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Steve Hill, a Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) supervisor, says that becoming a CASA volunteer is a big job – but a very important one.

When a child is placed in foster care due to suffering neglect or abuse at home, the court appoints a special advocate to represent the minor child or children.

The CASA volunteer receives special training for the job. Senior citizens who are CASA volunteers bring a lifetime of experience with them, and they take it very seriously, Hill said.

“They are like a party to the case. They get all the information, visit the child and give extra attention to the cases,” said Hill, adding that the overloaded system benefits from the advocates because they can be the eyes and ears for the court.

“They make sure the children’s needs are being taken care of, such as their dental, medical and school issues,” he said.

CASA volunteers make recommendations to the court as to what should happen to the children. They also make recommendations to service providers working with the parents who are receiving treatment for a variety of issues before being reunited with their children.

“They write reports to the court on what they think should happen. It is a huge responsibility,” said Hill, adding that the court makes the ultimate decisions in all cases.

A judge in the 1970s created the CASA program. “He was tired of hearing all the cookie-cutter plans and wanted kids to have individualized attention,” Hill said.

According to Hill, the system relies heavily on the volunteers. The goal is always to reunite children with their parents, and Hill said most of the time that does happen. He added that a typical case takes about two years to complete.

Bob Estrada, who lives in Gig Hargor, has been a CASA volunteer for two years.

“I got into it because I saw the advertisement about wanting individuals to be advocates for children, and since my wife and I are foster parents for infants, we decided that this would be an extension to what I was already doing,” he said.

Estrada said one of his jobs is to make sure parents do what they need to do in order to get their children back. He and other volunteers make sure the foster parents are following through with any medical and dental issues, as well as other important appointments.

“You have to have a heart for the children and do the best you can, and you have to remember that you are not the foster parents. You can’t be taking children to appointments. You have to remember your boundaries as a CASA volunteer,” Estrada said.

Emily Taylor has been a CASA volunteer for two years and said it’s all about teaching.

“It is a calling more than anything. I gain a sense that I am helping vulnerable people in our community and I am the voice for foster children,” she said.

Carrie Appling, volunteer coordinator, said CASA is extremely important to the community.

“We do have staff that take caseloads, but they have 80 to 100 cases a year, and having advocates from the community makes sure that we stay fresh and pay attention to what each child needs,” she said.

Appling said the best-case scenario is for the court to have a volunteer on each case who knows the child and family intimately and meets regularly with the child and whoever they are placed with to make sure that the court is working for the best outcome.

“The volunteers help by giving kids the time and attention that is needed to make sure that the whole system is aware of what is happening in that child’s life and that the court is meeting each child’s needs,” Appling said.

Volunteers are passionate about their cases and the children involved.

“I plan to keep doing this for as long as I can,” said Taylor.

Anyone interested in becoming a CASA volunteer should contact Volunteer Coordinator Carrie Appling at 253-798-3837.

Joan Cronk by — December 31, 2013 in Spotlight

What do retired clergy do? Some hang around as guest preachers filling interim positions vacated by other clergy. Some play a lot of golf. Others travel and lead tours. Three retired Lutheran pastors who happened to have graduated from the same seminary in the same year (1965) have banded together to record and preserve liturgical artwork under the prosaic name of The Schwidder Project.

Ernst Schwidder earned his master of fine arts from the University of Washington in 1959 and became the first head of the arts department at Valparaiso University in Valparaiso, Ind. In the mid-1960s, he elected to return to the Northwest as chairman of the art faculty at Seattle Pacific University. From 1967 to his 1992 retirement, professor Schwidder taught art and headed the art department at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma. Following his retirement, he opened his own south Seattle studio and continued to produce art suitable for worship space in churches of a variety of denominations throughout the U.S. and western Canada. 

His principle medium is carved mahogany wood, but he designed objets d’arte in repousse, metal sculpture, fabric art, concrete and stone. He collaborated in executing his designs with associates, students and other artists in glass and metal arts.

In all, Schwidder artwork graces over 90 worship facilities in Washington alone and over 300 from Massachusetts and North Carolina to California and Alaska. 

