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Irish poet Tony Curtis has a sort of magic. When he walks into a classroom, he enthralls the most skeptical English students with a world where words, music and humor make the most ardent of non-book lovers forget the bell. “I find students the most fascinating audience,” said Curtis, who will travel to ten schools in his two-week visit, punctuated by the Skagit River Poetry Festival which begins Thursday and will be held in venues throughout La Conner over the weekend. “If they can understand it, there’s hope for the adults.” One of his many...
What does one do when faced with a myriad of policies antithetical to one’s core values? Natalie Niblack asked that of Skagit Women Print collective and helped to organize a show around the theme, “Resist.” It is at the Perry and Carlson Gallery in Mount Vernon, through October 1. Niblack and Jules Faye created the collective to give women artists in the Valley a platform, a collective art experience and, with this new show, a political voice. Thirty artists participated on topics ranging from gun violence, freedom of the press, women...
Four young men file into the classroom of the Skagit County Juvenile Detention center across the way from the county court house in Mount Vernon on a Wednesday after Christmas. Matt Malyon, a chaplain with the jail and juvenile detention center through Tierra Nueva and creator of the Underground Writing program, sets up his handouts on tables. The four teens in bright orange sweatshirts and sweatpants pull out black notebooks with Underground Writing stickers on the front brought in by a young...
It's 8:30 a.m. on Saturday at the Monroe Correctional Complex, one of Washington state’s largest prisons. Men in khaki pants and white t-shirts at the front of a large visiting space with white walls and a painted mural wait to begin a performance of their own written work. More men wearing khaki and white with green name badges take seats on folding chairs for the first of two showings for the day at the Twin River Unit. A handful of visitors, who have passed through tight security, also take t...
Skagit is known for its sweet strawberries come June, but there has been nothing sweet about the season this year at the Sakuma Bros. Farm. The largest producer of berries in the valley finds itself at the center of a bitter dispute involving labor unrest, a boycott, and continued legal battles that have kept the company in the headlines. Journalist Anna Ferdinand explains the issues facing farms and their labor pools. Farm labor has changed over the past several years, with the once migrant...
Representatives of the Washington Coalition for Open Government awarded “La Conner Weekly News” editor and publisher Sandy Stokes with a Key Award on Thursday for advancing the cause of open government after the paper was awarded a $24,500 judgment in a lawsuit against Fire District 13 for violating the state’s Public Records Act and Open Public Meetings Act. “I want to say that it takes courage to stand up for open government and to advocate for transparency,” said George Erb, a director...
In an historic ruling in Skagit County Superior Court, Judge Susan Cook found in favor of unionized farm laborers, ordering Sakuma Bros. Farm, Inc. in west Burlington to allow workers and their families back into housing provided by the family farm since after World War II. “It’s incredibly important that farm workers are actually accessing the justice system and getting justice, because we have never seen this before, this is the first time,” said Rosalinda Guillen, executive director of Commu...
