WASHINGTON — Just in time for a new movie about the making of “Mary Poppins,” the 1964 Disney classic starring Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke has been selected for preservation at the Library of Congress so future generations of Americans can see it.
The library inducted 25 films last week into the National Film Registry to be preserved for their cultural, historical or cinematic significance.
This year’s selections include Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction,” the space race film “The Right Stuff,” and Michael Moore’s documentary confronting the auto industry, “Roger and Me.”
Curators said it was a coincidence that they selected “Mary Poppins” just ahead of its 50th anniversary and during the release of the new Disney film “Saving Mr. Banks,” which is about the making of the movie.
Steve Leggett, program coordinator for the library’s National Film Preservation Board, said “Mary Poppins” had been on the short list of picks many times before.
The films chosen this year span from 1919 to 2002 and include Hollywood classics, documentaries, silent films, independent flicks and experimental pictures.
Congress created the program in 1989 to ensure that gems from American movie history are preserved for years to come.
Some are chosen for their influence on movies that would follow, as with “Pulp Fiction” from 1994. The film board called it a milestone for independent cinema, and Leggett noted Tarantino’s “stylized violence and kind of strangeness” in the cinematography.
Older films often become endangered of being lost, said Librarian of Congress James Billington, “so we must protect the nation’s matchless film heritage and cinematic creativity.”
This year’s selections represent the “extreme vitality and diversity of American film heritage,” Leggett said. Many illustrate American culture and society from their times, he said.
The oldest films joining the registry this year are from the silent era. They include 1920’s “Daughter of Dawn,” which featured an all-Native-American cast of Comanche and Kiowa people, with a fictional love story and a record of Native American traditions of the time.
The 1919 silent film “A Virtuous Vamp,” a spoof on workplace romance, made Constance Talmadge an early film star. And “Ella Cinders” from 1926 featured the famous actress Colleen Moore.
Other notable selections this year include the 1956 science-fiction film “Forbidden Planet,” which depicted humans as space travelers to another planet; the popular 1960 western “The Magnificent Seven”; and the 1946 film “Gilda,” which is the first in the registry featuring actress Rita Hayworth.
Also included is the 1966 adaptation of “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf,” starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. The movie earned Oscar nominations for them both, a win for Taylor, and launched the screen-directing career of Mike Nichols.
Original prints of even newer movies, such as Michael Moore’s “Roger and Me” from 1989, have become endangered. “The true regret I have is that the cities of Flint and Detroit, which are at the center of my film, are now in much worse shape — as is the American middle class in general,” Moore said.
Photo courtesy Howard Garrett / Orca Network, June Members of L pod, one of the Salish Sea’s resident orca pods, heads north up Boundary Pass to Georgia Strait.
Forty years after the passage of the federal Endangered Species Act, the state and Snohomish County remain squarely on the edge of that preservation frontier.
More than 40 animal species in Washington are listed by the federal government as either endangered or threatened under the law, signed by President Richard Nixon on Dec. 28, 1973. Many others are listed as species of concern.
Among creatures found in waters in and around Snohomish and Island counties, seven species of fish or marine mammals are listed under the act.
Of the local fish species and orcas, salmon and bull trout were listed in 1999, the killer whales in 2005 and the other fish species in 2010.
Reasons cited for the decline of the fish are many, including pollution, overfishing and loss of habitat. In the case of killer whales, dwindling supply of their diet staple — chinook salmon — is a major contributing factor, officials say.
Supporters claim many success stories for the Endangered Species Act, with bald eagles and peregrine falcons among the more prominent examples.
Gray whales were taken off the list in 1994 and steller sea lions just this year.
According to U.S. Fish and Wildlife, 99 percent of the hundreds of species listed since the Endangered Species Act became law have been prevented from going extinct.
The law protects species by preventing them from being harmed or captured and by regulating human activity in their habitat areas.
Perhaps the best feature of the Endangered Species Act, some say, is that it keeps the species’ problems in the public spotlight.
“It has pulled people together to talk about what to do,” said Daryl Williams, environmental liaison for the Tulalip Tribes.
Recovery for many species, however, is slow and not guaranteed.
“Listing is a way of sort of planning for recovery, if you will,” said Brent Norberg, a marine mammal biologist with the National Marine Fisheries Service in Seattle.