His wood sculpting is easily recognizable for its long, lean, flowing lines, as well as for its idiosyncratic uppercase lettering of Scripture passages. In the craft of an artist, Schwidder did not intend to produce lifelike images, but to design through wood carving and other media visual theological truth apropos to the church setting and ministry in which his work had been commissioned. Thus, a church whose ministry was set in a mountainous, sea or farming area could expect that setting to appear in the carvings. A church whose name evoked an image (Good Shepherd, Saint Matthew, Holy Cross, Advent, Incarnation, et al) would be graced with a sculpture to remind the parishioners of a living name and ministry, and often with unique calligraphy to unite word with image. 

The durable and monumental character of Schwidder’s designs (some as large as 40 feet) is borne out by the fact that most remain in their original settings – and even when relocated because of a renovation or other reasons, they continue in use in other settings.

Schwidder died in 1998, but his liturgical art lives on to inspire worshippers and artists who follow him. You will recognize his unique style in a number of Pierce County worship sites:

·         Tacoma: Annie Wright School (chapel door, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Grace Lutheran Church, Parkland Lutheran Church, Saint Mark’s  by the Narrows Lutheran Church, Tacoma Lutheran Retirement Community (chapel), and Trinity Lutheran Church.

·         Lakewood: Prince of Peace Lutheran Church (triptych) and St. Mary’s Episcopal Church (parish hall).

·         Puyallup:  Immanuel Lutheran Church and Mountain View Lutheran Church.

His work appears also in King, Kitsap, Snohomish, Thurston and Whatcom counties in the worship spaces of Christian, Episcopal, Methodist, Presbyterian and Roman Catholic chapels and churches. His artistic efforts are present also in residential and office designs where, somewhat facetiously, he promised his patrons that his completed design for living or work space might resemble the interior of a church, for in fact Schwidder did not confine the notion of the sacred to churches alone, but also to where people live and work.

The Schwidder Project Committee is self-appointed, including two clergy artists (the Rev. emeritus Joel Nickel from Salem, Ore., and the Rev. emeritus Roger Sylvester from Seattle) and Richard Tietjen, Schwidder’s Tacoma-based pastor from 1983 to 1998 at Grace Lutheran. The three have pictorially recorded over 100 sites of Schwidder design in 10 states and seek not only to give record to the prodigious output of Schwidder designs, but also to assist parishioners to treasure visual art as enhancement to worship and as an abiding reinforcement of teaching the faithful over the generations. 

Richard Tietjen, who wrote this article, retired in 2011 after 46 years of active parish ministry, the final 28 years as pastor of Grace Lutheran Church in Tacoma, where liturgical artist Ernst Schwidder was an active member from 1967 until his death in 1998, and

St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Lakewood is among churches in the U.S. and Canada graced by the carvings of Ernst Schwidder.
St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Lakewood is among churches in the U.S. and Canada graced by the carvings of Ernst Schwidder.

where chancel carvings and vestments are Schwidder designs.

Contributing Author by — December 17, 2013 in Spotlight

Imagine finding and buying back a special car you had sold 42 years before.
For anyone who reminisces with thoughts about such a vehicle, John Chestnutt, 82, knows what it’s like to once again be driving his long-gone car.
When he was stationed in the Army in France, Chestuntt took note of the Citroen taxicabs there. They reminded him of the 1934 Ford sedan his dad owned when Chestnutt was 11.
The Citroen Traction Avant autos were French-produced cars built between 1934 and 1957. This make of car was the first mass-produced Uni-body and front wheel drive auto in 1934.
During Chestnutt’s next military tour, in Germany, he found an ad for a 1953 Citroen. Price? $50. When his tour was over, he had the Citroen shipped to the United States. Between locations in South Carolina, New York and then New Mexico, he worked on the car. In 1969, he towed it home to Spanaway.
In 1970, Chestnutt sold the Citroen. “It was one of my worst days” he laments. “I had a new location, new job, new home and family.”
After he retired, he would look at pictures of the car and reminisce.
“I often wished I had my beloved Traction back,” he said. “I had my regrets selling it. I even thought if I could locate my car I might be able to buy it back, but due to my age and physical limitations, this seemed a non-reality.”
Then he turned to the Internet. He found the Northwest Citroen Owners Club and placed an ad in their newsletter seeking his Citroen. This paid off seven months later when someone in Port Townsend e-mailed him, describing the Citroen she owned.
E-mails and photos followed. Some things were the same, but previous owners had made small changes. Finally, the current owner asked if there was one thing that only his car would have that would absolutely identify it as his. John recalled welding a brace under the rear bumper for towing the car. The owner said, “Something is there.”
Chestnutt and his daughter made a trip to look at the car. He recognized the brace and sidewall carpeting with pockets his wife had long ago created. Photos before and after also helped prove it was his old car.
Some months later, the owner offered to sell the Citroen to John.
“I decided that even at my age of 81 then, why not buy it? My daughter offered to help with the restoration,” he said.
On July 5, 2012, they retrieved the car. After replacing the wiring, sanding the fenders, hood, trunk and body, a fresh black paint job completed the project.
The odometer today reads over 55,000 kilometers. But as John notes, “That’s not original miles. I’m sure it has turned over more than once by now.”
Exactly one year later, on July 5 this year, the Citroen appeared at a car cruise in Spanaway with John proudly at the wheel. Curious onlookers circled it with questions. “What kind of car is that?” “I have never seen a car like this.”
What was going through John’s mind right then?
“It was the first public outing,” he said. “It was like being a kid again, after working for a year on it. It was an old man’s show-and-tell . I had no idea how car events worked. I am hooked now.”

