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Port Blakely Tree Farms to Provide The State’s Holiday Tree at the Capitol in Olympia |
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Written On: November 12, 2004 |
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OLYMPIA—The Association of Washington Business (AWB) announced that Port Blakely Tree Farms will provide this year’s state Holiday Tree which will be lit on Dec. 3 on the state Capitol Campus. The lighting ceremony is at 6 p.m., and the public is welcome to attend.
Port Blakely, a western Washington family-held tree farm, will deliver the 30-foot Douglas fir tree to the Capitol on either November 23 or 24. The state Capitol Campus crew will anchor the tree near the Tivoli Fountain and line it with lights in preparation for the Dec. 3 official lighting. The tree will be lit each evening throughout the holiday season along with the fountain and the Capitol Campus.
This year’s tree was located by Court Stanley, chief forester for Port Blakely, on its properties south of Olympia.
“This will be the final year for the outside tree,” AWB President Don Brunell said. Because of the renovations to the Capitol Campus buildings, the tree has been an outdoor tree for the last three years. “We hope to be back in the Capitol Legislative Building next year and return to the tradition of an indoor tree in the Rotunda.”
The indoor tree has been featured in many publications including Sunset Magazine. “It is majestic and attracts visitors from across Washington and Oregon,” Brunell added.
The Holiday Tree is the symbol of the Capitol Holiday Kids’ Project, sponsored by the Association of Washington Business (AWB) in cooperation with the Washington Forest Protection Association (WFPA) and the Capitol Campus Volunteers.
Since 1989, AWB members have donated the tree, funds to decorate it, and contributed money for Christmas gifts and toys for needy children. This year more than 100 AWB members and friends from Colville to Vancouver have contributed almost $12,000 to make the holiday brighter for children in rural areas of Thurston, Pierce, Mason and Grays Harbor counties. Santa’s helpers, who moonlight as volunteer firefighters in the participating counties, distribute gifts to needy rural families.
“Since the project started 15 years ago, AWB members have donated nearly $175,000. All the money goes to the rural firefighters to buy the gifts,” Brunell said. “Too often the needy in rural areas are forgotten. The rural firefighters and AWB members have filled that void, and it is one of the best things we do at the Association of Washington Business each year.”
This year, AWB partnered with WFPA to provide the tree. In the past, Mountain Star Resorts near Cle Elm and Weyerhaeuser Company have provided the trees. In the future, AWB looks to its partner, WFPA, to provide the trees and deliver them to the Capitol Campus.
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