.4, so that was pretty dramatic. But I wrote about land use and shoreline development proposals, homelessness issues, community celebrations and sorrows, political campaigns. stewardship activities, festivals, business people, historic preservation, animals, birds, buildings, and trees. So I was thinking that since the word heritage is being used a lot lately as we celebrate our country's 250th birthday, I thought I'd show off a few pictures about what might make our community special. And I did get Jonathan Turlove, former city employee's permission for this picture. I said, Jonathan, can I use this picture from our procession of the species? Of course. And then, of course, this is a postcard before me. But what I like about it is you can see the smokestacks of the Olympia Vineyard Company in the background there. which was a worker owned factory founded in 1921 when 125 employees pitched together $500 each actually to incorporate and own the company. And it was a fur and plywood mill. So what makes our community special, it's the water. We have a water thing going on tonight. Those are my kids at Capitol Lake, the day before the groundbreaking for Heritage Park, where we weren't able to play on the shoreline anymore. But then I was often the only media at some really important milestones in Olympia's history. And then that's a postcard from 1910. So we've come a long way. Yep, this is downtown Olympia. Again, that's a postcard. But we have a long ways to go. And here's one of my sea level rise pictures. The Tacoma News Tribune also used one here. a couple of my pictures because I've rushed down there at the appropriate time. So helping others tell their stories is also something that I do as I did with An American Picture Bride published in 2017. I was honored to be chosen by Toy K to help her tell her very powerful story as a Chinese American woman from Montana brought to Olympia in an arranged marriage to Bill Kaye. And his family owned Kaye's Cafe in downtown Olympia next to the Labor Temple. And we gave a few copies to the library. The family has control of the book and the copyright. So I don't know if we have any more copies, but this is definitely part of Olympia's history. and Toy passed away last year. So putting my blog on hiatus in 2019, a lot of people didn't know where I went, but I was writing a book about the Nisqually Delta.

And here we are.

This is a national story as the Nisqually River begins on Mount Rainier in Mount Rainier National Park and travels through three counties and 78 miles to reach Puget Sound. A small portion of the Delta is the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge. The Delta was once too small to save, many thought, but now of course it's a favorite place where over 350,000 people go each year to appreciate open space and nature. So I'm going to do it. An extremely truncated version of my slideshow, I'm showing you my aerials. This is Thurston County. So, in the last 70 years or so, Thurston County, Pierce County, the ports of Olympia and Tacoma, various other entities, each put forth multiple simultaneous proposals to industrialize the Delta. The industry was there, but it really began in 1949 when the Port of Olympia put that area, their property, in their comprehensive plan to site heavy industry and a future port there. The Port of Tacoma got in on the action, and then the state I-5 came in, and it was really a free-for-all after the farm was sold in 1968. um, um, feds, uh, purchased a small portion of the property. That slideshow is a half hour. So please look at my, uh, website, um, saving the squally delta.com for where I'll be. I'm on a book tour. I've already given 25 presentations throughout the community. I'll do book clubs. I'll do private events, um, staff meetings, but that I've tried to give a truncated version before, and it just is too much. So this is Pierce County. And in the vein of highlighting and protecting our national heritage right now, I would like to illustrate a whole chapter that I cover in the book, and it's about Squalichew Creek in DuPont. That's Catron Island, DuPont. That's Cal Portland, a sand and gravel mine. And right here is Squalichew Creek, where I'm talking about. This is DuPont City Hall. So in 2018, I was reporting for my blog about a massive warehouse proposal, which would be located 100 feet from the creek, which was what the critical areas ordinance allowed when the property was purchased. The trail here has been used for millennia by tribes. And then a narrow gauge railway was put in by the DuPont company. And then when that property sold to Weyerhaeuser in 1976, Those rails were pulled up and now it's a beautiful family friendly trail again, right to Puget Sound. So the trailhead starts at DuPont City Hall. It's just stunning. For thousands of years, the Squalichew area was the site of a year round village for the Squalichew and Nisqually Indians. British Royal Navy officer George Vancouver entered South Sound waters in 1792. And in 1832, the Hudson's Bay Company arrived and built Fort Nisqually. Here also is the 1839 Episcopal Methodist Mission site, the first non-permanent Euro-American settlement on Puget Sound. But not only that, in 1904 to 1912, the Buffalo Soldiers of the 9th Cavalry camped and held maneuvers near the creek. In 1999, the Washington Trust for Historic Preservation called this area one of the 10 most endangered historic properties in Washington state. And today it is still eligible as a national landmark by the National Register of Historic Places. But today this area is threatened by a 256,000 square foot warehouse that will have 50 bays covering 15 acres with impervious surface. This case went through the legal process And a hearing examiner approved it in December 2024. And that's in my book. Now what is happening is it's come to fruition and about 300 healthy trees have been logged, including some landmark trees. The Creek lost protection through no fault of its own in 1994. So it is not protected by the Shoreline Management Act. And that too is in my book as to why that happened. Pileated woodpeckers are in abundance here. So please go and just witness the beauty of the area. And when you reach Puget Sound, you go through about a 200 foot canyon. It gets kind of cold. There's hillside seeps, as you saw in the previous picture, and it's just a beautiful place and bring a lunch. So this area, also in Pierce County, and the Delta is threatened. Cal Portland, the sand and gravel mine, has operated there under various names. It really began 135 years ago, but they've recently asked for an expansion of its footprint and would be using water from Squalichew Creek. The book is a call to action and to really transfer institutional knowledge. I interviewed about 25 folks who spent decades of their lives protecting the Delta, including the Nisqually Delta Association. And some folks are no longer with us, but I also interviewed folks who are currently saving the Delta now and doing really good work, the land trusts, the Nisqually River Council, which is the oldest watershed council west of the Mississippi. There's a lot of cooperation and collaboration between all things Nisqually, among all things Nisqually. So I just spent three days, just came back with teachers from our Nisqually, Chehalis, and Deschutes watersheds and beyond out at the refuge. It was called Summit for Teachers, Tides of Change, and it was about salmon and Puget Sound recovery issues. And it was a blast. So how can you not be hopeful about the future and all the work that our teachers are doing and all the work that our kids are doing? I led two breakout sessions on environmental journalism and gave my full Delta book slideshow. So I was very grateful to do that and I'm really grateful here too for the work that you do. So thank you for having me.