Marian Dinwiddie, who wrote this article, is a Pierce County resident.

John Chestnutt's "beloved" and long-lost Citroen Traction is back home with him after 42 years apart. (Courtesy photo)
John Chestnutt’s “beloved” and long-lost Citroen Traction is back home with him after 42 years apart. (Courtesy photo)

Contributing Author by — December 3, 2013 in Spotlight

Madonna Hanna, who has a you-can-do-anything attitude, still surprised herself when she went from being a novice in track and field to part of a medal-winning relay team in this year’s national Senior Games.
Hanna, 59, is a Milken Educator and motivational speaker with more than 30 years of experience as a teacher and 25 years as a program creator, coordinator and fund-raiser. She has earned national recognition as a career and technical educator, plunged into community service and tackled speaking engagements on topics such as bullying, swearing and group behavior issues.
But she had no reason to think she might be a national-caliber senior sprinter. The Ruston resident had no experience in track and field, and her only previous foray in sports was when she took up tennis and bowling in her 20s before she decided “on a whim” in 2011 to enter the 100-meter and 50-meter dashes in the state Senior Games.
“I was just looking for something to do in the summer. I was teaching at the time,” Hanna said.
Her husband Steven, a former track competitor who also coached the sport at the high school level, became her personal trainer and coach. He soon had her running stadium steps and doing situps to get in shape for races that she. figured just required her to “run in a straight line as fast as I can.”
That worked. In the 2012 state games, her third-place time in the 200-meter race qualified her for the national meet. She also was invited to run in the 4×100 relay at the nationals.
Fast-forward to last summer and the national games July 19-Aug. 31 in Cleveland, Ohio. Having never run in a relay previously, Hanna found herself trying to pick up the finer points of the event in literally minutes. After finishing ninth in the 100 in 16.8 seconds, the fastest she’d ever run it, Hanna had 15 minutes to learn 4×100 techniques, including which hand to hold the baton with and how and when to transfer it to the next runner.
Hoping she was a quick study, Hanna gave it a try. After sprinting through the first leg of the relay, Hanna’s handoff to the next runner was perfect, and their team went on to finish third and earn the bronze medal.
“I couldn’t believe it I did it. The whole thing was so exciting,” Hanna said. .
The Senior Games began in 1985 in St. Louis, Mo., the brainchild of seven men and women who formed what orginally was known as the National Senior Olympics Organization. The games, held every two years with as many as 100 participants, promote healthy lifestyles for adults through education, fitness and sport.
For Hanna, who taught fashion marketing and career opportunities at Bremerton High School and Bates Technical College and earned a statewide Milken Educator award before changing professions, the games are a real-life example of what awaits people who step (or is that run?) out of their comfort zone and try something completely new.
“I’m so glad I decided to do this. I never would have known I could do it if I hadn’t tried,” she said.

Madonna Hanna celebrates at the National Senior Games with her husband and coach, J. Steven Hanna.
Madonna Hanna celebrates at the National Senior Games with her husband and coach, J. Steven Hanna.

srmedia by — November 19, 2013 in Spotlight