They are called "Ayahuasca Circles." And in with-it places like New York, Washington, Chicago, Silicon Valley, Los Angeles and, yes, Seattle, the in-crowds are being drawn to evening gatherings to share a tea made from a natural drug with ancient Amazon ties that takes them on group "trips" where spiritual revelations occur.

(As the 15^th anniversary of 9/11 nears, a compelling question to ponder is whether the global regard for us that existed then, as evidenced by the outpouring of grief that came that day in our behalf, remains our national treasure or whether it is merely a squandered legacy.

On the 10^th anniversary, I shared a piece written a few days after that tragic 2011 September day by a former, now late, United Press International colleague, Al Webb, who did a wrap-up of the grief that citizens of every country shared on our behalf. Webb's article, written then from his post in London, captured that display of shared pain in a way that deserves, or rather requires, remembering. So I share it here again.)

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By Al Webb

LONDON (UPI) -- A small girl with a Cockney accent shyly waved a tiny American flag, and a queen brushed away a tear. In a Scottish town that has known its own tragedy, a lone church bell tolled. On a German river, foghorns sounded a low moan.

Across countries and continents, waves of sympathy for a nation in anguish rolled on. A young woman in a Kenyan park wept over the sad headlines in newspapers spread on the ground. A one-time terrorist donated blood for the victims. Hundreds stood in line in cities from Dublin to Moscow to sign books of condolences. 

And over the outpouring of grief and mourning for the lives lost in the boiling flames and rubble of the World Trade Center towers and a wing of the Pentagon, time and again came the strains of "The Star-Spangled Banner," sometimes in places where it had never been sung before.

In a gesture reminiscent of John F. Kennedy's "Ich bin ein Berliner," symbolizing his solidarity with another troubled people a half century ago, the Paris newspaper Le Monde perhaps summed it up best: "We are all Americans."

In London, where the little girl with the funny accent and her American flag pressed her damp face against the gates, the band performing the traditional Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace suddenly did something it had never done before -- it struck up "The Star-Spangled Banner."

For 45 minutes, the Mall in front of the palace became a little piece of America for hundreds of its citizens who were there because there were no planes to take them home. And the band of the Coldstream Guards played on.

As tear-stained faces lifted and sang along, as Americans and British and other nationals waved Old Glory, the marches rolled -- "The Liberty Bell" after the national anthem, followed by "The Washington Post March" and "Semper Fidelis" and finally, heart-rendingly, "When Johnny Comes Marching Home."

What the Coldstream Guards had triggered was the greatest mass demonstration of grief in Britain since Princess Diana was killed in a car crash four years ago. And as with Diana's death, a carpet of flowers, children's toys, poems, letters, all illuminated by tiny candles, built up this time at the fortress-like U.S. Embassy in London.

Amid the hundreds of bouquets, a single American flag was wrapped around a tree. One woman pressed her tear-dampened lips to its fringe in a soft kiss. 

The sweeping tide of mourning reached its crescendo at 11 o'clock Friday morning when Britain, France, Germany and scores of other countries in Europe, Africa and Asia went silent for three minutes, in honor of the innocent dead in America.

In Paris, the elevator at the Eiffel Tower stopped halfway to the top. Buses, trams and cars halted in their tracks across the continent.

In Spain, more than 650 city and town halls became gathering centers for tens of thousands who bent their heads in silent prayer -- and then, at the end of the three minutes, they lifted their eyes and applauded in that people's traditional tribute to the victims of terrorism.

On the River Elbe leading into Hamburg, ships flew their flags at half-mast. The minutes of silence crept by -- and at the end were broken by the sound of a thousand foghorns rolling across the water into the city's very heart.

In Lockerbie, Scotland, there was no applause, no singing, no bands, only the ringing of a single church bell and the flutter of flags at half-mast. This is a town with singular links to America, forged in a terrorist attack in the skies 13 years ago.

In all, according to an estimate by The Daily Telegraph newspaper in London, some 800 million people across Europe joined in the three minutes of silence.

At Berlin's Brandenburg Gate, once part of a dividing line between freedom and tyranny, a crowd of some 200,000 -- among them Germans whose relatives had died in terrorist attacks -- gathered beneath a black banner bearing the words, "We Mourn With You."

In Paris, crowds jammed the Place de la Concorde, itself a symbol of reconciliation, while church bells rang for five minutes before the silence.

In the government's Elysee Palace, "The Star-Spangled Banner" rang out, while over the French air waves, radio stations played John Lennon's "Imagine."

The bankers of Switzerland are not noted for their sentimentality, so they dealt in their own currency. At the end of the three minutes of silence, they announced they were donating more than $500,000 to the families of the victims of the atrocities in America. 

Lloyd's of London, the insurance market based in the British capital and one of several insurers of the World Trade Center, rang its Lutine bell and observed a minute of silence in memory of the dead in America -- some of them in the several broker offices Lloyd's has -- had -- in the WTC. 

In Belfast, the bullets and bombs of Northern Ireland's own form of terrorism, known as sectarian violence, went silent as tens of thousands from both sides of the divide -- Roman Catholic and Protestant - gathered in front of a makeshift stage at City Hall, to stand in silent tribute.

It is a city that knows the heartache of terrorism. "We have suffered for 33 years," said Betty McLearon. "People here have to be admired for the way they can cope with it. It will take the people in New York a long time to get over this."

In Moscow, the Russians observed a minute's silence as they laid wreaths and floral tributes outside the U.S. Embassy, once a symbol of the Cold War. Thousands of Muscovites lined up patiently to sign books of condolences.

In turbulent Israel, a nurse gently inserted a needle into the right arm of Yasser Arafat, himself a one-time terrorist who is now head of the Palestinian Authority. In a demonstration of support, he was donating blood to help the American injured.

Back in London, the minutes of silence were followed by a service of remembrance in the capital's majestic St. Paul's Cathedral, led by Queen Elizabeth II herself. In the audience of 2,400 inside, Americans hoisted the Stars and Stripes for the rest of the world to see via television.

Outside the cathedral, the tens of thousands who could not get in waved their own tiny flags and listened over the loudspeakers that carried the words and music for blocks around.  The cathedral's huge organ rumbled into life, to open the service, appropriately, with the American national anthem.

Then something happened that has never happened before, certainly not in public and doubtless not even in private. Softly, the queen began to sing "The Star-Spangled Banner."

Now, the British monarch does not "sing" national anthems. When they are played, she never even opens her mouth. Until now.

 But Queen Elizabeth sang it all, this song whose words were written 187 years ago during Britain's last war with her lost American colonies, through the final words, "O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave." With the last note, the queen gently brushed away a tear. 

That said it all. 

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(Note: Al Webb, who died in February of 2015 at the age of 79, spent most of his career -- 28 years -- with UPI, separated by a few years in the 1980s for a stint with U.S. News and World Report. His reporting ranged from the civil rights struggles to the battlefields of Vietnam to the Houston Space Center covering the conquest of space.

Webb, along with Joseph L. Galloway, another UPI colleague, were two of only four civilian journalists who were decorated for their battlefield heroism, in Webb’s case for evacuating under fire a wounded marine during the Tet Offensive in 1968.)

The 80-acre vineyard and winery in the Yakima Valley where Patrick J. (Pat) Dineen focuses an increasing amount of his attention isn't an entrepreneurial encore for the retired bank executive so much as it's a return to his roots on the farm.

Dineen, who hasn't totally stepped aside from his 40-year banking career since he chairs the board of Bellevue-based Puget Sound Bank and is one of its original investors, grew up on a dairy farm in the Midwest. "I knew that when I retired I wanted to get back into farming," he says, admitting that the dirt called to him from time to time over the years.

This is harvest time in Wine Country and thus Dineen is spending many of his days this month at Dineen Vineyards, which sits on a hillside north of  Zillah, amid a cluster of Washington State's well-known wineries, with an impressive view looking west toward the mountains.

It's there that Dineen Vineyard's grapes, primarily cabernet, cabernet franc and sirah, are being harvested and winemakers from many of the 23 wineries that are his customers arrive to load up their grapes.

Dineen only produces about 300 cases a year for his own use, either under the Dineen Vineyards label or the Kamiakin label, a second label featuring a red blend, that came into being about five years ago. Most of the 190 tons of grapes are bought  by the other wineries.

One of those wineries buying his grapes is Sheridan Vineyards, in which Dineen invested in 2000 after being introduced to Sheridan's founder, Scott Greer. He soon ran across a rundown apple orchard nearby that he bought in 2002 and turned into Dineen Vineyards. TheSheridan winery is built on part of Dineen's acreage and is leased back to Greer.

