ELLENSBURG POPULATION

the community, “Now we have a subcommittee of our commission members that set up a time to meet with a specific group,” Klauss explains.

Alongside this, the DEI has held numerous events that facilitate community discussion.

Klauss says, “Last year, they had their first event belonging in the Burg, which was a partnership with CWU and the Ellensburg School District, and it was a community discussion, trying to bring people from all sorts of backgrounds together in Ellensburg to talk about what does it mean to belong? And what do you have to give to belong or give up?”

These conversations have continued, on April 8 the DEI held their second Belonging in the Burg event, they hope to hold these events twice a year moving forward.

The DEI commission also holds monthly meetings to discuss the information they’ve gathered and what is coming next for the community. “They’ll talk about other upcoming events and opportunities to get involved,” says Klauss, “They talk about how they’re using their budget. So, it’s just kind of a typical government meeting where the agendas are set, and just trying to work at chipping away some of these tasks that they put on their work plan.” All the city’s meetings are open to the public, in person and online via Zoom for those who would like to participate.

Home of the Wildcats

“Central Washington University will be most successful when equity, diversity, and inclusion are in every program, every college, and all throughout the university,” reads the university’s inclusivity and diversity statement.

Central Washington University offers an array of resources for students, on and off campus. On campus you can find the Diversity and Equity Center, “We provide holistic student support, identity-based & cultural programs, and social justice workshops to cultivate a sense of belonging and community at Central Washington University and beyond,” says the DIversity and Equity Center’s website.

There are many ways to get involved, the Diversity and Equity Center organizes identity-based affinity programs where students can establish community and a sense of belonging. This includes THRIVE: Women of Color Empowerment Program, Q*Fam: A 2LGBTQIA+ Support Program and Find Your People, a collaboration with student led organizations to facilitate opportunities to build community. Updates and events can be found on their social media.

The Diversity and Equity Center at CWU also collaborates with student-led organizations to facilitate cultural events across campus. This quarter they orchestrated events for Black History Month, Ramadan and Pride.

While CWU has resources for their students, that doesn’t mean the students’ needs are being met. In recent years, CWU students and staff have been fighting for a Center for Cultural Innovation (CCI) on campus. While the CWU Diversity and Equity Center serves their students, the students’ needs have outgrown the space.

According to the U.S. Department of Education, CWU’s student body is 53% white, 18% Hispanic, 9% two or more races, 6% unknown, 5% Black, 5% Asian, 3% non-resident alien, 1% Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander and 1% American Indian/American Native.

The CCI would offer minority students a designated space with resources tailored to their specific needs. “The CCI is a project that has been ongoing for ten years,” says the CWU Observer, “The CCI would provide a properly equipped kitchen so that students could cook cultural foods, a conference room, a worship room for all faiths and dedicated space for identity based student organizations.”

Taking Pride in the Community

Being proud of the place you live is constitutive to your happiness living there. In Ellensburg, members of the community have taken it upon themselves to foster an environment they feel a part of.

In recent years, Ellensburg High Schools LGBTQIA+ youth have been targets of brutal bullying and harassment. Students have spoken out about their experiences, in a CWU Observer article from earlier this year, students expressed their frustration with the administration after little to no change.

Helen House is a LGBTQ+ youth center in Ellensburg, dedicated to providing a safe space for members of the community. Tylene Carnell, the director of Helen House, has lived in Ellensburg for over 20 years and came here to find

Julep Kitchen & Bar

D&M Coffee Evolve

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Jerrols

The Pearl Bar & Grill

The Mule

5thSt

CWU

Gard Vinters

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Helen House

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Chestnut St her community. “A big thing in my own personal experience as a trans person was that I had to leave the life I love to find love for life,” says Carnell, “I had to leave the small community that I lived in in order to find other people like me.”

Carnell’s personal experience fueled her drive. When presented with the opportunity to start a grant for a LGBTQ+ youth space in Ellensburg, she knew her mission. “Our kids don’t have to leave their communities to find people like them, they can find support and resources, leadership and mentorship right here where they live, right here where they are,” she says.

Keelin Pattillo, the board president of Kittitas County Pride, has lived in Ellensburg since 2018, struggled to find her community. “I knew there were others like me out there, but I felt like at the time it was, everybody was kind of hard to find,” says Pattillo.

Last June, Pattillo met with friends to get the ball rolling on a pride organization in Kittitas County, “We started a nonprofit, got our 501 c 3 status,” she says, “we obviously had to create a board and I volunteered to be the board president, so that’s how I got into this position.”

“The mission of Kittitas County Pride is to educate and promote

LGBTQ+ awareness of diversity, health, culture and acceptance,” says Pattillo. While this is their focus, this isn’t all Kittitas County Pride is about. “Over the holidays, we put together a gift basket for an underprivileged family who couldn’t afford gifts for their young kids. So, it’s not just about us, us, us.We also definitely are trying to give back to the community in any way that we can,” says Pattillo.

Around Town

Ellensburg has taken necessary steps to ensure they are actively taking steps towards facilitating an inclusive environment, but how can the community do their part? Orchestrating this kind of atmosphere and allocating the necessary spaces, events and resources is a lot of work, which means there’s always ways to help.

The Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission in Ellensburg wants to hear the voices of the community and put in the work to make their wants and needs a reality. Nicole Klauss, the city’s public information officer and staff member to the commission, emphasizes the importance of showing up for your community.

“Just being willing to listen and maybe see what you can do. Have those conversations, maybe branch out and go to an event you wouldn’t normally go to and meet people from a different community, just trying to be open and inclusive,” says Klauss.

Taking part in these organizations, events and conversations helps a community to thrive. Many hands make light work and with so much happening within Ellensburg “We’re always looking for volunteers”, says Tylene Carnell, the director of Helen House.

