In Your Neighborhood, Feb. 10

North Clark County and Woodland

Woodland: On Jan. 16, Woodland Girl Scout Troop 52 held its first official reunion at the Woodland Assisted Living Center. The troop formed 54 years ago and stayed together until the girls graduated from high school in 1967. The women reminisced over Girl Scout cookies and shared memories from their childhood. The troop traveled to the Seattle World’s Fair in 1962, went on many camp-outs, helped in numerous service projects and had the top cookie sales for Oregon and Southwest Washington for three years. Three of the scout leaders — Elsie Jensen, Gwen Kramer and LaVonne Hummels — made the meeting. Eight of the scouts — Anne Rose, Artie Sakai, Vikki Bunger, Roni Church, Sara Weese, Robin Hannam-Brown, Linda Whitworth and Linda Barlow — attended.

Battle Ground, Meadow Glade and Hockinson

Hockinson: Chandler Rea, 11, celebrated his birthday this year by riding home from school in a Fire District 3 fire engine. Chandler’s mom purchased the ride at the Hockinson High School Booster Club Auction in October. He brought three friends along for the ride: John Briggs, Chase Benson and Drew Henderson.

Venersborg: A handful of Venersborg, Washougal, Camas, Battle Ground and Yacolt residents held a seed exchange at the Venersborg schoolhouse on Jan. 31. The group shared cookies and traded seeds while dodging painters, who were busy repainting the schoolhouse roof.

Central Vancouver, Minnehaha and The Heights

Hudson’s Bay: If you see what looks like a piano on wheels zipping around town, you’ll know it’s actually a piano ambulance. Barry Leung of Fastsigns, a business on East Mill Plain Boulevard, recently toured the School of Piano Technology for a the Blind and was sufficiently impressed by its achievements to provide the vehicle signage for the piano hospital’s little white car. “The program has been giving meaningful careers to most of its graduates, which bucks the trend of high unemployment rates for blind and visually impaired individuals,” he said. The school sends blind piano technicians on house calls to diagnose problems with people’s pianos and repair them.

Hazel Dell, Felida and Salmon Creek

Salmon Creek: More than 400 friends of Chinook Elementary attended the school’s annual Family Arts Night on Jan. 22. Students and family spent the evening composing songs on the music department’s keyboards, making clay sculptures, trading cards and learning how to make balloon sculptures. Mud Eye Puppets were on hand to help the kids make puppets out of recycled materials, while En Taiko filled the gym with rhythms of their Japanese drums. The event was funded by the students who participated in Run for the Arts last fall and the Parent Teacher Student Association.

Felida: Thomas Jefferson Middle School has some sole — around 6,000 to be precise. Students, faculty and the surrounding community collected more than 3,000 pairs of shoes in a four-day Soles 4 Souls drive. Eighth grade leadership students, three teachers and a parent volunteer sorted and paired the mountain of footwear. The shoes are being stored in an empty office space next to the Salmon Creek When the Shoe Fits. They will eventually be sent to Haiti.

Orchards, Sifton and Brush Prairie

Brush Prairie: Members of the Prairie High School Air Force Junior ROTC spearheaded a DVD drive throughout the Battle Ground School district, bringing in 411 discs that will be sent to U.S. troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. The DVDs were donated, primarily by students and employees of the school district, after Pat Wagner, the mother of a U.S. Marine, suggested in November that the ROTC program tackle the project. Her son Robert was in the Prairie ROTC program and graduated in 2008. Initially, the drive focused on Prairie High School students and staff, but one of the ROTC students, Amy Walker, a sophomore, pushed to involve the entire school district. Many of the DVD cases have something extra tucked inside — notes written by students thanking the troops for their service to their country.

Sifton: Stores at Eastridge Business Park donated part of their sales on Jan. 30 to help the Bradbury family of Orchards. On Dec. 18, the Bradburys’ pickup was struck by a wrong-way driver, killing Ashlee Bradbury, 15, and seriously injuring her brother, Chaz, and father, Terry. The three Clark County Papa John’s restaurants also participated by donating 15 percent of one Saturday’s sales proceeds to the Terry Bradbury Relief Fund. By the end of the day, the stores raised $2,120 from more than 1,000 visitors. Christinia Roush, property administrator of Eastridge Business Park, said in an e-mail, “The businesses that donated are locally owned small businesses that are struggling in the tough economy. I find it so wonderful and refreshing that they are willing to donate to this cause during these tough economic times.”