The vineyards primarily produce the three major varietals, but a total of eight different varietals are grown, though Dineen is quick to make it clear that "the viticulture is my interest in growing the grapes rather than making the wine."

His ongoing process of learning about the grapes includes traveling to Europe each year to visit different grape-growing regions and says with satisfaction that "I get into prestigious wineries that I wouldn't be able to if I didn't have the winery."

Like a number of those involved with vineyards or wineries in Washington State, Dineen first looked for land in the Napa Valley in California, but found "it was more pricey than I wanted to get into."

Dineen produced his first wine under the Dineen Vineyards label in 2003, primarily for personal consumption, but about four years ago he got his commercial bond to permit him to market and sell his wine.

"That was primarily to promote the vineyard," he said. "My plan is not to get any bigger since I'm retired. We could get bigger but chances are we won't."

Dineen, discussing his decision to be in the group who put up money to launch Puget Sound Bank in 2005, says "I had a good career in banking, made good money, and wasn't looking to get back into the business. But I figured I could do this with a minimal amount of time and effort. It hasn't turned out that way."

Dineen says Puget Sound Bank, a $200 million, single-office bank, "has a strong balance sheet. We didn't get into problems because we avoided real estate and focused on commercial and industrialized loans."

Dineen started his banking career with Seafirst Bank after moving West following graduation from Marquette University and five years in the Air Force. He then joined Spokane-based Old National Bank, which was acquired by U.S. Bank, where Dineen eventually served as president for Washington before he retired.

Looking ahead at the industry, Dineen said "we're going to see a lot of branch closures in an era when people can do their banking from anywhere. They could care less today if your bank has a branch on the busiest corner in town."

He notes "there aren't many healthy banks changing hands these days because banks looking to sell find that their book value is pretty much what they're being offered today."

"A few years ago, selling prices for banks would have been twice book value or even better for an attractive bank," he added. "Until we get back there somehow, you're not going to see much movement among healthy banks."

The tax breaks for high-tech companies that are now seen by some as depriving the state of millions of dollars at a time of dire budgetary challenges were a proud accomplishment of his administration, says former Gov. Mike Lowry, noting they were created to lure new business to Washington.

 "We were coming out of what was, at that time, the state's worst recession and we needed to attract industries that would produce good-paying jobs," Lowry recalled of the proposal he came up with and pressed through the 1994 Legislature.

The focus of the current criticism, and Lowry's comments during a recent interview, are what the critics refer to as "tax loopholes" and he calls "incentives" that have permitted high-tech companies to avoid paying state sales tax on new facilities, including equipment.

"We were absolutely correct to come up with policies to lure companies to the state that would create high-paying jobs that were basically the jobs of the future," Lowry said.

"We kept encountering companies that said they had looked at and then rejected this state as a place for new facilities," Lowry recalled. "The incentives allowed us to move into one of the most competitive positions among states."

One of the state's key competitors in the hunt for new high-teach companies was neighboring Oregon, which had and has no sales tax, and that put this state at a dramatic disadvantage.

Soon after enactment of the sales-tax exemption legislation, Washington State won a major victory when Taiwan Semiconductor announced it would be locating in Clark County rather than in Oregon. "The largest one-time capital investment ever in this state," Lowry said. Other wins were a Sharp Electronics facility and an Intel plant in southern Pierce County

A $132 million tax break for Microsoft, due primarily to its construction of data centers in Quincy in Grant Country, has raised some eyebrows among those viewing the state's list of the dollar impact of such tax preferences.

While he is convinced about the importance to the state of having created the sales-tax exemptions, he is equally convinced that they need to be reviewed periodically to ensure they are doing what was intended.

"Those tax breaks shouldn't just continue automatically," Lowry said. "Each piece of tax-incentive legislation needs to be looked at individually from time to time for possible sunset (termination). Each must be justified on the basis of expansion of jobs."

In fact, in the intervening period since Lowry's program in 1994, sales tax exemptions, and exemptions from the state's business & occupation tax have proliferated and been extended to logical industries like aerospace manufacturing, biotech and medical-device manufacturers.

Other also logical exemptions are for manufacturing in rural counties and manufacturers of timber and wood products, though some of the exemptions may cause more head-scratching, like fruit and vegetable processors, dairy and seafood processors and cold-storage warehouses.

The State Department of Revenue's most recent figures on the tax exemptions, for 2009, indicate 278,000 jobs were credited to the tax incentives, which cost the state $236 million, $109 million of which was claimed by high-tech firms while $80 million in reduced state and local tax receipts was for rural manufacturers.

Mike Fitzgerald, who was a key member of Lowry's team as director of Community, Trade and Economic Development and who has held held similar positions in three other states and may  be one of the nation's most experienced economic-development experts, reserves special praise for Lowry. Fitzgerald credits Lowry with really understanding the way the game had to be played to bring jobs to the state.

"He would bring his entire cabinet together and tell us that we were not to violate any environmental considerations, but otherwise we each had a role to play in working together to go after these companies," Fitzgerald recalled in a visit about a year ago. "Under Lowry, we recruited or were in competition for more big business than maybe under any other governor."

With her three autistic children as her "classroom" for the past decade, Laura Kasbar learned the unique ways autistic kids learn. Now she is ready to launch a business whose video-based web platform will offer parents, schools and health therapists a new tool to harness that process of learning for a dramatically growing number of kids with autism.

Kasbar, a Spokane mother of six, including twins Max, who was severely autistic, and Anastasia, who was moderately so, says the new company, called GemIIni (named for the twins), will launch in the first quarter of 2012.

Funding for the launch has come from the Spokane Angel Alliance and its leader, Tom Simpson, and an unusual commitment by Spokane's Inland Imaging and its CEO.

It was 11 years ago, Kasbar recalls, "that I walked into the tv room and saw all my kids lined up on the couch watching television and I couldn't really tell which were the autistic ones."

"At that time, the conventional wisdom was that the television should be off if autistic kids were around. But that experience was the catalyst that made me realize I should be using video to teach them," she said.

So over the next decade, with the help of her oldest son, Nicolas, who was on the autism spectrum as Asburgers, she developed the method embodied in the video. Her special focus was to help Max, who doctors told her, when he was four, would never talk.  She says he is now mainstreamed in school and excels in class without an aide. 

Now 14 and featured on a GemIIni video, Max has recently tested as having a college-level reading ability, a dramatic advance from his original diagnosis of being a lifelong non-verbal autistic. 

Kasbar says all three of her once-autistic children have now been removed from the autism diagnosis.

When Kasbar decided earlier this year she and her husband, Brian, were ready to launch the company, she was introduced to Simpson, who formerly guided a Spokane-based venture fund and now oversees the Spokane angel group.

Simpson set up a presentation for the start-up company a few months ago and wound up investing, as did some of the angel-group members. The presentation also drew the interest of Steve Duvoisin, Inland Imaging's CEO, who personally invested as well as bringing his company aboard. 

"I briefed our 60 physicians after the presentation and their attitude was: 'You mean we can make an investment that will help a lot of kids and could also provide a return on the investment?'," Duvoisin recalled. "It was an easy decision, but I emphasize their focus was on how much help this would be to the kids."

The number of children on the autistic spectrum and who thus need the learning help amounts to one in 38, and is growing at an amazing 17 percent per year.

"Autism is a very genetic disorder with an environmental trigger," she explained. "There are things in the environment that are the triggers for those genetically predisposed to autism."

The range of the autism spectrum, she says, "suggests a range of susceptibility to the triggers."

Explaining the role of video as a learning tool for autistic kids, Kasbar noted that the autistic avoid looking directly at a speaker's face and thus lose much of the normal learning process of mimicking articulation in speech. But, she says, they are not uncomfortable looking on-screen personalities in the eye and watching their faces.

"I've spent thousands of hours working with families in Europe and in the U.S. over the past three years to perfect the method," she said.

She says Nicolas, now 24, and a salsa instructor, as well as a coach of sales teams, helped with actual interaction between the program and the child, adding:"It was very helpful having someone on the autism spectrum work to refine the program."

Materials prepared for the marketing of GemIIni indicate it will use a subscription-based model with online computer-based training platform that Kasbar hopes to sell to families with autistic children, but also school districts, independent therapists and treatment centers and health insurance companies.

The business model provides for a charge of  $36 per student monthly, a fee that she says testing and surveys indicate is acceptable to parents, who would thus have a way to leverage home-time into therapy time at a reasonable cost.

She estimates the total special-needs market, including children with language-related disorders, at 7.8 million. Her target is to reach 50,000 families the first year.