Thank you so much for coming and sharing with us.

Do you have any questions?

Yeah, does anybody have any questions?

Well, come see me at a presentation. I've also heard the city of Lacey put it on their website because I spoke to them in council chambers, the full slideshow and the Puget Sound Estuarium. Also, I had a presentation there at the Olympia Library and they put up a link too. I haven't seen them, but I'm sure they're fine. I say something different every single time I give a presentation, but this one was unique just for you. So thank you.

Can you tell us where we can find copies of the book?

Oh, sorry. Yes, on my website, www.savingasquallydelta.com. It's also at local businesses downtown, Last Word Books, Browsers, Soul Cafe, which is within Traditions, Orca Books. Gosh, there's a big list on my website as well. It's in Lakewood, DuPont Historical Museum, the Washington State History Museum. Everybody's on board. And I have a forward from former Governor Dan Evans, who I really appreciate his faith in me as well.

That's great. I think I have one quick question. So the creek that you mentioned, said that the the warehouse that's going to be nearby was approved in december of 2024 i guess i have uh well two questions like one how far along are they like is it already built is the warehouse constructed um it's it's logged okay the area is locked um i haven't i wasn't able to get there this week because i was so busy but it's moving at a very fast clip okay and then i guess the other question that i had i'm just curious if you know I'm assuming that had to do some type of, like somebody had to do like an environmental impact statement.

Oh yeah. It went through the legal process and appeals and citizens had a voice. I first alerted folks to this in 2018. So it's gone through the process.

And do you know like what the expected impacts were to the creek? Like if any, if they were included in that process?

It's all in the hearings examiner report, which is on the city of DuPont website.

anybody else have any questions great thank you so much thank you so much we really appreciate it thank you and uh our vice chair michael bowman was not able to be here today but he he said hello because he mentioned he just met you at a different event so oh yeah great i'm meeting lots of folks lately thank you

Awesome. So our next item on the agenda is a presentation from one of the students from the University of Washington. Laura, it's great to meet you. We're excited to hear from you.