The southern resident orca population, for example, had 88 whales in 2004, the year before it was listed under the ESA. The population now is down to 80, according to the Orca Network, a Whidbey Island-based group that tracks the whales.
“Because they’re so long-lived and their recruitment is so slow and their numbers are so small, it’s going to be quite a lengthy process,” Norberg said.
William Ruckleshaus, the first director of the Environmental Protection Agency under Nixon in the early 1970s, is 81 and lives in Medina.
The EPA was created and Endangered Species Act was passed after pollution and declines in species had reached alarming levels, Ruckleshaus said. The Cuyahoga River in northeast Ohio, for example, famously caught fire in 1969.
“The public demanded something be done about it and the president responded,” he said.
He said the endangered species law might have overreached.
“We passed laws that promised levels of perfection that probably weren’t possible. It’s hard to do it, to be honest with you,” Ruckleshaus said. The law has been refined over time, he said.
Among those stories is perhaps the most high-profile recovery: the national symbol, the bald eagle.
The eagle’s numbers in the 48 contiguous states declined from roughly 100,000 in the early 19th century to only 487 nesting pairs in 1963, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife website.
Several measures were taken to help the eagle, beginning with the 1940 Bald Eagle Protection Act, which made it illegal to kill an eagle. The pesticide DDT, found to have thinned the eggshells of eagles and other birds, was banned in 1972.
Still, “listing the species as endangered provided the springboard” for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to accelerate recovery through captive breeding, law enforcement and nest-site protection, according to the agency’s website
Bald eagles rebounded and they now number about 10,000. The eagles were taken off the list in 2007.
The Endangered Species Act’s effect on salmon is not so clear, the Tulalips say.
Development that destroys habitat is not restricted enough to offset the losses, Williams said.
“We’re still losing habitat faster than we’re gaining it from restoration,” he said.
The problem is inconsistency in rules among various agencies involved in environmental protection, said Terry Williams, fisheries and natural resources commissioner for the tribes.
Also, because of the ESA, some habitat restoration projects have to jump through the same hoops as other construction, causing delays in measures that could help fish, Daryl Williams said.
“I kind of have mixed feelings about it,” he said.
Those restrictions may be a necessary evil, said Norberg, of the fisheries service.
For example, if creosote-soaked logs are being removed from a waterway, if it’s not done properly, it could result in creosote finding its way back into the water, “so it does as much harm as it does good,” he said.
Restrictions also can affect landowners’ use of their property. This not only angers some property owners but can defeat the intent of the law, said Todd Myers, environmental director for the Washington Policy Center, a right-leaning think tank in Seattle.
Because the law governs use of land where a listed species is found, some landowners take steps to eliminate habitat for a species on their property so it won’t be seen there, Myers said.
“You get a regulatory stick that puts landowners at odds with habitat recovery,” he said.
A better way, he said, is to reimburse landowners for measures taken to preserve or promote habitat, he said.
“That at least takes a step toward making a landowner a partner as opposed to an opponent.”
Despite the ESA’s flaws, “it is working well in terms of bringing all the various parties together to talk and to plan accordingly,” Norberg said.
The decline of the salmon might not be reversed without it, Ruckelshaus said.
“It is an extraordinarily complex problem,” he said. “But for the ESA I doubt we would have paid the attention to it we have, and I think that is absolutely necessary for it to recover.”
Jonathon GreyEyes has one word of advice for Native students interested in pursuing challenging, satisfying and well paid careers: STEM.
Okay, it’s really four words—science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Those are the areas of study students should focus on in order to move ahead in the 21st century global workplace, GreyEyes says.
GreyEyes, a Navajo Nation citizen, is a small business liaison officer for the massive, multinational Boeing Company, the world’s leading aerospace company and the largest manufacturer of commercial jetliners and military aircraft combined. Boeing also designs and manufactures rotorcraft, electronic and defense systems, missiles, satellites, launch vehicles and advanced information and communication systems. In short, the company is involved in everything that flies and/or uses technology, which is to say just about every business and employment opportunity in the global marketplace.
Grey Eyes says STEM is the smart career path for Native scholars. (courtesy Jonathon GreyEyes)
As a small business liaison officer, GreyEyes works to increase small and diverse business participation in support of the Boeing’s company goals and objectives. As a Native American, he tries to engage Indian country as much as possible by seeking out not only small Native-owned businesses for Boeing to partner with, but also Native students who are potential Boeing employees.