"I expect that the company will become a leading provider of therapies for children with autism and other learning disorders," said Simpson, who is providing office space and consults with the Kasbars on marketing and development issues.

The political struggle in Moses Lake over the cost and management of its irrigation district is a microcosm of the conflict going on in cities, towns and taxing districts across the country between supporters of growth and progress, and those who seek to constrain government and contain spending

But because major companies have begun to focus attention on the area due to things like transportation access, cheap electric rates and low property costs, economic development opportunities are now on the minds of community leaders. Thus the obscure political contest has taken on new importance for the region's 45,000 residents.

The climax of the battle for the political affections of the owners of the 9,000 parcels of property in the Moses Lake Irrigation and Reclamation District has become, for the past couple of years, the ironically timed Christmas-season election for a seat on the district's three-member board.

The annual mid-December election had drawn little attention, despite the importance of the district's work in the clean-up of the 6,500-acre lake, until a year ago when two prominent local political types ran against each other to claim an open seat.

Ron Covey, 64, Moses Lake city councilman for 14 years, including six as mayor, sought to fill the seat to ensure continuation of the district's dredging and environmental clean-up, and the $1 per $1,000 property tax to fund the irrigation district's $1.5 million annual budget. Covey is also the current president of the Grant County Economic Development Council.

Mick Hansen, 71, a former Democratic state representative whose uncle and aunt were both state senators from the region, sought the board seat, arguing that the property-tax could be cut in half and questioned the importance of some of the clean-up projects.

The outcome of the race was important to the future of the district because if Covey won, as he did, barely, in a race where the approximately 11,000 votes cast represented a turnout about 10 times the norm, it would ensure a 2-1 majority supportive of current district funding and direction.

The election-night results gave Covey a 61-39 percent edge. But that majority had shrunk to 2 percent by the time absentee ballots, assumed to have been largely retirees wintering elsewhere or elderly residents, were counted.

A Hansen victory would have created a board majority focused on a hard look at both the board's direction and the operations of its full-time director, hired in 2007, and the staff.

Hansen is running again this year, challenging an incumbent board member.

The evidence of no love lost between Covey and Hansen was Columbia Basin Herald business reporter Lynne Lynch's quote of Covey during an appearance in last year's race, when he said he would not "cut the budget and gut the lake." He also suggested Hansen would bring "arrogant, ill-conceived good ole boy ideas."

The district's activities focus on the environmental challenges the lake has faced. More than 50,000 cubic yards of sediment accumulation annually have clogged channels on the lake, degraded water quality and led to excess plant growth, which district clean-up and dredging efforts have sought to counteract.

Now Moses Lake and surrounding Grant County have begun to attract economic-development attention from after almost half a century of struggling to survive and grow following the early '60s closure of Larson Air Force Base, which had been the justification for the community's existence.

And that increased attention has brought considerable focus on the lake itself as part of the appeal of the area to real and prospective new residents and businesses.

The new-found attention has included BMW, lured to Moses Lake by low-cost and sustainable power, to create a new plant in a joint venture with SGL Automotive Carbon Fibers where parts for the automaker's new high-tech electric car will be manufactured. Plus nearby Quincy has attracted datacenter developments, including Microsoft's new, fully modular center, as well as other like Yahoo and Sabey Corp.

Inexpensive power is a key lure. But former Washington Gov. Mike Lowry, who has both business and non-profit involvements in the Moses Lake area, sees "a lot of positive business factors at work" in the area,

"From foreign-trade zone, to all modes of transportation, and low electric rates, relatively low property costs, good workforce and good regulatory climate in the local government, there's real economy-development appeal at work there," Lowry said, adding that the lake itself is a vital aspect of the region's appeal.

Pat Jones, new executive director of the Port of Moses Lake, puts it this way: "The lake is an important part of the community at a lot of different levels."

Former Washington Congressman Brian Baird's long quest to bring a small note of integrity to the dysfunctional legislative body from which he retired a year ago has finally, with a 60 Minutes episode titled "Honest Graft," gotten a bit of national visibility for an idea whose time has long since come.

And it's possible that, as irate citizens across the country seek ways to express their frustration at the implications of the abject failure of the so-called supercommittee to come up with any agreement, Baird's idea may become a focal point for citizen action.

During the last three of his six terms representing the state's 3rd District, Democrat Baird sought unsuccessfully to pass, or even just gather support for, what he called the Stock Act. It would have barred members of Congress from doing stock transactions in areas they regulate, in essence, prohibiting their investing in a manner that those in the real world call Insider Trading.

For ordinary citizens, reaction to Baird's proposal would be a laughable "well, of course." But in a place whose mantra is "the rules we make for you don't apply to us," seeking to force action by the lawmakers on one small, self-imposed ethical constraint could become a rallying point for a fed-up public.

The thrust of the CBS segment that aired this month is that lawmakers often do make stock purchases and trades in the very fields they regulate. While ordinary citizens could be jailed for engaging in the kind of investment shenanigans that those in Congress involve themselves in, there's not even an ethical concern among lawmakers.

Baird may be able to gain far more visibility as a former lawmaker than he could as a member of Congress and the hope has to be that this first shot across the bow of Congress will echo down the months of the coming election year.

And a sure way to take this worthwhile campaign viral is to share in every possible social-media fashion 60 Minutes reporter Steve Croft's questioning of current House Speaker John Boehner and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi at their respective news conferences.

For viewers of the ineptitude with which both Boehner and Pelosi tried to answer Croft's questions about whether their investment practices were at least conflicts of interest, the thought that had to occur was "Who elects these people?" The answer, unfortunately, is people like us elect them. Shame on us.

Boehner, for example, bought a bunch of health-care-related stock during the health-care reform debate of 2009. And when Boehner's efforts to kill the so called "public option" succeeded, those stocks skyrocketed.

Pelosi, meanwhile, had gotten in on a series of lucrative stock Initial Public Offerings. One of those involved an enormous number of Visa shares that Pelosi purchased while she was working on legislation that would have hurt credit card companies. Two days after purchasing the stock at $44 a share, and after the bill was put on long-term hold, Pelosi's stock shot up to $64 a share.

Ideally, members of Congress will be pressed, in any news conference or appearance before business organizations or other groups in the coming election season, to explain why they fail to support the legislative concept for which Baird sought support in Congress.

Fortunately, Pelosi's struggles with the simple task of answering a question from the 60 Minutes reporter have become pervasive on YouTube, and should remain so down through election year as a backdrop to those questions posed to members of Congress seeking to stay in office. It should be watched by millions, and shared with millions more.

At a time when we're already dealing with "pledges" from candidates for political office, a much more logical pledge to press upon candidates than a no-taxes pact is: "Will you support the current version of Stock Act legislation in the House next year?"

And no candidate forsaking Congress for a run for state office should escape being forced to explain to their hoped-for statewide constituency why they lacked an interest in imposing ethical conduct at the most basic level on their fellow lawmakers and themselves by supporting Baird's efforts.

In this state, that would mean the question would be posed to Rep. Jay Inslee, who is running for governor. And why shouldn't he be pressed to answer that question? Hopefully, it will be posed early on in the campaign. 

Baird's 3rd District successor, Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler, announced earlier this month that she is signing on as a co-sponsor of a bill similar to Baird's plan, this one called "Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act," sponsored by Minnesota Democrat Timothy Welz.

A total of 92 lawmakers have signed on as co-sponsors, including Washington Democrats Rick Larsen and Jim McDermott, though not Inslee.

But those wise in the way Congress works, or more accurately doesn't work, will note that the bill was assigned by House Leadership to the Subcommittee on the Constitution, about as distant from a subcommittee that has anything to do with ethics, finances or investments as they could get.

Howard Schultz' quixotic appeal to CEOs to halt donations to re-election campaigns of members of Congress because of their inability to progress beyond stalemate is a bit impractical because only candidates that CEO types contribute to would be impacted. Candidates supported by groups like unions and trial attorneys would actually benefit if Schultz' call drew CEO response.

But a call for denying donations to any member of Congress who doesn't pledge to support the specific legislation that Baird long championed might have a whole different outcome in terms of response from those seeking to remain in Congress. And since the demand for such a pledge would be coming from Democrat and Republican voters alike, it might be the seed that could grow into a renewed sense that there are things that those from all parts of the political spectrum can actually agree upon.

And it would thus represent a small step toward acceptability for a legislative body that badly needs to be viewed by the American public as not just trustworthy, but simply relevant.

Susan Preston, whose image as a leader in clean-energy investment has grown in her years overseeing the nation's first angel fund for seed and start-up clean energy companies, has reason to look toward 2012 with optimism. And she dismisses the criticism of those who would deter federal efforts to spur such investments as "purely political."

