The Editor:
Thank you, The Northern Light, for alerting us to Blaine resident Dolores Jordan’s Ukrainian support efforts. Wanting to help, we’re privileged to know our donations will go directly to Father Roman on the ground in Ukraine with an established assistance network of people, places and methods.
Coalescing around Dolores are my wife, Jennifer; Dolores’ granddaughter, Maria; Rita P. from Blaine; and me; each with our own areas of expertise. We have launched the GoFundMe campaign and are working to spread the word. Please help us?
Father Roman intends to purchase a cargo van with the funds we raise and use it to distribute food, water and medical supplies to those victimized by this war. Nearly seven million people, just shy of Washington’s entire population, have been internally displaced in Ukraine, and they suffer without access to basic life-sustaining supplies. Compassionate volunteers in Ukraine are ready to risk their lives delivering necessary supplies, but need reliable transportation.
A few local residents have rallied around Dolores to help establish the GoFundMe campaign. More local residents now have the opportunity to directly support individual elderly, disabled, women and children in Ukraine.
Our contributions enable us to prevent another Holodomor, a dictator-caused famine that saw perhaps 10 million starve to death. Every donation is a practical way of declaring, “Never again!”
Will you please join us? Visit “Ukrainian Cargo Van Fund” at gofund.me/4edc13bf.
We also seek a graphic artist willing to donate services. Call Dolores at 360/332-7074 for more information.
Jake Beaty
Birch Bay
The Editor:
(This letter has been edited due to space. For a complete copy, visit: conta.cc/3uvqQnY).
For many years, Birch Bay Beach Park has been the primary venue for large community events like the kite festival, sand sculpture, Rollback Weekend and Discover Birch Bay Days.
Due to planned improvements, Whatcom County Parks and Recreation did not allow usage of the park in 2020 or 2021. Work is beginning on the beach park very soon (possibly by the time you read this letter). To see the complete master plan for the park, go to whatcomcounty.us/2372/plans.
Early stages of the improvements are scheduled to be completed in June of this year. Whatcom County Parks and Recreation has granted permission to utilize the beach park for events in 2022. However, there are new site restrictions and other factors that severely handicap the ability of Birch Bay Chamber of Commerce to carry out successful community events at this site. Most notably:
• Requirements for on-site ADA parking cannot be met
• Cost increase
While we would like to bring your community events back to Birch Bay Beach Park, it’s just not realistic or feasible to do so in 2022. We value and appreciate Whatcom County Parks and Recreation and hope to work with them again in the future.
The show(s) will go on! We are currently working on plans with other organizations at alternate venues and will carry out our event calendar as planned. While things may look a little different, we are excited and up to the challenge of organizing and conducting full-fledged events the Birch Bay community will be proud of. Updates on dates, locations, schedules, activities and vendors will be posted at BirchBayChamber.com, our social media pages and our weekly newsletter “The Buzz.”
We are honored to serve the Birch Bay community. Please reach out to the chamber staff or a member of the board of directors if you have any questions or feedback.
Sacha Sanguinetti, on behalf of the Birch Bay Chamber of Commerce board of directors
The Editor:
I read the letter from the Custer resident regarding train horns and have a few comments. The train horn, which we can hear from miles away, is not “choo choo” train whistle at Disneyland ride.
Last Thursday, within two hours at midnight, the horn was activated at least 20 times. We moved to this nice heavenly area for peace and to hear birds singing not a train horn at 2 a.m.
The writer commented that people wake up in Ukraine to bombs and here we are blessed to wake up to a train horn. The train horn is not to please a very few amount of people, it bothers the majority of residents from B.C. to Bellingham.
Its purpose is for safety. This is old, cheap technology. BNSF must study and apply other safety measures.
I don’t have any problem with a train horn during the day, but from 10 p.m. until 6 a.m. people can sleep better without a horn.
The BNSF website mentions that they will implement no horn zones if city or county authorities request it.
Mike Ersh
Blaine
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