“My responsibilities primarily are to maximize opportunities for small businesses of any type to participate [in] Boeing’s activities,” GreyEyes told Indian Country Today Media Network. “Now, being Native American, I’ve tried to seek out Native American companies to participate in the different research, primarily research and development.”
Boeing and other large companies that receive government contracts actively recruit employees in the Native American community, GreyEyes said. “There’s lots of opportunity in just about any field in which somebody would want to work. For most jobs a college degree is going to be required. I think across the board—not just in the Native American community, but in any group that you want to look at. We’re seeing a decline in [students pursuing] the STEM fields…and so I would encourage students (and I’m encouraging my own children) to focus on these areas where they have an aptitude and an interest because there’s a lot of opportunity in [these] fields.”
One of the ways he seeks out both small Native-owned businesses and Native students is through the American Indian Science and Engineering Society, whose mission since 1977 has been to substantially increase American Indian and Alaska Native representation in the STEM fields—as students, professionals, mentors, and leaders, according to its website.
A young visitor to Boeing’s Future of Flight tour.
The AISES national conference is one of the big annual events that Boeing supports every year. The company interviews and hires new employees there. “It’s very important to Boeing to give everybody an opportunity to participate with Boeing either as an employee or as a subcontractor—and, fortunately, that’s why people like me have a job maximizing opportunity!” he said. GreyEyes is a lifetime member of AISES as a Sequoyah Fellow. The program was named in memory of Sequoyah, who perfected the Cherokee alphabet and syllabary in 1821, resulting in the Cherokee Nation becoming literate in less than one year, according to the AISES website. “In this spirit, AISES Sequoyah Fellows are recognized for their commitment to AISES’s mission in STEM and to the American Indian community. They bring honor to AISES by engaging in leadership, mentorship, and other acts of service that support the students and professionals in the AISES family,” the site says.
What GreyEyes does at Boeing, essentially, is match jobs to businesses. He looks at the scope of work that the company intends to subcontract and then provides the program manager with as many opportunities and alternatives in terms of small businesses that can provide the services. “In the area of research and development it’s typically very specialized. I don’t get involved until it’s [a job] over $650,000—that’s a government threshold for requiring a subcontracting plan—so that would be a small contract and some of the large contracts would be in hundreds of millions of dollars.”
GreyEyes said he loves his job and the most exciting thing is the variety of projects the company pursues. “I always tell people I’m living in a Star Trek world. Some of the contracts that we’ve won just stagger the imagination. I’m always amazed at the types of things we research. We have thousands of investigative researchers researching anything you can imagine,” he said.
Boeing is the world’s leading aerospace company and the largest manufacturer of commercial jetliners and military aircraft combined. (Boeing)
One of Boeing’s recent innovations was the development of the Standoff Patient Triage Tool—an instrument Homeland Security dubbed as technology “to boldly go where no medical responder has gone before.” The wireless gizmo can detect a person’s vital signs—including whether a person is alive or dead—remotely from up to 40 feet away. The original intent was for battlefield use, but like other inventions developed for war the tool has numerous civilian applications including at fires, car crashes, mass casualties and other disasters.
Boeing has a number of programs that benefit its employees, including a program that pays employees to get graduate degrees, GreyEyes said.
There is a Native American affinity group to support the sizeable number of Native employees in the company, GreyEyes said. The group is organized regionally and nationally and is involved in all aspects including recruiting and mentoring Native students. “They might be showing them what life is like at a large corporation, helping them understand why education is so important and how it’s going to benefit them when they come to a large corporation like Boeing.
“In addition, through AISES we talk students through all stages of their education from middle school on through graduate school, and we try to get them tied in to particular people at Boeing who might be good contacts for when they’re ready to look for employment and then at events like the AISES national convention where we have several people doing active hiring and interviewing on site—members of the affinity groups are involved in all those stages, and it’s not part of their job it’s just something they do on top of it because it’s important,” GreyEyes said.
Once people are employed at Boeing, the affinity group brings everyone together to talk about what life is like there and whether any issues the affinity group should raise need to be addressed. “It’s just general support for each other,” GreyEyes said.
To view the range of job opportunities at Boeing, log onto its website at Boeing.com and click Careers on the menu bar.
Special events leading up to 2014 include Seattle Center Winterfest, through Dec. 31; New Year’s Eve at the Space Needle, Dec. 31; Seattle Parks Polar Plunge Jan. 1.