Preston, general partner in the nearly four-year-old California Clean Energy Angel Fund (CalCEF), acknowledges the high-profile bankruptcy of solar-power start-up Solyndra may suggest improvements are needed in federal energy-loan guarantee programs..

"But you don't throw the baby out with the bath water just because some politicians are using the bankruptcy to make political hay," Preston said.

"Overall, the government will show a nice profit on the loan-guarantee program," she says, moving on during an interview to things she'd rather talk about, like the successes of CalCEF and the likelihood that she'll focus next year on raising a new clean-energy fund.

And she enthuses about the possible resurrection of a tax-break for start-up investors that she conceived and that was gathering support in Congress before the economy went flat.

That "political hay" that Preston calls "purely political" has been made over the last couple of months by Congressional Republicans over the bankruptcy of Solyndra, a Fremont, CA, solar-panel maker. It was treated  by the Obama Administration, including a visit by the President himself, as the poster child for investment in renewable energy.

Solyndra was the first beneficiary of the federal loan program and, as a company with new technology and support from a group of venture-capital firms, it seemed to be an ideal candidate for visibility.

Thus when the company went bankrupt this past September, defaulting on a $528 million federal loan, Republicans seized the opportunity to make it the poster child for what they viewed as excessive Obama enthusiasm for alternative energy.

 "The loan guarantee program from which Solyndra received money has a number of other companies in the program, the vast majority of which are involved with project financing of large, utility-scale facilities with 20 to 25 year power purchase agreements," Preston said.    

In fact. the U.S. Department of Energy web site indicates the federal agency has made $35 billion in loans and created almost 65,000 jobs as a result.  

"If you want to talk about wasted money, let's look at the billions and billions of dollars spent on defense technology which completely fails," she added.

Preston, while a partner in a major Seattle law firm, helped guide the launch of the nation's first women's angel group, Seraph Capital, in Seattle in the late '90s. And in a six-year stint as Entrepreneur-in-Residence for the entrepreneur-focused Kauffman Foundation, she became a widely recognized expert on angel financing, including authoring numerous articles, white papers and books on the topic.

It was that angel-financing expertise that resulted in her invitation in 2008 to guide the launch of the CalCEF Clean Energy Angel Fund, for which she proceeded to raise $11 million to invest in early-stage clean-energy companies. The angel fund was launched by the California Clean Energy Fund, a non-profit that hired Preston to create the angel fund and then became a limited partner in the for-profit CalCEF.

Preston is confident the political flap won't have a negative impact on either the CalCEF angel fund, or in a new fund she expects to begin raising money for early next year.

At this point there has been no official announcement on plans for the second fund, which she says will be "much bigger" than the current fund's $11 million, adding that while "we have not come to complete agreement on the name, it will likely be CalCEF Clean Energy Ventures."

Despite the financial challenges that have prevailed almost since CalCEF was launched, it has produced a positive return on investment with its four fundings, which averaged about $750,000, Preston said.   

Although Preston emphasizes that there are no geographic restrictions on investments by the CalCEF angel fund, "on a practical basis, and because of the strong prevalence of clean energy companies in the Bay Area, we have not made an investment outside this area."

But she notes that she and her partners "have been to several other places in California, and elsewhere in the country, to explore possible candidates for investmernt."

"Clean energy has seen a bounce back in the last 18 months and at a greater rate than some other technology sectors," Preston said, adding that "within clean energy, certain areas are performing better than others when you look at global indexes.  For instance, wind is down, but smart grid related technologies are performing reasonably well."

Asked what kind of energy startups are likely to generate the most interest over the next couple of years, Preston responded: "Energy efficiency, smart grid and storage are my bets."

"Grid storage will be an interesting area to watch because the problem with wind power is that the wind blows more at night while most of the needs are during the day," she said. "We are really in need of storage technology."

Preston is enthused that a proposal she put together about four years ago for an income tax credit for investors in start-up companies, an idea that drew bi-partisan support in both houses of Congress before the economic chaos shunted it aside, has seen a revival of interest in recent months.

The Access to Entrepreneurs Act (ACE) may move forward this coming year, she says, but it will have to be without her assistance because the first priority will be launching the new fund while continuing to oversee administration of the CalCEF fund.

"Our goal is to do well while we are doing good." Preston says.  "Our first priority is to make money for our LPs, but because we invest in clean energy, we get to do good at the same time."

To those who think that benefit auctions for charitable causes may be losing their appeal, Kip Toner, who for more than three decades has been in the business of getting folks to raise their paddles, has news for you.

Toner, who's KTBA, Inc. (Kip Toner Benefit Auctions) is 20 years old this year, says auctions have become an increasingly important part of charitable organizations' annual fund raising efforts. And he predicts that the importance and the number of auctions will continue to grow for those non-profits, perhaps even because of the current economic challenges.

"Because of what's happened in the economy over the past four years, auctions have become increasingly important for charities because other sources of revenue have declined significantly," Toner observed. "A number of those charities have come to us and said they simply need to have their auctions produce more than in the past."

It was in 1991, after 15 years learning all aspects of the auction business with the James G. Murphy Co., that Toner launched his own company in Seattle and proceeded to grow the enterprise into an auction company that does business across the country.

Toner sees two trends that he expects will dramatically increase the importance of benefit  auctions in the future. One is the growing use of handheld devices for bidding. The other is the increasing presence of what he calls "consignment items" -- items for which the donor and the charitable organization  split the amount of the winning bid.

Referring to the advent of bidding with handheld devices, Toner says: "The trend will increase the bidder pool against a fixed number of items and that will certainly increase the price for each item."

The emergence of handheld devices for bidding is part of what Toner sees as "the challenge auctions have in front of them to update their appeal to a new generation." He adds that the way handheld bidding fits into a more fun environment is that attendees don't have to pay as close attention to the front-of-the-room action when they can track bidding on their device.

Despite the challenges, the number of auctions is actually growing rather than declining, Toner notes.

"Some organizations have stopped doing auctions," he says. "But for every one that is dropped 10 emerge. There is almost an unlimited supply of items for auctions and coming up with new and unusual ones is merely a matter of creativity."

Toner's company did 105 auctions last year, with he doing at least one a weekend at auctions extending from New York and Washington, D.C., to Hawaii.

Asked about how much money his auctions generate for various charities, Toner said the last year they tried to calculate the total charity take was 2007 when "the auction revenue the charities actually took in was $16 million," he said. "That was the amount actually earned at the auctions from the live and silent segments, fund an item and other sales such as raffles."

As a result of the expected growth in auction numbers, Toner says more and more people are seeking to get into the auctioneer game. That has prompted the national auctioneers association to create a recognition of the formal title Benefit Auctioneer Specialist and ask Toner to write the curriculum and teach the classes for those who want to qualify for that ranking.

Toner credits the late Dick Friel, who with wife, Sharon, were the beloved team at many Seattle-area auctions, with bringing humor to the auctions.

"Dick was great because he taught us all about the importance of  humor in the auction, he showed us how to be entertainers as auctioneers," Toner added.

Two items that Toner says are growing in popularity are parties at the local fire station and small-plane flights put up by the owners of the planes.

"Firefighters love to have people come to the station both because they inevitably get a few minutes to do a fire-safety talk and because those attending the party usually bring the food, and leave the leftovers behind," Toner said with a smile.

"The private-plane trips are frequently bought by people who want to take out-of-town guests up because it's a great way to see the Northwest in all its glory," He adds.

Asked about what makes a successful auctioneer, Toner emphasized: "you have to make it about the attendees, not about the auctioneer, and that includes thanking people by name.That isn't really difficult since I have a sheet with a name after each bid number," Toner pointed out.

He recalled doing a recent art auction in New York where all the attendees were Spanish, adding that he spent advance time learning how to pronounce each name. "I'm not positive I got each name right, but they appreciated the effort."

What's the largest pricetag he recalls for an item? Toner says it was likely the $650,000 paid by an auto dealer who outbid several other challengers for the opportunity take his customers on trip aboard the cruiser of a well-to-do North Idaho business person.

"In the end, the winning bidder decided instead to take all the competing bidders," Toner chuckled.

When the 68-year-old Toner was asked how long he might continue at his current pace, given continued good health and energy, he said he's done 23 years of auctions for Georgetown Prep in Washington, D.C., and 20 for Pilchuck Glass. "I'd like to reach 25 with each before I think about retiring."

Nine years on from Michael P. Anderson's death on the ill-fated space shuttle Columbia, the fund-raising effort to ensure continuation of the annual program at Seattle's Museum of Flight aimed at inspiring at-risk children of color to dream big dreams is nearing its final stage.