Hi, thanks for having me. OK. Can you hear me? Yep. OK, great. So I'm going to share my screen. So can everyone see my slide?

Yep.

Perfect. So my project is about a temporary use for the KGUI radio station. I'm just going to briefly introduce myself. I'm Nora, and I'm a Master of Architecture student from UW. And this is a project I did for a class for historical preservation. So I'm pursuing a certificate in historical preservation. And yeah, this is the project. So why do we want to preserve this KGY radio station? So the first reason is because of its historical significance. So the KGY is one of Washington state's earliest radio broadcasting station that was founded in 1922. And also, it served as a civic memory. So for decades, KGY functioned as a virtual civic space connecting Olympia community through news, events, and public broadcasting. And as an architecture student, the most important thing is that it has a really high architectural integrity. And this building was designed by a firm called Robert H. Whelan, who also designed the Olympia City Hall. So you can see the picture on the right is what the building looked like in the 1960s. And it basically looks the same as what it looks like now. So they barely changed anything. And one of the other thing is that it has a really unique set condition. So the structure sits on pylons directly above the tidal mudflat, give people a feeling like the building is floating on water. And also because of environmental constraint, the protection to the shoreline, new construction on mudflat is highly restricted. So rebuilding this type of structure is not likely to be permitted today. And so this gives us an opportunity that we can adapt, reuse this project. And this also aligns with the Port of Peninsula Master Plan from Port of Olympia. One of their goals is that this area should be more community-oriented waterfront. And then when we zoom into this building, like what should we preserve? So the first thing is a unique waterfront location. So it's have like, give people feeling that it's floating on water and have a really beautiful view to the water when you get inside and also, a beautiful view to the Olympic mountains. And the second thing is very interesting is iconic visual identity. So you can see like the building has like green vertical with sliding and also have a really like bright orange color of large Later in KGY on the facade, give people a really strong mid-century branding style. So like on the bottom right is a picture I took from the restaurant next to it. And you can see like this building has been a great decoration of the whole view, like make like the beautiful scenery more interesting. And the third thing I want to preserve is the entrance. So this building's entrance is consisted of two big stuff. The first thing is the wood plank bridge leading to the main entrance. And then after you get into the building, you have a double-hide mezzanine with open stairs and the large glazing that can directly give you a view to the beautiful water and the mountains. And the last thing I really want to preserve is the 1960s waterfront facade. So the original design was changed in the 1970s. They pushed up the wall on the ground level towards the water to make more space for the office room. But the finish of the facade in the 1970s is not very elegant. So it gave me an opportunity that can restore the like 1960s beauty. And so after analyzing all these things, I came up with two possible futures for the KGY radio station. So the first one is community meeting house. So I can extend the KGY's historical role as a public communication platform into a physical civic gathering space. I can provide meeting room and social spaces that support community dialogue, local initiatives, and public events like the meeting we're having today. And the second one is the Port of Olympia History Cafe. So it's really inspired by the history of the port. So a cafe can be as a hub, can tell the story of the port's past, present, and future. I think this can directly bring economic revenue and visitor flow to the Port of Olympia that really align with the Port of Peninsula master plan. So after having a meeting with people from Port of Olympia, they're really interested in the idea of Olympia History Cafe. So I dive in more into this direction. So when it comes to adapter use, the first thing is like, like what design should be upgraded since this is like a really old building and some of the character of this building cannot fit into like a nowadays requirements or building code so the first thing it should really need to be like upgraded is the restroom facilities and the corridor since they're really narrow and the um and the restroom cannot fit into the ADA requirements. It should be expand. And also like talk about before, like restore the openness of the 1960 waterfront facade. Cause now it's like ever limited window space and the glazing is not enough and just waste a beautiful like waterfront view. And the third thing is that this building can be active as a site across day and evening. So it can be a cafe at daytime and a bar at nighttime. So it can raise population not during days, but also after office hours. So they also orient the public space toward the waterfront rather than the parking lot. So when I'm inside the building, I noticed that even though the building on the parking lot side is the south side, But because of the large trees, it's shading it. It doesn't have enough sunlight. So because of that, the public space should be more in the waterfront direction, not