Late last January, City Hall employee Jane Purtee got the bad news: she’d been diagnosed with cancer.
In March, she had surgery and missed three weeks of work.
Since then, she’s been through bouts of chemical therapy. She’s lost her hair. Work has piled up.
Through it all, employees have stood by her.
On Friday, July 17, 30 employees surprised her with a show of support by wearing head scarves.
“I came in and I looked at one person and noticed he had a scarf on,” she said. “I looked around, oh, my gosh. Even the guys had ‘em on — holy moley. Then I started to bawl.”
Purtee is an accountant for the city of Lynnwood, where she’s worked since 1989. She has a grown son and a 19-year-old grandson.
Employees learned of her cancer last March. “I was beginning to lose my hair, so how do you keep that a secret?” she said.
Purtee isn’t the only city employee fighting cancer. Another woman is on medical leave and employees have donated their vacation time to her.
“Here, you cannot donate your sick hours; you have to donate your vacation time,” said Stephanie Simpson, Mayor Don Gough’s executive assistant.
Firefighters donated a week here, a week there. It added up, she said.
‘You just put out the request and it flows back,” Simpson said. “She was just so touched.”
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