In fact, the effort launched for a hometown hero by Spokane business leaders following the Feb. 1, 2003, shuttle disaster, along with the major assist from African-American pilots of Alaska Airlines and a financial commitment from the airline itself represents fulfillment of a big dream in its own right.

As the Museum of Flight prepares to host the third annual Michael P. Anderson Memorial Aerospace Program on February 4, final selection is in progress for the group of 10-to-14 year olds who will receive support from a special fund to attend the day-long session.

The goal of the program has been to create an enduring memory of Anderson and to make his achievements an object of aspiration and inspiration for young people, particularly the African-American students who would seek to emulate him. It's intended to help inspire an interest in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education and careers.

Avista Corp. CEO Scott Morris, motivated in part by the fact Anderson's father was an Avista employee, assigned the firm's director of community development, Anne Marie Axworthy, and communications manager Jessie Wuerst lead roles in the project, with a goal of  raising funds for a statue of Anderson in his hometown. That was soon after the shuttle disaster. But with completion of the larger-than-life bronze statue in Spokane in 2005, the vision expanded.

That meant doing something on the west side of the state and that led to a focus on a second statue at Seattle's Museum of Flight, which was dedicated in June of 2009, as well as a program to bring African-American children an awareness of Anderson and his accomplishments. That led to the creation of the Michael Anderson Memorial Aerospace Scholarship for Children of Color, which is administered by the Museum of Flight.

The campaign to raise the final $50,000 to ensure that the Museum of Flight program and the scholarships continue will also get a boost next month when the person credited with being the key figure in making the Seattle portion of the program a reality retires from the Air Force and returns to Seattle.

Maj. Gen. Harold L. "Mitch" Mitchell, Deputy Inspector General of the Air Force in the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force, retires this month after two years on active duty and will resume his role as an Alaska Airlines pilot, which is what he was doing when he was first approached about involvement.

"The goal has been to do more than merely put up a statue," Mitchell explained in an e-mail exchange this week. "It's important to leverage Anderson's legacy to help students have a chance to do similar things."

In an effort to put together a group to focus on the goal, Mitchell turned to other African-American pilots at Alaska, then realized "we needed some funding to make this happen so we thought it was an idea worthy of sharing with the company."

He says they didn't expect Alaska to be as supportive as it was, but the airline agreed to put up $100,000 as matching funds over four years.

"To be honest, we've struggled on our side of the match, but they have been outstanding," Mitchell said.

Wuerst of Avista said the campaign has raised $190,000 thus far and needs to raise a final  $25,000 to get the last $25,000 of the Alaska match.

Anderson was 43 when he and the other six crew members of the Colujmbia crew perished as the shuttle broke apart on re-entry.

But in an interview from space earlier in the 16-day  mission, Anderson expressed a thought that became the quote on the plaque on each statue: "This is what I wanted to do since I was a little kid.  If you apply yourself, work hard to be persistent, and don't give up, you can achieve anything you want to achieve." 

It's that commitment that supporters of the Museum of Flight program hope to bring to a growing number of children of color from all parts of Washington State.

Former Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels' likely decision to seek the Democratic nomination for Washington Secretary of State may represent a sobering reality to the three Democrats already announced and campaigning. But it's also a bit of cold water on the hopes of those who figured he'd seek to regain the city's top elected position next year from "the accidental mayor."

While Nickels has given himself until Valentine's Day to make up his mind about a race that he says he didn't really begin to contemplate until "over the Holidays," it was clear during a telephone interview that he's already thinking about what he would seek to accomplish in the office. The chances that he will decide not to run are remote.

"I think this office, where all businesses documents have to be filed, can be a place for someone to act as an ombudsman for small businesses all across the state," said Nickels, who would be seeking, along with the other Democrats, to be the first from their party to win the Secretary of State job in this state in 50 years.

The other Democrats include Kathleen Drew, a one-time State Senator who now works for Gov. Christine Gregoire and who is the only woman seeking the Democratic nomination. She has already received some important endorsements. Those include former King County executive Ron Sims, who recently returned from a stint in an Obama-Administration post, and King County Assessor Lloyd Hara, who is holding a fund-raiser for her next month.

The two Democratic legislators who have filed are Jim Kastama, a state senator from Puyallup who chairs the Economic Development, Trade and Innovation Committee (EDTI), and Rep. Zack Hudgins, a former employee of both Amazon and Microsoft.

The lone Republican in the race, and the first of any of the hopefuls to announce, is Kim Wyman, protégé of outgoing Secretary of State Sam Reed for a decade in the Thurston County assessor's office before being elected to replace him eight years ago when Reed decided to seek the state office.

Wyman notes that she has "already demonstrated the ability to perform the functions of the Secretary of State's position, like elections supervision and business filings, at the county level." She, of course, has the endorsement from Reed to replace him.

If the others of both parties hoping to succeed Reed were taken aback by the prospect of campaigning against Nickels, many Seattleites who were hoping he would seek to reclaim the mayor's job in 2013 were surprised and disappointed.

There was a sense on the part of business leaders and others that Nickels, who actually finished third in the 2009 primary, was merely supposed to be getting a signal from many who wished to send him a message about a perceived arrogance, not oust him from the job.

For those, who had no interest in having Mike McGinn as mayor but didn't care for businessman Joe Mallahan, it was an interesting lesson in not wasting your vote to send messages. So as McGinn's relations with the City Council, the governor and the business community have soured, many took to referring to him as "the accidental mayor" and were awaiting Nickels' effort to win back the office.

Nickels, 56, admitted in our telephone conversation that "in the back of my mind there is a sense of some unfinished business" for the job he held for two terms. "But it's time for me and for the city to move on."

Since being rejected by the voters, which Nickels describes as "a very humbling experience that gives you a different perspective on things," he has had a teaching fellowship at Harvard, served as a public delegate to the United Nations and traveled to the Ukraine to advise mayors there.

He describes those experiences as "two years of experimenting" to determine what he'd do next. Now, he says, the role of Secretary of State would be "a logical continuation" of his 35-year love affair with public service.

Wyman, who says she expects a number of other candidates to emerge before the filing period begins in June, has already visited 15 counties around the state and is "starting to build" a strong campaign team. She has so far raised about $25,000, noting that "as you get into races down the ballot, it's much harder to raise money."

Drew became the first Democrat in memory to be elected to her east King County seat in 1992, unseating eventual GOP gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi before losing to him four years later. She has since been involved in higher education at the UW Bothell campus, wrote the state's ethics law, worked closely with tribes and been involved in governmental reforms efforts.

Drew offers frankly: "I think I will have a lot of support from women."

The two Democratic legislators, Kastama and Hudgins, would have expected to draw from a traditional base of financial support for Democrats in a down-ballot contest that stands to draw less attention than the high-visibility race for the open gubernatorial seat, for president, U.S. Senate and congressional races.

Nickels, whose entry will change that fund-raising dynamic, addresses in advance what's likely to be a key political shot others take at him, saying "I'm not looking at this as a stepping stone to any other office."

Stuart Anderson, successful cattle rancher, restaurateur, author, television personality and entrepreneur, is finding that a comeback at the age of 89 is turning out to be more challenging than he had expected. It's not because of age so much as it is the economy and changes in the restaurant business.

The man who built Stuart Anderson's Black Angus from a single location near downtown Seattle in 1964 into a chain of 110 steakhouse restaurants across 19 states before selling the chain in the late 1980s was lured out of retirement by a shuttered Black Angus in Rancho Mirage, CA.

The appeal of reopening and rebranding a restaurant that he had originally opened in 1980 when his California expansion of Black Angus/Cattle Company restaurants was in full swing proved too much of a temptation, despite the protestations of his wife, Helen, who recalls saying: "Over my dead body."

"It was tough to see that restaurant go away, along with a crew we had come to know," Anderson says of his reaction when he learned in early 2009 that the restaurant he and his wife frequented had closed

"We thought we could help the economy by creating some jobs there," Anderson says. "And I thought Helen and I had the experience needed to reopen the restaurant."

But he concedes it has been more difficult than they had anticipated, originally convinced that "with my 60 years of experience, I felt we could overcome all the difficulties posed by this economy. But it's amazing how much you forget at the age of 89."

Helen, who has been Anderson's partner and spouse for almost 40 years and describes his comeback from a stroke three years ago as "miraculous," admits "we knew it would be costly, but it has been more of a financial drain than we thought it would be."

Anderson says "the restaurant business is more competitive and demanding than it used to be, with government regulations and additional costs we were unfamiliar with. It has been challenging," he admitted.