It’s the last weekend of the holiday season and there’s still time to get out and experience light displays, the downtown carousel and other holiday happenings before it’s time to ring in the New Year.
Seattle Center Winterfest continues through Tuesday’s big New Year’s Eve celebration. Weekend entertainment includes Massive Monkees dance crew at 12:30 p.m. Sunday, and the Winterfest Ice Rink is open daily through Jan. 5.
Tuesday, New Year’s Eve, there’s a free, all-ages dance at Seattle Center Armory from 8-11:45 p.m. and the ice rink is open until 11:30 p.m. so there’s plenty to do before the up-close view of the grand fireworks show off our Space Needle to welcome 2014 at midnight.
Along with Seattle Center crowds, people at venues around the area with views of the Needle and TV viewers locally and around the world will admire the festive spectacle, one of the world’s largest structure-launched fireworks displays. First-time partner KEXP coordinates the music score for the show, broadcast on 90.3 FM for everyone watching the display, also broadcast live on KING-5 TV.
The Space Needle Observation Deck and restaurants close at 6 p.m. Monday for private, sold-out events. The Monorail is great way to get to Seattle Center, but for safety reasons, it’s closed from approximately 11:15 p.m. until the fireworks show is over, resuming about 12:20 a.m. and continuing until 1 a.m. to get you back downtown after the show.
For anyone looking for a bold, brave and kind of crazy start for your New Year, take a dip in Lake Washington at the Seattle Parks Polar Plunge Wednesday at Matthews Beach Park.
Be ready for anything in 2014 after immersing yourself neck-deep in the cold lake and earning your Official Badge of Courage to commemorate the adventurous achievement.
More than 1,800 people of all ages are expected at the event along with their fans and supporters, and registration is required to earn your badge, so come early; carpools or arriving by bus or bike is suggested. Warm beverages are provided and costumes are encouraged for the festive event.
For younger participants or anyone who needs a bit more room, the more low-key “Polar Cub Club” dip precedes the big main event. The official group plunge is at noon; some adventurous folks do both.
By Scott Wilson on December 26, 2013, Three Sheets Northwest
If you’ve been surprised by the flurry of newspaper articles and Facebook posts about whale sightings in the Salish Sea this fall, it’s no fluke… there really have been an unusual number of unusually close encounters with the massive cetaceans in our waters this year.
The Vancouver Sun has the full story. Both recreational and professional whale watchers have been seeing an unusual amount of humpback and orca whales this season.
Some Canadian whale-watching businesses have been holding off from performing annual maintenance haul-outs because business has been so good in this traditional “off” season. Orcas, both transients and members of the Southern Resident pods, have been sighted almost daily off of Victoria.
At the same time, other orca pods have been ranging south through Puget Sound, escorting a ferry carrying artifacts from an archeological site of the Suquamish tribe, bouncing around between Admiralty Inlet and President Point, and generally making their presence known to mariners and waterfront communities through the north Sound. Humpbacks have popped up all up and down the coast, rubbing against whale watching boats here, and even nosing around a sensitive oil removal operation from a sunken hulk in Grenville Channel on the central BC coast.
Although this winter is seeing an unusual surge in whale encounters, the overall trend in the local orca population has been relatively stagnant. From an estimated level of around 200 individuals in the late 1800s, the local resident pod numbers dipped into the upper 60s by the late 1960s, and have slowly climbed to around 90 whales and stayed there for the past decade.
And increased orca sightings may not be a positive indicator overall; the surge in whale activity has coincide with a spike in local harbor seal populations. More food here may be drawing transients in from places where fewer prey than normal are available.
Humpback sightings, on the other hand, are a more unalloyed good sign. The huge mammals have not been widely hunted locally since 1966. The fact that they have returned to local waters in such numbers, says the Pacific Whale Watch Association, may indicate that some of the natural apprehension of human encounters has begun to fade. Several of the huge mammals have approached whale watching craft closely enough that the boats have been forced to shut down their engines and just drift until the whales have lost interest and moved on… anywhere from 15 minutes to two hours. One whale spent the time rubbing its face along the hull of an inflatable.
Whatever the reasons for the visits, it’s been a happy holiday season for the normally slow whale-watching trades.