the parking lot direction. So this is the first floor plan of the Port of Olympia History Cafe. So after you enter in the space from the bridge, it's a corner cafe with a counter and then and also like is a double glazing entrance area and after you keep walking towards a beautiful scene and the beautiful scene is actually leading you to like the exhibition area so the exhibition area has a theme called Costa Salish and Tiger Life and we're going to talk about talk about it in the next slides and then if you keep and if you're like walking to um To the right, there will be a whole dining area with bars. So like imagine you're just sitting by the bar and there is a beautiful sunset behind you. And also like since they have like a hallway surrounding it, give us a chance to put like dining tables there. You can have a beautiful terrace dining area. And also I expand the other washroom to fit the ADA requirements on the ground floor. And also the kitchen is in the south, like to the parking lot side. So, yeah. And then what is the coastal salvage and tidal life excavation area? So it will focus on the coastal salvage life before Western industrialization. So it can have a canal model as a central spatial and cultural symbol, and it can display the mudflat ecologies, like shellfish, tidal cycles, and really like really like natural things and also it can like a display the audio visual or history sharing indigenous Americans life like from their perspective so the key question of this exhibition area is to ask what did this what did this place mean before it became the port And then this is a visualized picture of this cafe on the ground floor. So I keep continuing the color language. I have a bright orange color. And with the light blue wall, kind of like a baby blue wall, I can really build a visual connection to the water. And also, I have many wood furnitures. natural. And on the left side, you can see the exhibition area with the boat and the shellfish. And on the right is the dining area and also like a terrace dining area in distance. And the beautiful view from Port Olympia. And then this is the second floor. And so on the second floor, after you like walking up, through the open stairs is another exhibition area with the theme of industrial port and extraction and then on the right is the same with like a dining area and then also have a terrace dining outside the building on on the wood plank And also because of the slope roof, the height on the south side on the second floor is very limited. So it gives us the opportunity to use it as a storage place and also the same place as a washroom. So the facility can go directly up and down. But on the second floor, there will be no ADA washroom, just a normal washroom. So what is industrial port and extraction? So it was exploring the industrialization of the port of Olympia. So it can have a timeline wall tracing major historical developments of port of Olympia and a global shipping map situating Olympia in their international trade and there's a play of industrial excavation like ship components. And also most importantly, they have a section addressing environmental complex and a community debate. So the key question of this exhibition area is about how did industrial redefine this landscape? And this is the visualized picture of this, like the second floor. So you can see this is exhibition area on the left and then the dining area on the right. And then a really beautiful glazing and it was a beautiful view to the water. So as I talked before, you have three exhibition area, but you only have two floors. How come where are you going to put a third exhibition area? The third exhibition area is about the present port. the exterior landscape actually functioned as the third excavation. So no physical boundaries, the port today became the display. So the views of all the mudflat, tide, and the port activities is the excavation thing, and the real-time observation of ecological and industrial coexistence. So the key idea of this excavation area is to tell people that the port is still evolving, Yeah, and then this is a little bit like a zoom in detail, like about how to preserve this old building. Like the most important thing is the timber pilings. So for to preserve the timber pilings, they came up with some ideas. Like the first thing can remove the marine growth. and inspect the timber condition. And the second thing I can be done is to strengthen the deteriorated piles using a new material that can wrap it around and then pour liquid inside that can strengthen the pilings, make sure it can still hold the structure. Yeah, and then they give us advantages that it can preserve historical timber far back and they have a minimal intervention and then a lower environmental impact. However, like this thing also have a limitation because it required a periodical rate inspection and the maintenance because it's not as strong as concrete. And the second thing is just to totally repair it. So how to repair it, like it can remove damaged timber piles and then replace it with like FSC-certificated Douglas fir, or just directly replace it with reinforced concrete pile. So it will give the structure a really strong load capacity and have a longer service life. The limitation, it will lose the original historic material and also have a different visual thing. So yeah, this is my presentation. Thank you. And I actually have more like historic project on my personal website and just feel free to scan it and explore it on my website. Thank you.

Thank you so much. That was so interesting.

