OLYMPIA — Gov. Jay Inslee has appointed three North Olympic Peninsula residents to state boards and commissions.
Sequim residents Richard Hendricksen, retired planning director for Columbia County, and Vicki Lowe, Sequim City Council member and Washington’s executive director of the American Indian Health Commission, were named to two boards.
Hendricksen started on Nov. 9 with the Clallam County Boundary Review Board, and Lowe started Nov. 1 on the Universal Health Care Commission.
Kate Dean, Jefferson County Board of Commissioners chair, started Nov. 19, serving on the Puget Sound Partnership Leadership Council.
In a press release, Inslee’s staff wrote that “boards and commissions are designed to give Washingtonians a voice in their government and allow residents to influence decisions that shape the quality of life for all Washingtonians.”
Hendricksen will serve on the Boundary Review Board through Jan. 31, 2023. There are five seats on the county board with two appointed by the governor. Hendrickson was Sequim planning director from 1998-2002 and retired as Columbia County planning director in 2013.
According to state officials, the review board holds “jurisdiction over municipal annexations, incorporations, disincorporations, and creation or annexation of certain special districts for Clallam County (and) has jurisdiction over extensions of sewer and water services outside the city or district.”
Lowe will serve as the chair of the Universal Health Care Commission through July 2024 as one of 14 members with seven appointed by the governor.
“Universal Health Care is something I have a firm belief in,” she said.
The commission, according to state officials, looks “to create immediate and impactful changes in the health care access and delivery system in Washington and to prepare the state for the creation of a health care system that provides coverage and access for all Washington residents through a unified financing system once the necessary federal authority has become available.”
In September 2020, Inslee appointed Lowe to the Washington State Women’s Commission, and she is also a member of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Persons (MMIWP) task force through the Attorney General’s Office.
She was elected to the Sequim City Council in November’s general election.
Dean is one of seven board members appointed by Inslee to the Puget Sound Partnership Leadership Council and she’ll serve through June 2025. Its purpose, according to state officials, is to lead “a science-based, results-driven and accountable public partnership to implement a strategic recovery plan, the Action Agenda, for the restoration and protection of Puget Sound.”
They’ll facilitate “coordination and communication among the multiple entities working to restore Puget Sound,” state officials wrote.
For more on Washington’s boards and commissions, visit www.governor.wa.gov/boards-commissions.