The Destinations Loung at Tulalip Casino Resort, where CMG recently implemented a system upgrade with Yamaha CIS components
Source: Pro Sound Web
Tulalip Casino Resort (Tulalip, WA) recently upgraded its Destinations Lounge audio system with components from the new Yamaha Commercial Installation Solutions (CIS) product line.
Specifically, the system includes one MTX3 processor, two XMV4280 amplifiers, six VXS8 loudspeakers, 16 VSC8W loudspeakers, and two VXS10SW subwoofers, all purchased on the recommendation of Clarity Media Group (CMG), Lake Oswego, OR.
“We decided to use the Yamaha CIS products primarily based on the sound quality of the demo units we listened to,” states Travis Cibolski, co-owner and system designer, CMG. “We also appreciated the system’s ability to integrate with the existing infrastructure to offer simple operation for our customer.”
Cibolski notes that CMG wanted to create a relaxing and high-end environment in the Destination Lounge. The audio is accompanied by a 4K Atmosphere video system displaying music being played by the artists, a mix of music videos, “mood” music which contains pictures of nature, cityscapes, etc. with music, and “digital karaoke” style scene with a live band covering songs.
Each band member is played on a different TV appearing on four HD screens, with stereo coverage provided at every seat. “The wide dispersion of the Yamaha CIS speakers allowed us to do this without cluttering the ceiling with lots of speakers,” explains Cibolski. “Surface mounted speakers are used for the entry and placed between suspended ceiling panels. The Yamaha speakers are compact enough to be completely hidden, offering pleasing sound with a low visual impact.”
Aaron Jackson, audio visual technical engineer at Tulalip Casino, adds, “We knew that this system needed to be high end and sound crystal clear at all listening levels, while maintaining the aesthetics of the space.I fell in love with Yamaha products after CMG installed a head-to-toe Yamaha/NEXO system in the Canoes Cabaret, our live music venue.
“Our Destinations Lounge system sounds amazing through the entire spectrum and has beautifully uniform coverage in every seat. We have come to expect that when we buy a Yamaha product; it’s going to work, it’s going to look great, and it’s going to sound amazing. Bottom line for us is, Yamaha has struck the perfect balance of price and quality.”
The Yamaha CIS product offerings have been created specifically for installed sound market applications where there may not be an experienced audio operator running the system such as restaurants, retail outlets, public address systems within the transportation industry, convention centers and hotel ballrooms.
MARYSVILLE — Marysville School District Superintendent Dr. Becky Berg has invited local legislators and leaders from the Marysville and Tulalip community to a roundtable meeting to discuss current educational issues and topics of mutual interest.
“Issues surrounding the state of education have never been more pressing. This meeting will provide us an opportunity to come together and discuss the current state of education, state funding impacts, educational mandates such as TPEP (new teacher evaluation system) and the Common Core State Standards. Our children are our most valuable assets, we must all work together to provide them with the best education possible. I appreciate this time together to discuss these and other important issues” said Dr. Berg.
Participants will meet in the district’s board room beginning at 11 a.m. on Monday, Jan. 6. Invited guests will hear a brief overview on the district followed by discussion, guest comments, and a time for questions and answers.
Although only invited guest will participate in the discussion, the meeting is open to the public and there will be a designated seating area for those who would like to attend to view and listen to the process.
For more information, email jodi_runyon@msvl.k12.wa.us.
2013 was another good year for Native music. Established young talents Derek Miller and Samantha Crain put out excellent albums; Frank Waln, Leonard Sumner and Nataanii Nez Means embodied the bright future of Native hip hop; and DJ trio A Tribe Called Red continued to define their own genre of “pow wow step” dance music. But those are just a few of the reasons listeners had to celebrate. We asked several of the music cognoscenti to offer their selections for the best of the best.
Janet Rogers’ Picks for Best of 2013
Albums
1. Derek Miller, Blues, Vol. 1. Hot, rough, sexy blues (official site)
2. George Leach, Surrender. Twelve years in the making and every note was worth the wait. (official site)
3. A Tribe Called Red, Nation II Nation. They have created new territory just for dancing. (official site)
4. The Johnnys, Rock. A generous offering of the Thinking Man’s Metal Music (official site)
5. Patricia Cano, Songs from Tomson Highway’s The (Post) Mistress. Sultry vocals with perfect pitch. (indiepool)
Tracks
1. Wanbdi, “Bones” from Where the Fishes Go. Blues inspired female truth (bandcamp)
2. Ghostkeeper, “Horse Chief! War Thief” from Horse Chief! War Thief! Original! Metis nerd punk (bandcamp)
3. A Tribe Called Red ft. Northern Voices, “Different Heroes” from Nation II Nation. Inspired dance track, commands me like a puppet (official site)
4. Jasper, “Inglorious” from Inglorious (EP). Righteous political rock anthem of our times. (reverbnation)
5. Nick Sherman, “Drag Your Words Through,” from Drag Your Words Through. Back-to-basics good music. (official site)
ICTMN contributor Janet Rogers is host of Native Waves Radio CFUV 101.9fm and Tribal Clefs CBC 90.5fm.
