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DONATIONS

The Hanford Vit Plant team donated $22,000 in toys and cash to local the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves’ Toys for Tots and Local 598’s Bikes for Tikes campaign. Of the donation, $15,000 in toys and cash was designated for Toys for Tots. An additional $7,000 was raised for Bikes for Tikes. Donations to Bikes for Tikes helped purchase and assemble 1,600 bikes for the community, including some that are designated for Toys for Tots. In 2022, the vit plant team donated nearly $300,000 to local organizations, campaigns, and programs, such as United Way of Benton-Franklin Counties, Second Harvest, and Junior Achievement.

• Hanford Mission Integration Solutions (HMIS) donated more than $25,000 through its “12 Days of Giving” program. Donations were made to, or in conjunction with, several local nonprofits. HMIS also donated wish list items and gift cards to both Mid-Columbia Meals on Wheels and My Friends Place. Grocery store gift cards were provided to Columbia Basin Veterans Center, Communities In Schools of Benton-Franklin and the Tri-Cities Cancer Center Foundation for distribution to their clients and families. Rounding out the 12 Days of Giving were donations to each of the community care funds or foundations for six local law enforcement agencies: Benton County Sheriff’s Office, Franklin County Sheriff’s Office, Kennewick Police Department, Pasco Police Department, Richland Police Department and West Richland Police Department. In addition to the year-end contributions, HMIS donated $150,000 to Columbia Basin College to enhance support of the Pathways to Hanford program.
• Numerica Credit Union donated $10,000 to Communities in Schools of Benton & Franklin Counties. The organization surrounds students with a community of support, empowering them to stay in school and achieve in life. From these funds, children received $100 in a Numerica savings account and free financial education resources.
• Team members from First Interstate Bank, a bank with an office in Kennewick, recently collected and donated 12,232 clothing items from its annual Coats and More Drive to help keep community members warm this winter. Items collected included coats, hats, mittens, scarves, socks, and snow boots, and were given to local nonprofits, including schools, child and family services, senior centers, and veteran outreach programs. Since starting the drive in 2009, First Interstate has collected and distributed 63,532 total items to community partners and schools.
• Employees at STCU, which has several Tri-City branches, documented 10,000 hours of volunteerism in 2022. The volunteers included 18 employees who served at least 80 hours at a single organization. Scores of others exceeded the 16 hours of paid time off that every STCU employee receives annually for volunteer activities. In response, STCU provided a record number of year-end Volunteers Count grants, ranging from $25 to $1,000. The grants go to every organization where an employee reported at least 12 hours of service – a total of 120 organizations. Any employee with at least 12 hours of service was invited to complete an application for a $1,000 grant on behalf of the organization they serve. The 18 recipient organizations were selected based on the employee’s passion for the cause, and the organization’s benefit to the community. In all, STCU employees reported giving their time to 307 organizations across a broad swath of the Inland Northwest. Also included are at least 69 organizations where STCU employees serve in leadership positions on boards or committees, including the WSU Board of Regents, Columbia Basin College Foundation and United Way of Benton-Franklin Counties.

NEW HIRES

• Erin Landon has joined the staff of Mid-Columbia Media Inc., the newly created company that publishes the Tri-Cities Area Journal of Business and Senior Times on behalf of its new owner, the Cowles Company. She will work part time in accounts receivables, circulation and handle other business duties as assigned. She joined the Kennewick staff following the newspapers’ December sale to Cowles. She has supported the two publications for more than a decade, working in production, billing and other roles before she stepped away to be a stay-at-home mother. She returned several years ago to support billing a few hours a month. She has lived in Kennewick since 1989 and attended Kamiakin High School, Columbia Basin College and Washington State University. She and her husband, Chris, live in Kennewick, where she home-schools daughters Ava, 11, and Morgan, 8. The family also includes dogs, a horse, several steer, chickens and the most recent addition, a goat.
• Whitney Brigham has joined Idaho Central Credit Union as a senior private client relationship officer. She will be serving the Tri-City area. She was born in Spokane and raised in Prosser. She attended Yakima Valley Community College and Central Washington University. Brigham has been in the financial industry for the last 13 years and has held a variety of positions including branch banker, assistant relationship manager and wealth management banker.
• Prosser Memorial Health has hired Dr. James Wallace as a full-time emergency physician. He has been working in emergency medicine for 30 years and is certified in advanced cardiac, advanced trauma, and pediatric advanced life support, as well as a certification from the American Board of Family Medicine. He received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Oklahoma and his MD from the University Texas Southwestern. He completed an internship and residency with the University of Washington in Seattle and went on to build his professional career in Port Angeles. He speaks Spanish.
• Visit Tri-Cities has announced two new hires.
  Rosemary Fotheringham joins the team as the director of marketing. She will lead the marketing, advertising and public relations efforts of Visit Tri-Cities. She is responsible for developing and implementing strategic marketing campaigns and comprehensive media outreach programs, developing compelling editorial content and social media communications, and managing visitor service programs. She graduated from Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand with two bachelor’s degrees in tourism business management and marketing.
  Corbin Harder was hired as the director of creative and communication services and will lead the creative and communication services team in the development and design of multimedia assets, publications, websites and communication tools. He brings more than 10 years of varied creative industry knowledge as a creative director.
• Lourdes Health has hired Tara Zamarron as an advanced registered nurse practitioner at Lourdes Rheumatology. Zamarron will join the already established rheumatology practice with Dr. Sudeep Thapa. She previously practiced with Samaritan Healthcare in Moses Lake as a family nurse practitioner since 2016 and a registered nurse from 2013-16. She also worked as a nursing coach and development coordinator with Columbia Basin Health Association in Othello. From 2008-10, she worked as an emergency room RN at Kadlec Regional Medical Center in Richland. She earned her master’s of nursing from Simmons University in Boston in 2016 and her bachelor’s of nursing from Western Governors University in Kent. She completed nursing school at Bronson Hospital School of Nursing in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and an Emergency Medical Technician course with Belding Ambulance System in Belding, Michigan. She is a member of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners.