Many of those rooting for him to succeed again will be those from his home state. Not just Seattle, where the chain was headquartered as one of the most respected in America,  but also Spokane, where Black Angus number three became the most successful in the chain, and Ellensburg where his 2,400-acre ranch sprawled along Interstate 90. It was the ranch with its black angus herd, as well as the signature mustache and cowboy hat, that  made him the icon of cowboy country.

Over the course of nearly a quarter century, Anderson created a restaurant company with 10,000 employees and annual revenue of $260 million.

Shortly before Anderson's retirement in the late '80s with the sale of the company, industry publication Restaurants & Institutions, in a national survey, judged his chain the nation's best full-service restaurants three years out of four. And USA Today judged the chain best in the nation in the category of casual dinner.

He tried his hand as an author when he produced Here's the Beef! My Story of Beef, a book he describes as "fun and informative" that sold thousands of copies in the Black Angus restaurants. The book was a follow on to the highly popular McDonald's commercial in which an elderly lady asks: "Where's the Beef?"

And his stint as a television personality was as spokesperson for Seattle's Senior Housing Assistance Group's low-income senior housing developments.

Part of Anderson's concern for the amount of time and effort he and Helen are having to invest in their restaurateur entrepreneurial encore is that she doesn't have as much time as she'd like for her commitment to Umbrella Ministries. The Palm Springs-based national 501c3 is focused on helping mothers who have lost children.

The two spend "three or four nights a week" greeting customers and making the rounds of the restaurant, Anderson says. 

"I've seen tough times before and some of my restaurants didn't make it," says Anderson, noting the failures included the Tacoma restaurant that opened following Seattle.  

While noting his conviction that "the general economy has to change around here" and "there are too many restaurants," Anderson insists he and Helen will make Stuart's Steakhouse a success.

Helen McGovern, who three years ago put asidea career as elected official and prominent real estate executive to become the head of a non-profit engaged in fighting hunger in Pierce County, chuckles at the idea that a third career as Harlequin Heroine might await her.

While it may not actually turn into a "career" with the publishing house best known for its pervasive romance novels, McGovern and her role as what Harlequin describes as "making a positive difference in the lives of others" will be the inspiration for an ebook fictional short story.

McGovern received word a few days ago that she was one of three women voted winners in an online and Facebook competition to determine recipients of Harlequin's "More Than Words" award.

Seems that Harlequin, as one of the world's leading publishers of books for women, turns out more than romance novels. And the Toronto-based publishing house has as an aspect of its social corporate responsibility an annual award aimed at "celebrating the lives of women who make a positive difference in the lives of others."

McGovern, a woman from Ohio and another from Toronto were voted winners by Harlequin readers, 111,000 participating online and 7,800 via Facebook, and each will receive $15,000 for their cause and be "the inspiration for three fictional short stories," according to Harlequin. It was the first time in the eight years of the event that readers, rather than staff members, did the selecting.

The short stories on the three, written by Harlequin authors who are donating their time to talk with the women and gain inspiration to create stories based on their experiences and contributions, will be available in 2013 in ebook format and can be downloaded then at no cost.

As a Harlequin spokeswoman explained, when I called her in Toronto, the contest and awards "are to publicize to the women who read our books the causes of women worthy of being publicized."

Forsaking the corporate world and elective office for the dramatically more modest trappings as executive director of Pierce County's Emergency Food Network was a move McGovern had long anticipated as a focus on "a more purposeful life" when she made the move in April of 2009.

As a result of a column I did on her a year ago, McGovern was invited to speak before Seattle Rotary, which she did last week. And leading into her comments about guiding the nonprofit that distributes 1.3 million pounds of food each year to Pierce County food banks, she disclosed, with a chuckle, that she had received the Harlequin honor

But the jokes about being a romance-novel heroine, which is possible but not really the likely outcome of the short story she'll have written, didn't change the fact of this being an important recognition, following one a year ago with a Second Half Champions award.

That's was statewide award presented each year by Wells Fargo Advisors, along with ArtsFund and Seattle Community Colleges, to individuals who have "completely repurposed the second half of their lives to make significant contributions" after the age of 50.

It was after finishing her "most financially successful year ever" at Colliers and with her decision not to seek re-election after eight years on the Lakewood city council, including two years as deputy mayor there, that she decided the time had come for her move to a non-profit career.

So she learned of the opening at Emergency Food Network, set up a meeting with the board, and when she was asked if there was anything she would like them to know about her, she calls saying: "Yes. This was meant to be. I was meant to have this job."

Social Venture Partners (SVP), the Seattle-based organization that describes itself as the world's largest network of engaged philanthropists, approaches its 15th anniversary with a couple of major initiatives about to unfold. One will extend the organization's international footprint and the other will enhance its impact nationally. 

First is an expansion into India next fall and second is creation of a "mezzanine fund" that will offer more philanthropic cooperation among member cities, allowing them to function much the way angel investors do in syndicating deals. Beneficiaries of that fund will be philanthropic organizations "with great models" who will be able to expand their reach into multiple cities.

Paul Shoemaker, who has guided SVP since 1998 when founder Paul Brainard convinced him to leave his position at Microsoft as group manager for worldwide operations to become SVP's first president, says the organization is coming off its best year for new members since its expansion year of 2000.

Shoemaker, now referred to on his business card and SVP website simply as Executive Connector, might suggest that the initiatives to be undertaken this year could expand the numbers dramatically.

The move into India, which will launch in Bangalore later this year, is driven both by the fact that "there are some basic forms of philanthropy there already" as well as by the large number of citizens from India who are drawn to the high-tech companies located in the Seattle area. Many could be attracted to SVP membership by the India initiative.

"There are so many connections between India and Seattle," Shoemaker observed. "And we're confident we've found the leaders there to make us confident of success, even if SVP will look different than it does here.

"It will undoubtedly be a different monetary level for members," he said, "and the social system in India is different but we'll bring the same core principles."

With respect to SVP's creation of its mezzanine fund, it will operate somewhat like syndication so that SVP cities into which a non-profit would expand will participate in the financial and personal support for that non-profit.

"What we are creating is a fund from cities across the system evaluating the strongest local grantees that have the interest and the best opportunity to expand into multiple cities," says Shoemaker. He explained it as "helping nonprofits with great models replicate and reach next level funding opportunities."

"They might now be operating in one or two cities and want to grow into three or five cities," he said.

The applicants for support from the mezzanine fund are currently being evaluated and those selected as grantees for the new program will be announced in the next month or so, Shoemaker said.

Shoemaker, who was named last August as one of the "Top 50 Most Influential People in the Non-Profit Sector" by The NonProfit Times, recalls that expansion into other cities helped spur the initial growth to what is now about 2,100 members around the country, plus Canada and Japan.

It was in 2000 that SVP, then only beginning to expand beyond Seattle, had its first surge of young partners. Many of them were successful techies, answering Brainard's and Shoemaker's call to get involved in a new model for philanthropic focus on creating a better non-profit sector.

Each agreed to donate $5,000 a year to SVP and become personally involved with one or more non-profits. The amount is now $6,000 a year.

The first cities into which SVP expanded were Phoenix, Vancouver and Dallas. Since then, the organization has expanded only into cities that sought to become SVP locations, but that is another thing that's changing this year.

"Up to this point we've been reactive, waiting until someone from a community contacted us to express interest in forming a group," Shoemaker said. "Now we're actively pursuing cities where we should be represented and most likely locations this year, in addition to Bangalore, are Austin and Raleigh/Durham."

There are currently 25 venture-partner cities in which SVP operates in the U.S., Canada and Japan. As of last January, the SVP network had contributed nearly $41 million in grant investments to 500 nonprofit organizations and provided tens of thousands of volunteer hours in service and counsel.

One of the more interesting developments in the evolution of SVP is the number of partners forsaking the private sector and stepping into leadership roles in the social and public sectors. In a large sense they are following the model established by founder and desktop publishing creator Paul Brainard and Shoemaker himself.

They include:

-- Lisa Chin, a former Amazon executive who stepped out of the private sector to become the first executive director of Year Up Seattle - helping urban young adults reach their full professional potential.

--Tim Schottman, who two years ago left behind a 17-year career guiding Starbucks international development to become chief global officer at Sightlife, building a network of eye banks to support corneal transplants with the lofty goal of eliminating blindness for 10 million people in the developing world.

--Peter Bladin, formerly of Microsoft, who headed up Grameen Foundation's technology Center for 10 years.

Shoemaker says "this is definitely a trend we are fostering, hopefully leading it, because it is significant for bringing people with key organization-building skills from the private sector into the non-profit world."