Frank Waln’s Picks for Best of 2013
Albums
1. A Tribe Called Red, Nation II Nation. This record is powerful, political and spiritual. ATCR is legendary. (official site)
2. Leonard Sumner, Rez Poetry. These songs are so fresh with a unique blend of musical influence scatted all throughout. Leonard Sumner carves out his own genre with this classic album. (official site)
3. Samantha Crain, Kid Face. Equal parts Neil Young, Bob Dylan and Danger Mouse, this album’s haunting melodies and introspective lyrics will pull you in and never let go. (official site)
4. Dark Water Rising, Grace & Grit: Chapter 1. Heartfelt and dynamic, this album shows Charly Lowry delivering flawless vocals backed by a talented band. DWR mixes southern charm with Indigenous sensibilities in an album that is sure to win your heart over. (official site)
5. Fawn Wood & Dallas Waskahat, Blessings. Powerful, feel good music from one of the best female vocalists out, regardless of genre or ethnicity. (Canyon Records)
Tracks
1. Angel Haze, “A Tribe Called Red.” An aggressive punch to the gut from two of the best Indigenous acts out right now. She honors her Indigenous heritage without exploiting it on this monster of a song. (official site)
2. Tall Paul, “Taurus the Bull.” Channeling sound of classic Midwest MC’s, Tall Paul flexes smart lyrical commentary all over this grim track, proving why he is one of the best Indigenous MC’s to ever touch a microphone. (official site)
3. Scatter Their Own, “Taste the Time.” A beautiful ode to protecting one of the pillars of life, water. Memorable riffs, smart lyrics and a concept that is uniquely Indigenous. The music video rocks too. (official site)
4. Nick Sherman, “Wrong Side of Town.” Nick Sherman is one of the most talented Indigenous songwriters we’ve heard in a long time. This song is warm, relatable and beautiful on many different levels. (official site)
5. George Leach, “Carry Me.” A larger than life sound and great vocal performance push this song into the realm of commercial cross over success. (official site)
Frank Waln is a NAMA-winning hip hop artist.
Vincent Schilling’s Picks for Best of 2013
Albums
1. Frank Waln, Born Ready. Fearless story-telling, symphonic hip-hop from the Rosebud Sioux Reservation. (official site)
2. Inez Jasper, Burn Me Down. A fun and enlightening mix of traditional sounds with contemporary dance music and uplifting vocals. (official site)
3. Nataanii Nez Means, 2 Worlds. Without holding back Nataanii attacks his hip hop tracks fearlessly and covers topics such as AIM, Rez issues and his own father Russell Means. (Bandcamp)
4. Samantha Crain, Kid Face. Amazing folk vocalist with a powerhouse of emotion for a young artist. Watch out for this one. (official site)
5. A Tribe Called Red, Nation II Nation. An immaculate blending of traditional drum song and electronic beats to include dubstep, electronica and even sirens. (official site)
Tracks
1. Nataanii Nez Means’, “The Radical” from 2 Worlds. A gorgeous hip-hop tribute featuring the words of Russell Means (Bandcamp)
2. Tara Williamson, “Come to Me” from Lie Low. Soft vocals, melodic tunes, #1 artist on Native trailblazers June Jamz (official site)
3. Frank Waln and Cody Blackbird, “Hear My Cry” from Born Ready. Traditional infused with Hip Hop with vocals from Both Waln and Blackbird.(official site)
4. Christa Couture, “You were here in Michigan” from The Living Record. Though the album released in 2012, this track, with a folky and catchy melody, had definite staying power long into 2013. A brilliant song. (official site)
5. The Johnnys, “On the Wrong Damn Side of the Law” from Rock. Fun rockabilly-ish gesture-invoking readily playable great music. (official site)
Vincent Schilling covers entertainment for ICTMN and his weekly Native Trailblazers radio show.