Does anybody have any questions or anything? And I'll also say that I see in the audience, we do have two attendees that are joining us so if folks that are listening in wanted to have a comment or just raise your hand then i can um allow you to speak but i know that nor you've taken some trips down to olympia and worked with some local organizations to do the research for your project so it's really awesome to see the work thank you anybody have any questions

I just want to say I thought this was great. The design is really beautiful. He did a really great job. So very good. And I had no idea this existed either. So it was very educational as well.

Yeah, it's like a really beautiful beauty and really happy to have a trip there. And actually like the beauty itself is much prettier than the picture. So yeah, it's just really cool.

Okay. Let's see. You've got, um,

Dave, do you mind trying to say something?

Yeah, perfect. What would be the cost? Has anybody come up with an idea as to how to turn this into reality? Or is this just a concept? Is there money behind this?

So this is just totally a concept for a school work, but like we talk with people from Florida Olympia and their major concern is just about the cost. So yeah, still like a long way to go, but we still have a hope for it because like there's like, for example, like the restaurant next to it is actually planning to like purchase the building and did a renovation and then serve as a restaurant. But yeah, It's going to be a big cause of renaming the old building, especially when it has a very unique set condition.

Beautiful concept, Nora. You did a really, really great job. I hope it happens.

Me too.

I'm rooting for you. I lived there for basically 50 years. I worked in that building, so I know every inch of it. I was there when it opened. So anyway, nice job. I hope you can save it, but keep us posted.

Thank you. Yeah, I sent this proposal to Port Olympia, and they really like it. But money, yeah, that's a big thing.

That's it from me.

Thank you.

And then we've got another. another hand raised. So, Greg, let's see if you can say something. I think we'll be able to hear you.

Yeah, thank you, Brittany. Can you hear me? Can you hear me? You can?

Yes.

Okay, great.

Well, I, too, want to express my thanks to Nora for doing this great job for us for preserving the KGY Studio building. I think this is great to have you present this proposal, and I I think that you added quite a bit of work to the previous presentations that I had seen, especially you're looking into preserving and strengthening or replacing the pilings, which of course is really key to the future of this building. So I really appreciate that you added that additional detail to your presentation and your study. I think that's really valuable. And like Dick says, I hope that you would forward this and I hope that the port commission and staff will act upon it. And I also liked the fact that you picked up on the color scheme of the exterior, that kind of, you know, that nice orange and kind of the grayish blue color for your interior design. the interior of your exhibition areas. So I thought that was very, yes, thank you. Thank you for putting that scenario up. So anyway, thank you again, Nora, for your great work on this. This is really something that I think will give some impetus to preservation of the KGY. We don't want to lose it. I worry about it a lot, but hopefully this will come to reality. And thank you so much for your work on that.

Yeah, thank you so much for bringing up this proposal to the class and giving me an opportunity to see this beautiful building and work on it. And the additional thing is I took another class. It's about detailed historic building preservation. So I was like, yeah, I'm really interested in this building. So I want to do more on how the actual thing can be done for this building. So yeah, I can send you more information. like uh pay more things about the strategies yeah thank you thank you so much great yeah thank you thank you too thank you too nora i appreciate that very much thank you any other questions or comments i have a

comment, it might be something we can even take action on. Is it possible for us to endorse this plan and send our endorsement on over to the port to let them know that we really like the work?

That's a great question. I'm not going to pretend like I know.

That is a great question. I don't know either but i think that um if that's something you'd like to pursue and if the commission votes on it i'm happy to help draft up a memo to say we really love the student presentation of work and yeah i don't see why we couldn't send to the court email to say that this is um you know something that the commission enjoyed

I'm treading into uncharted waters in my newly found role as chair of the area commission. But my assumption is that if we wanted to do that, someone would need to move that we do that.

I am moving. Or present a motion, rather. Yes. I would like to make a motion that the commission endorse this plan and send word to the port that we appreciate Nora's work and hope they will pay close attention to it.

I would love to second that motion.

Sure, and I can help with that because I talk with people from Pearl Olympia. His name is called Laurie Hankerson and I think I can send more email to him. Thank you so much for liking this project.