The uncertain future course of national health care is retarding fledgling efforts to expand what's known as "compassionate care" for cancer patients as hospitals in Seattle and elsewhere are proving reluctant to launch new cancer programs that drain rather than enhance revenue.

Matt Loscalzo, who helped develop the concept of "psychosocial" programs as the underpinning of "compassionate care" for cancer patients and their families, laments that major hospitals around the country have been reluctant to incorporate it into their treatment programs.

But Loscalzo. executive director of the Department of Supportive Care Medicine at the respected City of Hope in Duarte, east of Los Angeles, is careful not to criticize the major hospitals, including those with highly touted cancer-care programs, for failing to move toward psychosocial treatment programs.

"All hospitals and institutions are holding their collective breath over the challenges they face," Loscalzo says. "These hospitals represent a lot of good people under a lot of stress. First they have to keep the lights on, then attract good people, then meet a tremendous amount of regulation, insurance challenges and Medicare cutbacks."

Loscalzo is a pioneer nationally in the development of  psychosocial programs and he has guided development of a touchscreen tablet that allows cancer patients to deal with the mental and emotional issues beyond their medical problems.

The device, called SupportScreen, is a cornerstone of City of Hope's leading-edge focus on compassionate care. The device, which is programmed specifically for each patient, is designed to electronically record distress levels, through answers on touchpads, by asking cancer patients to identify and rate their practical, social and emotional problems along with medical information.

Patients reveal concerns that might otherwise go unrecognized, such as mental health imbalances, stresses over personal finances or insurance coverage concerns, or suicidal thoughts.  The information, which the patient knows will be shared with the entire healthcare team, allows that team to immediately provide integrated treatments and crises interventions.

And because of the efforts of a philanthropic couple who maintain residences in both Los Angeles and Seattle, visibility for SupportScreen will be coming to Seattle and, with it, a heightened awareness of what compassionate care actually means to cancer patients' outcomes.

Loscalzo's other role at City of Hope is as administrative director of the Sheri and Les Biller Patient and Family Resource Center, created nearly four years ago through the vision and financial support of the Billers to create an international model of compassionate care. His psychosocial program, including, the touchscreen tablet, is a major part of the Biller Center's unique offerings.

The reach and influence of the Billers has given Loscalzo's efforts a major boost. Sheri is chair of the City of Hope board and Les is retired vice chair of Wells Fargo and current board chair for Spokane-based Sterling Savings.

Loscalzo's goal is to move the psychosocial program concept, complete with the SupportScreen, into the mainstream of cancer care, expanding its reach well beyond the handful of cancer hospitals where the program is now being introduced. The only other one in the West, in addition to the City of Hope, is the Huntsman Cancer Institute in Salt Lake City, which Loscalzo describes as "a fairly new center that is really trying to get is program up and running."

"The number of cancer survivors nationally is nearing 12 million and for them, psychosocial is going to be a part of the rest of their lives," Loscalzo says. "There are humanistic and financial costs for ignoring the psychosocial needs of patients and their families, as well as of cancer survivors."

In the nearly four years since their philanthropy allowed the Biller Center to open, the Billers have made the City of Hope's focus on compassionate care, including the SupportScreen, their cause.

It was because of a friendship with the Billers and a personal interest in the cancer initiatives there that I was able to get a first-hand look late last year at the programs of City of Hope and its almost unique focus on compassionate care. thus I had a chance to meet key players there, including Dr. Michael Friedman, who is president an CEO, and Loscalzo.

Because the Billers are givers, they share the willingness of all practiced philanthropists to also be askers, tapping friends, colleagues and associates to support their cause with personal involvement and financial support.

For three years, Sheri Biller's "ask" has been on behalf of a team of what she calls "Resource Racers" in an all-women's half marathon in New York City to raise money to augment the basic support for the Biller Center at City of Hope that's provided by the Biller Family Foundation.

This year, the call has gone out from both Sheri and Les Biller for "generous" contributions to her Resource Racers, including men as participants for the first time, for the Rock 'n Roll Marathon/Half Marathon in Seattle in late June. The donations this year will go specifically to expand the use and the number of SupportScreens available to City of Hope's cancer patients.

That may well bring visibility for the first time to cancer-care supporters in the Northwest, who may legitimately ask "why not here," given the cancer-care reputations of major hospitals in Seattle and Portland.

Meanwhile, Loscalzo's vision is to develop a touchscreen specifically aimed at children suffering from cancer. But that may be a ways off.

"We want to incorporate things like animation into the software of the SupportScreens we develop for youngsters," Loscalzo says. "A rough estimate is that we'll need about $1 million for development of those children's screens."

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For four decades, it was the place where three children grew to adulthood and where their laughter and tears, and those of eight grandchildren, echoed from walls and windows that were always decorated by Betsy (mom and grandma) for the appropriate holidays.

But the big old four-bedroom colonial in Seattle's desirable Mount Baker neighborhood had become too large for a now-aging couple, so the time to find a retirement apartment had arrived.

The attraction of moving into inviting new downtown-view quarters at Horizon House, one of Seattle's more sought-after facilities for retirees (and those not yet retired), eased the challenges of the move, particularly since familiar faces from Seattle's business community appeared around each corner.

But with the unfolding challenge of rapidly, and not easily, downsizing to take 40 years of accumulated items from 2,500 square feet plus basement into a place half that size, the memories surrounding the rooms, and many of the items, hung in the air.

In one bedroom, there was the bitter-sweet memory of the arrival of the daughter, born a year after our arrival back in Seattle from the Los Angeles area, who too briefly slept in her crib there.

Sarah Elizabeth, born four days before Christmas in 1973, gave a special meaning to that holiday season. Her brother and sister would sit on the couch and push as close as possible, looking on with smiling fascination while mom held or fed the baby.

Two months to the day later, we found Sarah dead in her crib, a victim of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). In an effort to bring meaning from her death, Betsy and I became involved in the state SIDS organization, first taking support in our pain, then eventually giving back by supporting other SIDS parents who needed help coming to grips with their loss. We learned you take, give back, then move on, once the realization comes that painful memory is replaced by loving memory.

The pain of Sarah's loss found a counterpoint two years later with the excitement of the arrival of Eileen, who bore the burden of being the "subsequent child," a description hung by psychologists on children born following the death of a sibling.

I made a point of being the one to check the sleeping Eileen each night as she lay in the same crib, though different bedroom, so that if she too had died, I'd be the one to discover it this time. As she passed the "at-risk" first year, the fatherly fears passed. But she retained, as the years passed, a special place in the family.

An enduring image for me was of the nightly routine we had when the children were young, of my singing them songs after they had been tucked into bed. I can still hear: "One more song please, daddy!" and Betsy admonishing: "You're being taken advantage of."

Those songs of childhood became part of our family culture, particularly when Michael grew into a young man and learned to play the guitar. As he would be sitting in the living room, in the final years before he married and began raising his own family, he'd be playing and singing to himself and dad would walk in and say: "play me a song, Michael."

Inevitably, it would be one of those songs I sang to Meagan, Eileen and him.

But sometimes it was Dan Fogelberg's "Leader of the Band," which Michael had learned to sing and play. And since it was one of his father's favorite songs, we'd sing it together. And again.

Then there was the room where Meagan and her Brownie troop gathered for their Monday afternoon activities under the guidance of her father, who turned out to have been the first male Brownie leader in the state.

That came about because when Meagan and a couple of friends found there were no Brownie groups they could join, her father said "let's see if this equal opportunity thing flows both ways. Is a man acceptable to lead a troop of girls?"

When I volunteered, the Brownie moms, to Betsy's amusement, called my bluff, welcomed me to the Brownie leaders' team, gave me the largest group of girls. But the moms were constantly supportive and available for questions from the rookie leader who was frequently panicked about creating projects and keeping a dozen second-grade girls focused. And Michael became a member of the group, possibly the first male Brownie in the state.

The empty spot by the front French doors after movers had cleared the area made it harder to picture the Christmas tree that occupied the spot each holiday season, to be surrounded by excited children, or grandchildren and their parents. And the absence of the sofa and chairs made it difficult to recall the candy-filled plastic Easter eggs that were inevitably hidden in and around them.

As we returned in recent days to check out the now-empty house, with its unfamiliar echoes as we moved through each room, an important reality for us, and for all those making large life changes, became clear. The memories don't remain behind in the place where they were made. Rather they travel with us, an essential part of the experiences we gather and carry through the years. Memories to be recalled and savored. Forever young.