Jason Morgan Edwards’s Picks for Best of 2013
Tracks
1. Saving Damsels, “Sweet Girl” from Find My Way. JJ Otero’s signature soul-searching and poetic lyrics really shine through on this particular track from the band’s 2012 release. (official site)
2. Twang Deluxe, “NWO- New Waylon Order.” Pays homage to one of the Navajo trio’s main musical influences, Waylon Jennings. Be sure to look for their debut album in 2014. (facebook)
3. Miracle Dolls, “NeverMind” from Guns n Thieves. The Miracle Dolls solidify their strong foot-hold as the leading Native presence on the alternative/indie rock stage. (official site)
4. Raye, “Drink Me Dry.” This newcomer is lighting up both LA and NYC with her distinctive style and sound. It’s hard not to feel the joys and pains of loves found and lost while listening to this poignant melody of giving all you have inside to that special someone. (reverbnation)
5. The Plateros, “A Motherless Child.” The Plateros continue to lead the charge for classic rock and blues fans. Infusing time-honored riffs with their unique stylings, the Navajo cousins continue to push forward, breaking new musical ground with each performance. This song puts the band’s singing, song-writing and playing on full display. (official site)
Jason Morgan Edwards is a photographer based in New Mexico who writes about music for ICTMN.
LINDSEY WASSON / The Seattle Times Enri Mendoza, left, and Daniel Sandoval, sort geoduck at Taylor Shellfish Farms in Shelton last week. China, the biggest market for West Coast geoduck, suspended shellfish imports from Northern California to Alaska on Dec. 3 after toxins were detected in two shipments.
China’s suspension of geoduck imports from the West Coast has hit Washington harvesters hard. Tribes, private companies and the state itself are losing hundreds of thousands of dollars.
On a typical morning, Lief Cofield and his three crew members pile into a 30-foot aluminum boat to harvest hundreds of pounds of geoduck clams.
But for more than two weeks, his boat, the Eagle Scout, has been tied to the dock at Fair Harbor Marina in North Bay, near Shelton — the dive suits stored, the equipment stashed and the crew stuck on land.
“We are supposed to be harvesting 1,500 pounds a day this week,” said Cofield, 26, who is a dive supervisor at Taylor Shellfish Farms in Shelton. “My guys make $15 an hour plus a 10- to 15-cent per-pound bonus on what they personally harvest; and that can really add up.”
His crew is not alone. Since Dec. 3, when seafood inspectors in China suspended imports of West Coast geoduck and other bivalve shellfish such as oysters after reporting high levels of algae toxin or arsenic, harvesters along tribal, state and private shorelines have all been hit.
Altogether, the state produces more than 6 million pounds of geoduck clams annually, and last year almost 90 percent was sold to China.
But now, tribal harvesting companies have laid off divers. Geoduck farms have reduced hours for many workers, and wild-geoduck divers all around Puget Sound are out of work.
LINDSEY WASSON / The Seattle Times Geoduck are seen in a crate awaiting shipment. Since China’s import cutoff, quotas have fallen drastically.
Meanwhile, the state is missing out on well over $1 million in revenue from the wild harvest. Washington auctions off rights to harvest geoduck on state aquatic lands; this year those rights were worth about $12 a pound.
“We only fished two days last week,” said Cendtary Xeno, a geoduck diver for Global Pacific Seafood. “Everyone has bills to pay and families, and lack of work at the holiday time is pretty bad.”
Currently, state and federal agencies are waiting to get more information from Chinese officials, and the Department of Health is preparing to start testing arsenic levels on Thursday.
While the investigation is ongoing, geoduck harvesting in Washington is essentially at a standstill.
According to the Washington Department of Natural Resources, an average of 50,000 pounds of wild geoduck are harvested weekly by divers such as Xeno, with Global Pacific.
With almost 1.1 million pounds of state-regulated wild geoduck left to harvest before March 31, the department estimates the current ban represents not only lost income for fishermen, but also $600,000 per week in lost revenue for the state.
Some tribes and companies have already completed their harvests for the year. But those who have not are missing out on millions of dollars’ worth of product that would have been shipped to China.
Suquamish Seafoods, run by that tribe, exports almost all of its geoduck to China, and has laid off all 24 of its divers.