Chris, just to double-check my Robert's Rules and Order, do we all need to vote on it technically? Yes. Okay, so all in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed?

No opposed, wonderful. Okay, I'll work on drafting up a little memo, and then Nora, I'll connect with you to see who your contact is, and cool, okay, let's...

Thank you so much, Nora.

That was so interesting.

Thank you for having me. Thank you for everything, everyone.

Of course. Okay. Wonderful. That was great. We had such cool agenda items. I think technically we're on to reports now, committee reports. I don't know how many of those we have. I guess one thing I was gonna ask was, Kyle, would you maybe be willing, if we wanna start with the POG committee, would you maybe be willing to just say a few words about, I know you've been working on the CLG grant application?

Yeah, absolutely. So for those that don't know, we submitted a draft application to DAP for the South Capitol Neighborhood Reconnaissance Survey since the last one was done in 1991. We wanted to do another with something that we discussed in front of the commission. So I wrote the application, submitted it to Michelle, had a call with Michelle Thompson at DAP to go over like what would make it most likely to succeed and a lot of questions came out of that so i've been talking to people that do reconnaissance surveys so historical preservationists across the country the upshot is so in the south capitol neighborhood there are roughly 136 properties that were not captured by the 1991 reconnaissance survey so then we would need presumably to find a way to capture them to survey that So the cost of that process for the entire neighborhood, you're looking at a range of $100,000 to $200,000 plus. Not something that we can do. That's way more than what the grant's going to return, which might be $15,000. As far as the time that that would take, it would be roughly three years for the whole neighborhood for just the undetermined properties, about a year. Yeah. There are, however, alternative solutions. So I spoke with a person, Kelsey Doncaster, who actually used to work at DAP in the grant management team with Michelle. And he suggested that we could use the grant to expand the period of significance from the National Register Survey, which I believe topped out at, what, 1941. So we would apply essentially to have that survey then extend to a different point in time, probably something like 19... I don't know, 65, 1970, because there's a bunch of mid-century modern properties in that neighborhood that were not captured that presumably could then be captured. To do that, there's a lot of heavy lifting that we could do on our own. So there was a county assessor's report that came out in 2011. So some of these properties do have information as to like when they were built and some luckily even have pictures that are available on wizard. So you can look and do a quick eye check. Like, is this something that, would potentially qualify or is it like an apartment building or whatever? Or was it built in like very obviously like 1980s? One thing to consider about this survey process is that as surveys age, buildings lose their eligibility. So since 1991, presumably there's been a fair amount of turnover in that neighborhood. A lot of buildings have probably been changed in such a way that they are no longer eligible. So that is something to consider. The TLDR from all of this is we're at a bit of an impasse now because we could go ahead with the undetermined property survey, which a quote for that would be roughly 30K. It's not something that you have to do all at once. Ostensibly, we could do some of it in this year with this grant and then apply again to complete it. But I don't know if there's a way for us to do the entire process together. with the money that we would get from the grant so more conversations what michelle is presently on um vacation but next steps for me at least after having all these conversations uh is to reach out to michelle and say hey this is what i'm hearing these are the returns of those conversations and get her advice because she's been such a great partner in this and um i think that she would be able to let us know you know what would be the best way forward Because if it turns out that this is something that we don't or can't logistically move forward with, we would want to pivot and quickly to something else so that we could get an application in. And I know that we discussed other ideas. All of those, I would assume, presumably still on the table. So that's the quick and dirty.

Cool. Thank you for that update. It sounds like it'll be really interesting to hear what Michelle has to say when she's back and Yeah, look forward to seeing the conversation continue going and hearing about what the right course of action might be or what our advice is. Thanks. Thank you, Kyle. Other committee reports?

So I know that the Moore Committee may have a report they met this month. committee chair, Melissa, would you like to share?

Yeah, there were a few things that we discussed. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Okay. And I'm not echoing this time.

No, you're good.

Okay, good. So there were a few things that we talked about in our last meeting. Notably, everybody came up with this idea about a trivia night, which I haven't actually been to one, but it sounds amazing. So We were talking about potential logistics of having a trivia night before the South Sound block party. And let's see, we were also talking about creating a one-page paper about why it's significant to be on the registry and kind of explaining that to the public, like why it's important and what does it do versus being on the national registry. Let's see, what else did we talk about? Mainly the trivia night and the one pager. Am I forgetting anything? The table.

