Busy volunteer helps keeps beaches pristine

Published 10:12 pm Tuesday, January 1, 2008

The high tide, north wind and chilling rain didn’t stop Kathe Stanness from checking on her beach.

On a winter day last week Stanness, 61, grabbed a trash bag from her car and trudged along the shoreline in north Everett.

As she picked up litter, the Smokey Point resident scanned the beach for signs of the tidal-flat-choking weed called spartina.

Stanness volunteers as a Washington State University Extension beach watcher and spends time at her adopted shoreline each week.

“Beaches and marine biology are my passion,” Stanness said. “My senior research project in college was on color change mechanisms in bony fish.”

The fact is, Stanness has many passions, including education and volunteering.

Stanness grew up as Kathleen McAloon in Eastern Washington where she was a Girl Scout and active with her family in the parish of their Catholic church.

“My folks were always doing something for the church or for St. Vincent de Paul. I never thought about it as volunteering,” Stanness said. “But if there was a turkey dinner, we would go and we would help.”

At Gonzaga University, where she earned degrees in biology and chemistry, Stanness also learned American Sign Language and signed Mass for a group of deaf students.

After some graduate work in ecology at Arizona State University, she moved to Western Washington. She and her husband Kenneth Stanness have lived in Snohomish County since 1979.

Kathe Stanness is a retired neurological surgery research technician for the University of Washington. She worked nearly 30 years at Harborview Medical Center, and was happy to put an end to the Seattle commute and spend more time outdoors, she said.

Stanness has worked several summers for the Everett Parks and Recreation Department as a naturalist on Jetty Island.

“I’m the one in Smokey Bear ranger hat,” she said.

Whether she’s on the job or working as a volunteer, Stanness doesn’t let anything slow her down, said Kraig Hansen, chief naturalist with the parks department.

“She’s fantastic,” Hansen said. “She loves the beach, and her biology background comes in handy.”

Currently an AmeriCorps member, Stanness is serving as an adviser to Edmonds Community College students in the school’s service-learning program. She especially has been involved in organizing environmental projects that involve students in education through volunteering. Their projects have included native plant restoration and trail maintenance in county parks.

Stanness has plenty of experience in such projects, having served as chairwoman of the naturalist committee for The Mountaineers climbing club.

“My motto was always ‘It’s the journey, not the destination.’ So stop and see the salamanders in the stream,” she said. “Who cares if you reach the mountaintop?”

In exchange for volunteering to teach Mountaineer classes and lead field trips, Stanness often asked her students to do trail maintenance.

“I was surprised when people didn’t want to give back a day for a work project,” she said. “If I get a good hike, it’s my job to fix those trails.”

That’s how she feels about volunteering in general, Stanness said.

“Volunteering is so important now because most communities cannot afford all the services people need,” she said.

Along with her volunteer work with The Mountaineers and the WSU Beach Watchers, Stanness makes prayer shawls for people who are grieving, sews quilts for children through the Linus Project, works with cats at the Northwest Organization for Animal Help pet adoption center north of Arlington and plays her cello in area nursing homes and for a Marysville church.

“I don’t sleep much and my husband says I’m never home,” Stanness said. “But there is pride and ownership in volunteer projects.”

And it’s enjoyable.

“It’s all about having fun,” Stanness said. “If I’m enthusiastic about sticking my nose in a tide pool and learning how a barnacle works, I’ll enjoy sharing that knowledge.”

The WSU Extension Beach Watchers program was a natural for Stanness, she said.

In exchange for the equivalent of 100 hours of college-level training, beach watchers are required to give back 100 hours of volunteer work on regional beaches.

“That means that in the summer I might explain to some kids why they shouldn’t take home buckets of crabs and have them die in their bedrooms,” she said.

And sometimes it just means walking in the rain and picking up trash along the beach.

“Even when I’m cold and wet, I’m having a good time,” Stanness said.

Reporter Gale Fiege: 425-339-3427 or gfiege@heraldnet.com.

Beach watchers

For more information about the Washington State University Extension Beach Watchers of Skagit and Snohomish Counties, go to www.beachwatchers.wsu.edu or contact Chrys Bertolotto at 425-357-6020 or chrys@wsu.edu.