John Stanton and Mikal Thomsen were in their late 20s when they teamed up at McCaw Cellular to become part of the birthing of a fledgling communications technology whose growth globally they helped guide through several major companies over the next 20 years, becoming iconic figures in the wireless industry.

Now just into their 60s, both have parlayed their business success into owning and guiding professional baseball teams, what they might well agree is a passion that rivals their business focus.

A business focus remains, however, as they continue to manage their Bellevue-based wireless venture and investment firm, Trilogy Equity Partners, formed by a collection of long-time wireless partners after the sale of their Western Wireless to Alltel Corp. in 2005.

Thomsen once told me that the opportunity six years ago to create the ownership team that bought the Tacoma Rainiers was like his “dream come true.” He would be owning his hometown team that he had grown up rooting for from the time his dad took him to his first game at age three. That was the year that the then-Tacoma Giants returned after a 55-year absence.

Stanton, who will soon assume the role of CEO of the Seattle Mariners after the ownership group he leads completes its purchase of the team from Nintendo of America, also recalls attending the games of his hometown team with his father. That was in 1969 when, as a teenager he became a fan of the Seattle Pilots in their first and only year of existence and recalls crying when they left town for Milwaukee.

Thomsen would undoubtedly echo Stanton’s “I am first and foremost a baseball fan” comment  that he made to the media gathering at Safeco Field when he was introduced as the leader of a 17 member local group that would become 90 percent owner of the team and he become the CEO, once Major League Baseball owners bless the deal.

Thomsen and his wife, Lynn, and Stanton and his wife, Terry Gillespie, are all alums of McCaw Cellular in the ‘80s and are now on the team of co-owners of the Tacoma Rainiers, though the oversight of the franchise, including attending many games and spending about 10 hours a week in the office during the season, falls to Thomsen.

The owners are fortunate that the baseball team acquisition included Aaron Artman as club president, a former Microsoft executive who oversaw the $30 million renovation of Cheney Stadium and remained with the new owners in the role of president.

Stanton’s and Thomsen’s baseball involvement extends across the state and all the way down to the West Coast League, an amateur collegiate summer league, where they are among owners of both the Walla Sweets and the Yakima Valley Pippins.

But it was when Thomsen had the opportunity to put together the purchase of the Tacoma Rainiers in 2011 that he turned to Stanton and his wife, an avid baseball fan herself, to become part of the ownership group.

Thomsen has immersed himself in his hometown baseball team and has enthusiastically committed to its increasing success, despite being the smallest market in far-flung Pacific Coast League and being the closest Triple-A team to a major league city.

In fact, the Seattle Mariners and the Rainiers are not only geographically close, which Thomsen admits may sometimes cost the Rainiers attendance of fans heading for Seattle, but close in that the Rainiers are the Mariners’ triple-A farm team.

As Thomsen puts it: “Most of the Rainiers fans are Mariners fans who enjoy keeping up with both teams and hearing about the players they saw in Tacoma performing with the major league club. I think the nearness of the M’s cuts both ways.”

In addition, the relationship is good for the Rainiers’ bottomline since the Tacoma roster is determined by and players’ salaries paid by the Mariners.

A lot of the changes brought about since Thomson’s group bought the team relate to community things, but he is pleased about what has happened in the stands and on the field.

At this point, atop PCL pack, the Rainiers seem headed for their first playoff appearance since Thomsen’s group bought the team, though Thomsen cautions that “it’s a long way from certain. We are only three games up on Fresno.” Plus the team appear on the way to another franchise attendance record, though beating the 352,000 attendance mark of last season is well behind the nearly 680,000 of the Sacramento River Cats.

In addition, Thomsen notes that the decision by the ownership group three years ago to build a new set of stands in left field “has been a stunning success,” adding that he celebrated his 60^th birthday there in early May this year “with a couple hundred friends.”

He says the change of the team’s logo two years ago to “the now somewhat iconic ‘R’” has helped drive merchandise sales “through the roof.”

In terms of community involvement, he says the Rainiers “teamed this past off season with Tacoma Parks, the Cheney Foundation and Mary Bridge Hospital to add a playground behind the right field berm that includes a whiffle ball stadium,

“It is packed for most games and open as a public park when games are not going on in the stadium,” he adds.

“The community views this as a partnership and we go out of our way to be great partners,” Thomsen says with obvious pride.

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Mother's day is a time to reach out to moms across the room or across the miles. But for many of us the connections need to be made through memories of moms departed. Or perhaps spiritual connections.And so it is that with another Mother's Day approaching, a decade and a year on since my mom died surrounded by her grandchildren and great grandchildren, I am reminded anew about a column I wrote a few days after her death in July of 2004.

I keep the column in a desktop file and open it around Mother's Day to reflect on her passing and the why of the relationship that often comes to exist between moms and sons, different than between moms and daughters. When I reread the column, I'm reminded of reactions from many who said they were moved by the column to call their moms, drop a note, or wish that their moms were still around to stop by to visit. So I share the column again.)

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My mother was a boys' mom, not only playing baseball, football and tag with her three sons and counseling us on our ability to succeed if we did our best, but also providing "mothering" for dozens of young men she kept her eye on in the St. Aloysius neighborhood in Spokane where we grew up, encouraging, scolding, guiding us all toward manhood.  

One of those boys, now a prominent Spokane businessman, recalled in a note to me a few days after her funeral that she had been one of the "angel moms" who kept him from straying very far from the right path.

It was at the age of 82, three days after the sudden heart-attack death of her 94-year-old husband of 19 years while she was hospitalized for a heart problem of her own, that she decided there wasn't a lot of reason to go on alone in this life and that she was, as she told a caregiver, "ready to go home." She had said "goodbye," one by one, to each of her grandchildren and great grandchildren who had gathered at her Spokane home, then went to sleep for the last time.  

Time allows the pain of loss to transition into perspective, though each of us deals with that process in his or her own way. Thus a couple of months after her death, I asked my brother, who had lived closed enough to Mom to stop by most days, how it felt to drive by her house now that she was no longer there.  

"I just say to myself, 'I don't have time today, but I'll stop in for a visit tomorrow,'" he said, then realized sheepishly he'd been more candid in his response then he had intended to be.

The photos of her sons, seven grandchildren and 16 great grandchildren filled her home, and their accomplishments filled her heart. Those accomplishments frequently came about, I was convinced, by her incredible faith in the outcome when she prayed to her patron saints, asking for their help.  

A convert to Catholicism, It was early on that she discovered St. Jude, the patron saint of lost causes. He and St. Anthony, patron saint of lost items, became the saints who heard from her the most, likely because her three sons frequently seemed like they needed the former and our antics led to the need for the latter.

She had a phenomenal record of success in having her prayers "answered," probably because those patron saints never heard her ask for anything for herself. To this day, I am convinced my track scholarship to Marquette was due to her prayers rather than my abilities.

Hazel Flynn was a working mom at a time when that was much more unusual than today. But our family needed the income supplement that her hours at the local IGA store in the St. Al's neighborhood provided.  

She was pretty hard-nosed about teaching us to be the best we could be. Thus, on occasion in my early years when I'd come home crying from being struck or harassed by neighborhood kids, she'd march me back to the scene and force me to have a proper fistfight with the offending kid.  

I can't remember ever losing one of those fistfights. Even on the occasion when I begged tearfully: "But mom, there are two of them!" She marched me back anyway and made the bigger kid stand aside until I had sent his pal home crying after our fight, then she motioned him to step in and get his drubbing.

Even from the perspective of almost seven decades, I still view that "battlefield education" by my mother as a remarkable, perhaps even unique, chapter in my early development. And many who have heard the story have remarked cryptically: "That explains a lot, Flynn."

She never had the opportunity, as a mom, to know the joy of daughters. But she did with the arrival of female grandchildren and great grandchildren, and she lavished her love on them perhaps even more than on the boys, perhaps to make up for her not having had a daughter.

She loved heading off to Nevada, where she had such phenomenal success on the dollar slots that she would be quite upset that she had wasted her time if she failed to come home with enough winnings to cover her trip costs, and have some left over for a gift for one or more of her family.  

I always suspected that part of the reason she had such uncanny success with the slots was that she wasn't trying to win for herself, but had other uses in mind for any money she won. I have never heard of a patron saint of slot machines, but I became pretty convinced that she had discovered one, and prayed to him before each trip, and that her winnings were prayers being answered.  

In fact, she was in contact with her patron saints so regularly that no matter who the heavenly greeting party normally includes, I'm quite sure in this case St. Jude and St. Anthony were on hand when Mom arrived that Friday afternoon in July of 2004, curious to meet the woman they had heard from so much during her lifetime.