We can do that. There'll be another section. I'll do a whole. Yeah, okay. But I think that as part of that with the trivia, the more committee wanted to get some feedback on who in the commission might be interested in participating in planning, helping out with logistics or being there to volunteer for the day of just so that if this does move forward, it won't just be two people working on it, but we can all work on it together.

Suggestions of venues that we had at the time were three magnets because it's family friendly and you can take your dog there or bus stop. But also another suggestion was like, what's the one with all the tater tots? Well, 80, they have their own trivia night already. So, and it's big, it's really big, especially compared to three magnets. So I don't know if any of you have been to a trivia event at any of these locations and think, oh, yeah, like that could be a good match. So like we're thinking the trivia would be Olympia like heritage based, you know, like our history. And Michael said he's great at trivia. So he was all pumped about creating questions and stuff. So. So I saw you nodding, Kyle. What do you think?

So I was talking to Michael about this via email, and I suggested Three Magnets only because I am very close with the owners, and we run events there all the time. So getting that set up would be very easy. I would just tell Nate and Sarah, hey, we're doing this, provided it doesn't conflict with a couple dates per week. And what else? Oh, I think that was it. We can make that happen very easily at Three Magnets. I don't know about any of the other locations. I haven't done anything there.

Bus stop has a big area that we can host the event in as well. Even have a giant screen if you want to put questions up on the board or whatever. But if you have inroads to Three Magnets, I would say that's probably the best scenario.

Well, yeah, because at Three Magnets, there's the big TV in the front, right? So they do trivia on Mondays, and then they put up the questions and whatever on the big TV, and there's space around the benches. And then we would also presumably want to, once we have decided on a date, submit that to What's Happening Today in Olympia, which is everybody's favorite social tool.

So we were talking about maybe doing it the week before... South Sound Block Party, let me look at my calendar. Yeah, I don't remember dates.

Is this the one in September or is that the other one? I think it's like the third week of August. Okay.

And I think that I may be able to find a source for some tickets as a prize, maybe. Oh, that's right, yeah. That'd be a very cool way to tie into Olympia's music history. Yeah. I think last year or two years ago at the South Sound Block Party, there was a proclamation for the music history of Olympia and the music scene and like the Riot Grrrl movement. So the Indie Music History Project, there's already a great bunch of research that we could pull from to do some trivia questions. And we could also reach out to the folks from that organization because they still are around. And I feel like it could, It could all fit very well together if that's where we want to start.

So Kyle, that date would be August 24th, a Monday. You said they usually have trivia on Mondays anyhow. If they were willing to cede that particular day to our cause, that would be great to have the prize be the South Sound Block Party tickets, which are that weekend.

Got it. So the 24th, August. Yeah, let me ask.

That would be amazing. Thank you.

As far as volunteering goes, I'm obviously in for volunteering. So not doing trivia. What I see. No, no. But anything else? No.

I'm happy to help out in some capacity, depending on whatever it is.

So the next step will probably have a meeting. We will have a meeting next month, probably the first or second week of next month to see where we are with hearing from three magnets and to sort of see about who's going to volunteer and what roles they might play.

I'll send an email out when that date is decided. So anyone who's interested in joining can show up for that meeting and see what role they can participate in.

And as a prize, like as a prize, we could give away a meet and greet with your Olympia Heritage Commission. How cool would that be?

A walking tour. There's so many cool prizes we could line up. And I think it would be really nice to just have the commission be brought up in a setting that's totally different than we're used to. Just out in the community, not even throwing our own event at a venue to bring people in, but we're going to where people are going for tributes. Like, I don't know, it seems really cool. I think we'll reach new audiences for sure. Yeah, for sure.

Cool. Cool. Thanks, NASA. Awesome. Any other committee reports?