AWARDS & HONORS

• For the third time in a decade, L’Ecole N° 41, one of Walla Walla Valley’s founding wineries, has earned an international trophy at a global wine competition. Global Fine Wine Challenge’s International Trophy for Best New World Bordeaux Blend was awarded to the 2019 Perigee from its Estate Seven Hills Vineyard in the Walla Walla Valley. This annual competition included six hundred of the New World’s top wines, entered by invitation only, from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and the United States.
• The Benton Franklin Fair & Rodeo has received an Award of Excellence in the Hall of Honor Communications contest held by the International Association of Fairs and Expositions. The winning “By the Numbers” entry was submitted in the category of “Miscellaneous Marketing for Fairs” with an attendance of 100,001 to 250,000. The item is a data-driven year-in-review marketing piece showcasing achievements of the nonprofit. Some highlights from the card’s content were total dollars generated for local 4-H and FFA youth at the Market Stock Sale, the amount given by the Fair in community donations, and the income earned at the fair by local nonprofits. The statistics are updated annually on the By the Numbers flyer. The item will be featured during a national workshop on Feb. 15. This workshop will also include presentations from other contest winning entries from fairs and festivals throughout the United States.
• Summer Yates of Pasco was scheduled to participate in the National Womens Soccer League draft on Jan. 12. She graduated in December 2022 from University of Washington and currently ranks as the UW’s all-time leader in games played and started; and ranks third all-time in points (77) and goals (27). Yates was the UW’s first All-American since 2004. Yates also played with the United States Youth National Team since 2014. She represented US Youth Soccer at tournaments across the U.S. and internationally including Italy, Netherlands, England, Australia, China, Spain, Switzerland, and the Dominican Republic.

BOARDS

• The Columbia Basin section of ASQ (American Society for Quality) has announced its 2023 elected and appointed officers: Section Chair, Denise Clements; Treasurer, Robert Boykin; Secretary, Marcus Aranda; Membership, Eric Clements; and Publicity, Jo Haberstok. The local ASQ section offers monthly virtual and/or in-person meetings and a newsletter with a focus on quality tools and techniques.

PROMOTIONS

• CPA Megan McCary has been promoted to the position of partner in the Northwest CPA Group PLLC in Richland, effective Jan. 1. She first joined the firm in 2011. During that time, she has been a key member of the team. Prior to joining the firm, she received her accounting degree from Washington State University and worked as an accountant for a private company. As a partner in the firm, she will continue to assist her clients, as well as provide leadership, insights and innovation to develop the Northwest CPA Group team into the future.
• Angela Pashon has been named assistant city manager for the city of Pasco. In this new position in the 2023-24 city budget, Pashon reports to the city manager in the executive department and helps oversee all city functions in the pursuit of the city council’s goals and directives. The position provides additional capacity to lead strategic initiatives and organizational development to meet the growing demands of the city, and it will also oversee the city clerk’s office and communications division. She has been with the city since 2016, first working as executive administrative assistant in the police department, then as a policy analyst, and she has served in several interim roles throughout the city and most recently as senior management analyst. Originally from Puyallup, Pashon also has worked for the city of Spokane and holds a master’s in public administration from Eastern Washington University and a bachelor’s in business administration from Washington State University. Pashon was named one of the “Young Professionals” of 2019 in the Tri-Cities Area Journal of Business.
• Baker Boyer Bank of Walla Walla announces the appointment of two employees to vice president and another seven to assistant vice president, effective Jan. 1. The promotions recognize leadership, innovation and commitment to the mission of the Bank and its communities and clients. The promoted individuals and their new roles are:
  Tyson Romanick to vice president. A CFA holder, Romanick started at the bank in June 2019 as a portfolio manager with the bank’s wealth management team. He has had an integral role in the portfolio management department, adopting and incorporating increasingly sophisticated technology to manage portfolios and communicate vital information to clients.
  Matt Sursely to vice president. He worked in the financial industry for more than 15 years when he joined the bank’s Cetera team in 2019. He then was pivotal in the bank’s transition from Cetera and has become a financial planner and a trust and investment supervisor.
  John Adams to assistant vice president. He joined as a trust advisor in 2019. He previously was co-owner and operator of his family farm in Adams, Oregon.
  Amanda Anderson to assistant vice president. She is the assistant human resources manager and career development advisor after joining the bank in 2018 as a human resources coordinator.
  Eric Denney to assistant vice president. He cultivated his relationship-based approach to working with clients in nonprofit management before joining the bank in 2019. As a family advisor, he works with business owners and high-net-worth clients on solutions for success.
  Elise Jablonski to assistant vice president. She joined in 2012 and is the business banking support supervisor. She works with her team to assist clients with business lending needs.
  Becky Kettner to assistant vice president. She is an investment advisor who came to Baker Boyer from a marketing and business strategy career in 2017. She previously was a trust advisor and key member of the D.S. Baker investment team that merged with the wealth management and trust team in 2021.
  Molly Neal to assistant vice president. A member of the Baker Boyer team since 2021, she is a trust advisor with the D.S. Baker advisor team and serves as interim Yakima branch manager.
  Nick Punch to assistant vice president. He joined Baker Boyer in 2019 and serves as a business advisor and interim Tri-Cities branch manager.