The tribe still had 140,000 pounds of geoduck to harvest before the end of the season in March. If the ban is not lifted soon, divers may not be able to finish harvesting, said Tony Forsman, the company’s general manager.
The tribe was selling geoduck for $11.50 a pound before the ban took effect, so the Suquamish Tribe could potentially lose out on more than $1.6 million worth of clams.
Divers receive 40 percent of the take for the geoduck they harvest, meaning each diver is at a risk of losing $67,000 — a large portion of their annual income — right before the holiday season, said George Hill, the harvest coordinator and a diver for Suquamish Seafoods.
“You can’t think about Christmas when you have to think of next month’s bills,” Hill said. “We have bills to pay, and not knowing when we are going to go back to work is very hard on us.”
To make up for the lost income, the 47-year-old Hill, who has five children, may look for a diving job harvesting sea cucumber. He hopes the ban can be lifted in time for the tribe to finish harvesting this year’s quota.
Seattle Shellfish, a company that farms only geoduck and ships exclusively to China, has shifted its 18 divers to other duties, such as geoduck farm maintenance, since they are not currently harvesting the giant clam.
Taylor Shellfish Farms, one of the largest geoduck providers in the state, ships only half of its harvested geoduck to China, which means there is still some work to be done. However, many employees have been moved to half-time and have been given other tasks, company spokesman Bill Dewey said.
Both farms say they will have to consider layoffs if the ban continues much longer.
At the Taylor plant in Shelton, holding tanks are usually packed full of thousands of pounds of live, freshly harvested geoduck. Starting at 11 a.m. each day, the four-man geoduck team, led by Gustavo Hernandez, has to work quickly to sort and pack all the clams before the first truck leaves for the airport at 4 p.m.
Last Thursday, the men raised the lid on the holding tank and stared down at the measly 1,000 pounds of geoduck, stacked in orange crates, that had been beach-harvested the night before. They didn’t start packing and sorting until 2 p.m. and were in no hurry.
“This is usually the busiest time of year,” said Hernandez, 35. “But without exporting to China, we just don’t have a lot to do.”
Geoducks first caught on as a banquet delicacy in Hong Kong, and the clams’ appeal has spread to other parts of China.
Geoduck harvesters, the state Department of Health, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) all have been scrambling to understand the suspension.
Fish inspectors in China identified high levels of arsenic and a toxin that causes paralytic shellfish poisoning, or PSP, in two shipments of geoduck — one from Washington and one from Alaska.
Friday, state and tribal officials closed the 135-acre geoduck harvesting area outside Federal Way where the Washington geoduck shipment originated.
The 385-pound shipment was harvested by the Puyallup Tribe in Poverty Bay, on what the Department of Natural Resources calls the Redondo Tract.
PSP is a biotoxin produced by algae that shellfish eat. In humans, high levels of either PSP or arsenic can lead to severe illness or even death.
However, testing in October by the Department of Health found PSP levels in the Redondo Tract well below internationally accepted limits.
Because there is no federal safety standard in place for arsenic, the last arsenic testing done in the area was in 2007. Levels found at that time were not of concern for human health, according to an agency spokesman.
The Department of Health originally had focused on investigating PSP levels, but last week the agency learned the Washington shipment was blocked because of arsenic, while PSP was the issue with the shipment from Alaska.
“The last thing I would want to have happen is for someone to get sick,” said Cofield, from Taylor Shellfish. “But closing down the whole West Coast because of two shipments seems a little heavy-handed.”
The Alaska shipment of geoduck originated from outside Ketchikan, and that state has also provided federal agencies with detailed reports, said Jerry Borchert, the marine biotoxin coordinator with the Washington Department of Health shellfish program.
Borchert said China uses a different unit of measure when reporting PSPs, and officials here don’t know how Chinese inspectors tested the arsenic levels. “So we don’t know how they came up with the level they have reported,” Borchert said.
“We are full of questions and are looking for some answers,” he said. “We are waiting for more details.”
NOAA, the federal agency working directly with the Chinese, sent a report with the health department’s PSP findings to Chinese officials, along with questions about how the toxicity levels were measured. Federal officials also are awaiting more information from China, and it is still unknown when the ban might be lifted.
Information from The Seattle Times archive was used in this report.
Coral Garnick: 206-464-2422 or cgarnick@seattletimes.com. On Twitter @coralgarnick
