PORT TOWNSEND — The Port Townsend Main Street Program’s LENT Low-Interest Microloan applications are due Thursday.
These funds are a tool to offset some of the financial impacts businesses endure from emergency situations, although business development proposals will be considered.
The funds are made available through the Port Townsend Main Street Program, which fosters economic vitality and preservation of place within the historic business districts while maintaining small town quality of life.
Priority will be given to business owners with shops in the commercial historic districts (Uptown/Downtown) that are experiencing a loss of business due to natural disaster, infrastructure failure or major equipment failure.
Priority also will be given to impactful infrastructure projects that would benefit not only the business applying, but neighboring businesses and the local economy, as well.
Business growth projects also will be considered but only in deference to emergency projects (Main Street earmarks $4,000 in funding for emergencies only).
Businesses that would otherwise qualify for conventional financing will not be considered for LENT Microloans.
The minimum loan is $500 and the maximum loan is $4,000 with no interest for one year; payoff within three years with incremental interest rate increase up to 5 percent.
Amounts under $1,000 must be repaid in one year.
To view and print out the application, visit www.ptmainstreet.org and click the “Microloan Deadline 10/15” tab.
For more information, phone 360-385-7911 or email Mari Mullen at director@ptmainstreet.org.
Light station meeting set for Saturday
SEQUIM — The New Dungeness Light Station Association will hold its annual general meeting at the Trinity United Methodist Church, 100 S. Blake St., at 1 p.m. Saturday.
This year’s speaker, Ken Normington, shares his stories of life on Connecticut’s Greens Ledge Light, a sparkplug lighthouse offshore in western Long Island Sound.
As a Coast Guard Engineman third class, Normington’s main responsibility was to keep the three generators running in this four-story, 52-foot conical lighthouse.
Additionally, catch up on what has happened at the New Dungeness Light Station this past year.
Attendees can also learn how to join this group of volunteers who help keep the light shining on the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
There will be refreshments, door prizes and four items for the silent auction.
Raffle tickets will be available to purchase as well as a variety of New Dungeness Lighthouse merchandise. All are welcome to the event.
Artist of the Month
PORT LUDLOW — The Port Ludlow Artists’ League will welcome the community to meet artist James Murphy as the October Artist of the Month at a reception Wednesday.
The reception will be in the lobby of Sound Community Bank, 9500 Oak Bay Road, from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. It will then move to the League Gallery next door from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.
Murphy, originally from the Midwest, came to the Olympic Peninsula to visit a new grandson and “fell in love with a child and a place,” he said in a news release.
“I came back a year later to stay.”
Murphy graduated in 1966 from the Kansas City Art Institute with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in industrial design.
His paintings hang in homes and offices from the Midwest to the Northwest.
The reception is open to the community and friends.
NAMI offers film
PORT TOWNSEND — The Jefferson County National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) will sponsor a free showing of “Hidden Pictures” at the Rose Theatre, 235 Taylor St., from noon to 2 p.m. Sunday.
Doors open at 11:30 a.m., and seating is first-come, first-served.
Filmmaker Delaney Ruston, who grew up in the shadow of her father’s schizophrenia, goes to six countries to explore the hidden struggles faced by people living with mental illness.
The film, featuring Glenn Close and Patrick Kennedy, reveals a global epidemic of silence around mental illness, as well as moments of profound compassion and remarkable change on the path to recovery, according to a news release.
The Jefferson County NAMI’s goal is to increase public awareness and inform the public about classes and support groups available in the county.
A question-and-answer period and door prizes will follow the film.
For more information, phone Valerie Phimister at 360-390-4547 or email seachordmusic@cablespeed.com.
Sequim lights are replaced
SEQUIM — Sequim Public Works crew members are replacing traditional light bulbs in city street lamps with LED units.
The work will be conducted between 5 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. Mondays through Fridays through the end of the year.
Residents may observe a one- or two-block bank of lights that are out at one time during this period.
The city began the replacement program in 2014 to save costs.
The Clallam County Public Utility District estimates that the LED — light-emitting diode — units installed this year will save the city about $6,000 in electrical costs per year.
Labor costs and materials are expected to be cut as well, since LED units need to be replaced less frequently than traditional bulbs.
For more information, phone Streets Manager Mike Brandt at 360-681-3437 or email mbrandt@sequimwa.gov.