Ridgefield and Fairgrounds

Ridgefield: Volunteers came together twice over the last month to plant 53 trees along Pioneer Street and surrounding the wetlands of the Cedar Ridge subdivision south of Pioneer Street near 35th Avenue. The trees, donated by Garret Hergert of G2 Outdoor Living Inc., were redspire pears, Armstrong maples, sweetgums, thundercloud plums, katsuras, and sunset maples. Twenty-five redspire pears were planted in the Pioneer Street right-of-way, and the rest were planted around the wetlands. G2 donated an additional 80 trees of the same varieties for use in city-owned parks, rights-of-way and open spaces.

West Vancouver and Downtown

Esther Short: The Fort Vancouver Regional Library Foundation held a bunco party at Divine Consign Jan. 21. Linda Thomas is chairwoman of the foundation, which pursues and secures donations, funding and endowments beyond the scope of the library district’s operating budget to fund additional projects and services. Forty people attended the event and raised more than $2,500.

Lincoln: In 1941, Bob and Vangie Goodman took a 650-mile honeymoon trip down the Oregon coast on a 1939 Harley-Davidson Sportster. In August 2009, they celebrated their 68th anniversary by traveling 400 miles through central Oregon on a Hog. They have been re-creating their honeymoon voyage for the past 23 years and ditched the coastal route a few years back to avoid congestion and traffic signals. This past year, the Goodmans traded in their motorcycle for a three-wheeler, but not because they couldn’t ride it. “If the bike fell over, I would have to call a wrecker,” Bob said. “I can’t pick it up.” The Goodmans take 180-mile Sunday rides on the trike to Hood River for breakfast. They plan to continue touring Oregon as long as possible, even though they would prefer to do it on two wheels instead of three. “She doesn’t like the trike,” Bob said. “She can’t lean on the corners.”

Lincoln: The neighborhood has been chosen by the city of Vancouver to serve as a “pilot neighborhood” for an upcoming citywide planning cycle. Four members of the city’s planning staff and about 25 Lincoln residents attended a Jan. 11 workshop and came up with results like these: Lincoln residents appreciate their neighborhood’s walkability, mature trees, older homes, nearby services and overall friendliness; they want more small-scale retail businesses like cafes, more gardens and parks (including a park at the former Dept. of Transportation site on Main Street), easier access to mass transit, more sidewalks and bike lanes, more attractive commercial streetscapes — and tenants for the vacant Kauffman Center on Fourth Plain.

East Vancouver, Cascade Park, Fisher’s Landing and Evergreen

Fairway Village: Jim Etzkorn, who has labored for a decade now to make Vancouver streets safer for pedestrians and children, was honored for his leadership and volunteerism by fellow members of the Neighborhood Traffic Safety Alliance. Etzkorn, a past president of the Fairway-164th Neighborhood Association, helped found the NTSA, chaired it for years and remains an active volunteer. The NTSA is a committee of neighborhood leaders that advises the city on making grants for neighborhood street projects.

Airport Green: Josef Schwarzott recently completed his quest to play at all of the public parks in Vancouver. Josef and his parents, David and Keri Schwarzott, have done some form of recreation at 91 developed parks and natural areas within the city limits. From start to finish, it has taken almost three years to cross every park off the list. Josef attends kindergarten at Hearthwood Elementary School.

East Clark County: Camas and Washougal

Washougal: Shoppers at the Washougal Safeway shared the parking lot with four draft horses and a homemade “barn on wheels” on Jan. 28. Lee the Horselogger set up camp at the grocery store to rest overnight before continuing his journey from the East Coast to the Pacific, much of it on the historic Oregon Trail. Lee has traveled more than 8,000 miles in his horse-drawn wagon, which holds supplies, water barrels and food, and serves as his living quarters. Lee and his horses are California-bound and plan to start a trip to Alaska later this year.

Camas: Kevin Giel doesn’t restrict his holiday decorating to Christmas and Halloween. His home at 2707 N.W. Leadbetter Parkway is decorated October through April for Halloween, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day and Easter. Now his driveway is lined with red lights and his home is looking festive with 29 heart lights, Cupids and a flag to celebrate Valentine’s Day.