I think it's the rest. I have a bunch of report or updates and reports that Heritage Review Committee So I sent an email to schedule and I need to close loop on that, but there are some upcoming meetings that I will be sending you information about for those who are on that committee. And then just an update for the Sandman status that so next month we're aiming to do a public hearing for the Sandman tugboat. I think at this point from being in touch with the port and with the group that the port is working with, the historic maritime foundation, Erin, who did a presentation with us last time, there's a bunch of different mitigation that they're working on. So, you know, working on a 3D scan of the boat, working on putting a video together, possibly having an inventory of the artifacts that are on the boat that could be, you know, displayed in a public place for the community to keep it around. I think the goal is to kind of pursue something at Harbor Days. And so I'm wondering to the group if there is any interest in programming and I guess not related to the public hearing, but more so just like collaborating with the port and the maritime community. Does the Heritage Commission want to get like a subcommittee together to help out with some kind of history collection or recognition at the booth at Harborfest?

Harborfest.

Harborfest, Harborday. Yeah, I mean, I think that being involved in whatever capacity makes the most sense would definitely be a good thing. I think that, like, not only is it within our kind of scope, but also I think that it's something that we care about, and I think that it's something that we should work with Maritime. I don't want to butcher their acronym, but the Maritime Association and the court. So, yeah, I think getting together with the people is like a subcommittee to discuss a problem.

for frame of reference are um are from september 4th to 6th and uh we did talk about potentially doing a table event which will require um some volunteers to take shifts and maybe we don't cover that entire friday saturday sunday but maybe we cover a portion of that and um For any of you that have volunteered at Arts Walk events, we could do something similar. Oh, who's this? We could do something similar as far as having a craft for kids. We talked about maybe some sort of paper boat option, potentially a paper boat hat could be fun. So that's to kind of give you a little bit of taste of what that

subcommittee would be like um what that actually event event would entail great uh i think similar to steven's earlier motion on supporting um setting the proposal this could be a good motion to make to have in our minutes and then um we'll be able to share with the court like the heritage commission informally is saying that they want to assist at this event

that it's out there i would like to move that we create a subcommittee to do exactly what i say all in favor aye aye any opposed great so so moved perfect so i have a motion for the heritage commission to form a subcommittee to assist with

the associated maritime heritage at Harbor Days for the Sandman. I'll capture that in a coherent way. And then I guess with my logistical hat on, similar to the other question, can I get like a show of hands on people who might be available for the fourth to sixth um because if we are if we voted yes on this motion i'd like to make sure we have the people to be there unless we all say yes and then no one's available of august september 4th to 6th weekend melissa your hand is up you're available awesome and stephanie okay awesome i'm probably available cool okay There's at least a couple of people. Okay, cool.

Presumably, we will be the only ones that need to be there, because there will be the Maritime Association.

Yeah, and I think that it's possible that we could even create programming that we don't need to be there the full time, but someone else can pick up whatever the activity or interactions. Yeah, okay, cool. Thank you.

Cool.

Any other updates? I do have another Sandman question. So as part of the plans for the Sandman, they are making an inventory list of all of the artifacts with the goal of launching an application for folks to write in and sort of, I guess, apply if they're interested in specific pieces of the inventory. And the goal to have this as an application is to make sure that the pieces are going public entities where the pieces will be able to remain in the public realm or be on display. So if it's at a restaurant, but it's on their wall versus in someone's private home, which is not the goal. And so there's a review committee that they're putting together for when this does launch. Is there anyone on the Heritage Commission that would be interested in being a member of this very small review committee? I actually don't have a list of who's going to be on it, but it would be relevant folks in the community that work with Heritage, Maritime Heritage.

I'm happy to help on that.

I see. So I think there might be only one spot for the Heritage Commission, and I see three notes of interest. Is any interest in the room, or is it all the three hands online? okay um i will graciously bow out and stephanie that looked like you were uh seconding would come yeah i'll i'll decline as well um that's fine okay steven i'll i'll let them know that you're interested and i'll pass your contact info along okay sounds good thank you other items i think that's all the project related and active information i have at this time okay wonderful shall we move to adjourn at 7 11 p.m

I don't remember if someone needs to second that or not.

Second.

Okay. So adjourned at 7-11. Thank you all.

Thank you all.

Bye, friends.

Have a good evening.

You too.