Support can be physical, emotional and monetary. Keelin Pattillo, the DEI’s board president, discusses her appreciation for such a strong presence of support during pride, but wants to extend this excitement year round. Pattillo recalls a time she went to Kittitas Valley Hospital, doctors’ scrubs and name badges were decorated with stickers and pins, some depicting rainbow flags. “That, for me being a queer person, kind of helped me feel a little more comfortable at the doctor’s office,” says Pattillo.

Don’t dismiss the effects of kindness and inclusivity, in today’s world a smile could be all it takes to make a person feel safe and welcome within their surroundings.

story by Deacon Tuttle design by Evan Brown photos by

Water Distribution

1,630,000,000,000,000,000. Gallons Of. Drinking Water. On Earth. Craig’s Hill’s water tower houses four million of those gallons.

No matter the amount of water that surrounds us and the necessity for consumption, many don’t know how we Ellensburg residents get our drinking water.

The People Behind Our Water

Art Sinclair has been in water distribution for over three decades. With a background in mechanics and engineering, he decided to apply for a job opening in Ellensburg. Initially hired as a pump worker due to his credentials, he operated in that role for eight years before moving to his current job as a foreman.

Sinclair is proud of his team’s effort and the work they do daily.

“Every entity out there has what they do for the public. So in our case, our plaque would be that we clean, safe water, available whenever,” says Sinclair.

Shawn Byers is a senior pipe person on the team. He highlights the difficulties in obtaining qualifications to ensure they are ready to take on the dangers of the water division and provide the drinking water we are accustomed to.

“To do Art’s job or be in the water system we have to go to schooling. We both have our water distribution manager three. That was a really hard test for the state of Washington,” Byers says. Sinclair says those tests consist of mathematical formulas that calculate how many gallons of water are in a tower or how to examine the correct balancing method for chlorine filtration.

Squeaky Clean Supervision:

For the water in the city of Ellensburg, bacteria is low and not an issue in our daily lives according to Sinclair.

“So we only have one well and we hardly ever use it. That isn’t a deep well so very little bacteria, organisms or anything. It’s clean to start with,” says Sinclair.

This is because the well is very close to the surface. The depth is 900 feet which doesn’t leave room for any major issues to creep into the supply. Even if a minor bacteria came into contact with your choice of drinkware at home, Sinclair says the chlorine measures the department takes would make that null and void.

“If you didn’t drink like super fast, [the chlorine] will try to kill that bacteria before you do.”

There are several factors that are available via the City of Ellensburg Water Division site that showcase all of these measures, which are updated frequently.

“All the stuff we test for and all that. I mean hundreds and hundreds of things,” says Sinclair. Sinclair stresses the importance inspectors play in supervising the purity of the city’s water coverage. This is at all levels of the process: the beginning, during the cycle and afterwards to do a final security check.

“They put in what we call hypochlorite chlorine, hybrid chlorine as they put all the pipe together, and then they hook a hose up with a backflow device and blow all that stuff out or fill up the pipe.”

Following that part of the process comes what they call baking. This involves leaving what is in the pipe for 24 hours. Chlorine “bakes” in the pipe and allows for the remaining liquid in the pipe to be purified. Tests can be taken once more after the water is released.

Whether it be from Yakima or Wenatchee, the water makes its way through this screening process in order to be proofed.

“They basically set up a culture and they stick it under it and leave it so many hours in so much heat, and then they count and if there’s not enough counts of bacteria, and then it’s considered passable.”

Byers says these types of tests are done 20 times a month.

These are done all over the area and not only for the water used in residential homes. Sinclair and Byers lists a myriad of well-known locales which share this treatment: Ellensburg High School, West Ellensburg Interchange, Bowers Airport, the list goes on.

Operations change given the season as well. For example, during Spring, the team works on reconnecting services for irrigation purposes.

“We had to go and reconnect every one of these services. I mean, taking the lid off, getting down in the box, new washers and tightening it down, checking to make sure it doesn’t leak,” says Sinclair.

What does Ellensburg’s water infrastructure look like?

3500 water valves

4 Million Gallons Craigs Hill

1 Million Gallons Airport Way

855 Hydrants

10 Wells

In total, the water division consists of a seven-person crew. Those out and about in the field are divided up into groups of two.

184 seasonal meters need to be updated every spring and fall season. Sinclair says it’s a big deal and takes a lot of time, but it’s necessary.

Another procedure has to do with ensuring fresh water is circulated through the system and nothing is stuck at a standstill.

“So we go around twice a year and flush mains in a place where there’s a dead end and the water can’t travel and it just sits there. We go to all those spots twice a year and flush out old water so that there’s fresh water there.”

Pipes, Problems and Plans

“Hey did we have anything left from yesterday?” “Was there anything we said we wanted to do?” These are some of the typical questions Sinclair hears in the morning. When the aforementioned questions are answered, they plan the crew rotations and send them out for maintenance.

Many issues aren’t prevalent on a day-to-day basis, but a bigger issue that the crew has dealt with is water main breaks. These involve pipes bursting and overflowing with excess water, which Sinclair says isn’t out of the ordinary.

“Part of it is the ground shifts all the time and the biggest reason I think for our water main breaks that we’ve seen in the last 15 years is that there wasn’t a good bedding put down. So there’s like this pipe and there’s a rock underneath it.”

Sinclair says all it takes is one small issue and…boom, ring snapped, water main breaks. Thankfully, many advances have occurred since Sinclair started in the field to lessen this frequency.

The water division uses ductile iron which is industry standard and combats leaking water well according to Sinclair. Sinclair says they’re happy with the flexibility and how they switch operations week-by-week with Byers testifying the exact same sentiment.

“We have a pretty good crew.”