PORT ANGELES — Leonard Beil, community leader, forward-thinking Port of Port Angeles commissioner and longtime educator, is dead at 88.
Beil died Friday of age-related causes at his home in Port Angeles.
Funeral services have not yet been scheduled.
Beil served as one of the three elected port commissioners from 1999 to 2005; was Clallam County Citizen of the Year in 1985; received the Governor’s Award for Outstanding Volunteer Service in 1991; and was the recipient of the Volunteer of the Year for the State of Washington Southwest Area 1 Department of Corrections in both 1993 and 1994.
In 1996, he received the Port Angeles Community Memorial Award and, in 2009, a Citizens’ Service Medal from the Port Angeles City Council.
In 2010, Beil — a former principal of both Sequim and Port Angeles high schools and pioneering leader in vocational education during Peninsula College’s infancy — received a Community Leadership Award from the Washington Association of School Administrators Region 114 “for outstanding community leadership and service to education and the young people of Washington.”
He served in World War II with the Army’s 75th Infantry Division and was wounded in the Battle of the Bulge on Dec. 25, 1944.
As a port commissioner, Beil took particular pride in pushing to make the port a bigger economic engine in Port Angeles and make its activities more transparent to the public.
The port is a taxing district which covers all of Clallam County and operates the Port Angeles Boat Haven, William R. Fairchild International Airport in Port Angeles, John Wayne Marina in Sequim and Sekiu Airport on the West End.
He led efforts to begin rehabilitation of the Boat Haven, increase the number of local topside ship repair workers, build more hangars at the Port Angeles airport and create a Small Works Roster to encourage employment of more local labor on port projects.
The port’s meetings were tape-recorded at his initiative, and the port’s minutes were posted on its website.
The number of closed-door executive meetings by the port commission was reduced. Beil answered questions from the public seven days a week, in person, by phone and by email.
Beil met with his counterparts in city and county government on a regular basis and was also behind the creation of three community advisory groups to help guide the port’s operations at the Boat Haven, Fairchild airport and John Wayne Marina.
“The port’s major mission is to create jobs, and this was my mission as a commissioner along with open communication with the public and coordination with other public entities,” he said in 2005.
Beil was an active member of the Port Angeles Rotary Club and led numerous community anti-litter campaigns.
He was president of the noon Rotary Club in 1975-76, following membership in the Sequim Rotary Club, for which he served as president in 1960-61.
He spearheaded creation of a Rotary-sponsored flower garden along a portion of Front Street leading into downtown Port Angeles.
But perhaps his proudest Rotary accomplishment was leading a Rotary project in the 1990s to dismantle the former Loomis Tavern log cabin in Gales Addition east of Port Angeles, number and catalog each log and rebuild the structure on a new foundation and fireplace at Lincoln Park.
That building, turned over to the city of Port Angeles, serves as a meeting space and kitchen for community groups.
Born Dec. 22, 1922, Beil graduated from what was then Washington State College in Pullman in 1948.
He and his family moved to Sequim that year.
After three years as a vocational agriculture instructor at Sequim High School, Beil was principal for 14 years.
He then was Port Angeles High School principal for five years.
He followed that with 11 years as director of vocational technical education at Peninsula College from 1970 until 1981, when he retired.
After his retirement, Beil become involved in and led the local America Legion chapter as a commander, education chairman and Boys’ State chairman.
He also contributed 18 years as a member of the local Manpower Planning Board.
“Mr. Beil has been a vital, contributing leader of the Port Angeles community for the past 61 years,” Port Angeles School Superintendent Jane Pryne said in her nomination of Beil for the WASA Community Leadership Award in 2010.
“One of his crowning achievements was the planning, building and implementation of the North Olympic Skills Center,” Pryne said.
Then-Port Angeles Mayor Gary Braun, City Manager Kent Myers, Police Chief Terry Gallagher and Fire Chief Dan McKeen presented Beil with the 2009 Citizens’ Service Medal for more than three decades of work promoting public safety.
McKeen said Beil was instrumental in bringing paramedic services to the Port Angeles Fire Department.
He said Beil also was an original member of the Medic One and Public Safety advisory boards and had helped at-risk youths with community service programs.
“What makes Port Angeles a great city to live in is not the government services but the degree to which citizens get involved,” McKeen said.
“And Leonard Beil is truly an example of that contribution.”
Beil and his wife, Tea Rose, were married for 66 years. She died on Nov. 18, 2010, at 87.
The Beils’ 65th wedding anniversary in 2009 was celebrated with their children — Leonard D. and Stella Beil of Bainbridge Island, Ronald and Kathy Beil of Seattle, Gary and Pam Beil of Fox Island, Linda and Kevin Berglund of Port Angeles and Susan and Eric Rogstad of Bothell.
At the time of Mrs. Beil’s death, there were also 17 grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.
Drennan-Ford Funeral Home in Port Angeles is handling Beil’s funeral arrangements.
