Stillaguamish Tribe contributes over $500,000 for causes

Tribe contributes over $500,000

The Stillaguamish Tribe contributes more than $500,000 to help support communities.

“As the Stillaguamish Tribe continues to strengthen our economy, we continue to support our community providing grants to a variety of community organizations including schools, fire departments, the YMCA, Arlington Wading Pool, food banks and numerous nonprofits. We honor our ancestors when we help strengthen the communities in which we live,” said Shawn Yanity, Stillaguamish Tribe Board Chair.

Money raised for Everett Children’s Museum

IRG Physical and Hand Therapy’s second annual Charity Golf Tournament raised $20,000 to donate to the Everett Children’s Museum. This is up $6,000 from last year. About 140 golfers participated.

Arlington citizen of the year

The Kiwanis Club of Arlington honored Rex Bartlett, owner of Rex’s Rentals in Arlington, with its Citizen of the Year award. Bartlett and his wife, Cindy, and son, Alex, have owned Rex’s Rental company since April 2006 and prior to that for 17 years he managed United Rentals in Arlington. Bartlett has coached soccer in Marysville and Granite Falls. He has donated time and equipment to the Arlington Kiwanis Club, Arlington Boys & Girls Club, Arlington High School and various Christian schools.

Girl Scouts build houses to bring in bats

When Girl Scout Troop 41137 found an environmental problem in Mukilteo, the Mukilteo Library played a role in its solution.

The 11-member troop meets near the Sno-Isle Libraries community library in Mukilteo and often hikes the Big Gulch trail system that starts at the library. As Junior Girl Scouts, girls are eligible for the Bronze Award by earning a series of badges on a “journey” that culminates in a Take Action Project.

“The girls realized that they always run into mosquitoes and ‘noseeums’ that bite on the trails in the summertime,” troop leader Margaret Ostervold said. “They thought encouraging more bats to reside in the area may help with the issue.”

After scouts complete the journey, they develop ideas to help their community in sustainable ways, Ostervold said. They need to identify a problem and spend at least 20 hours working on solving that problem.

The troop members invited local bat enthusiast and rehabilitator Meg Lunnum from Happy Valley Bats in Silvana to talk about bats. Lunnum told them about the 12 species of bats in the Puget Sound region and the 1,300 species worldwide.

“She met the troop behind the Mukilteo Library and told them all about our local bats and even brought one that she was rehabilitating for them to see,” Ostervold said. “They really enjoyed the live bat.”

The live bat was Carol Ann, a silver-haired bat, Lunnum said. She explained how bats benefit the environment by eating pesky insects such as mosquitoes.

With help from parents, Girl Scout Troop 41137 built 36 bat houses that will be hung around Mukilteo, including the library.

“The girls were very attentive and interested, especially when I brought out Carol Ann,” Lunnum said.

She gave the troop building plans for bat houses and showed good places to put them. Then, the girls asked for building supplies from Ace Hardware, Midway Plywood and Dunn Lumber. They got enough material to build the three dozen bat houses.

The library has had a native habitat garden on the grounds since 2012, thanks to the efforts of the Mukilteo Wildlife Habitat Group.

“The bat houses nicely tie into the wildlife space outside the library. The bat houses are an extension of how Sno-Isle Libraries maintains the environment and practices sustainability and good stewardship at each of our libraries,” library manager Jane Crawford said.

The troop plans to hang the rest of its bat houses around the city of Mukilteo and surrounding area.

“It was quite a process, as we had some girls who had never used a hammer, but everyone is quite adept now,” Ostervold said.

Source: Sno-Isle Libraries