County archivists preserve, celebrate our history

Within King County Archives’ climate controlled vault resides the first record of marriage in Seattle, the minutes of an 1853 County Commissioners’ proceedings for the Washington Territory and a blueprint of a 1915 King County Ferry. The documents were just a few of the artifacts Archives chosen to highlight for the nonprofit Historical Seattle’s workshop called “Digging Deeper.” The King County Archives was the last stop in the six month series where participants visited a different archive each month to get a behind-the-scenes look into research materials in the many archives in Seattle and King County. “They wanted to increase their members’ comfort level with conducting searches within the archives,” Carol Shenk,… Read More

Five Questions with Theresa Roscoe, Career Support Services Manager, Human Resources Division

1. What was your first role at King County? I began my career at King County 25 years ago as a temporary receptionist for the Office of Civil Rights, after identifying the County as an organization where I felt I could learn and further my career.  During my career at King County I worked in Human Resources, the Executive Office and in Transit. 2. What do you do as Manager of Career Support Services? My role is to manage the day-to day activities of the Career Support Services staff. As part of my… Read More

KCEGP Nonprofit Expos provide quality connections between nonprofits and employees

The King County Employee Giving Program (EGP) hosted five Nonprofit Expos in September and October to help employees get a better understanding of how their contributions to the Annual Giving Drive have a real impact on the lives of people and animals, on the arts, and on the environment, both here and abroad. The Nonprofit Expos featured more than 140 nonprofit organizations and reached more than 800 employees directly from every King County department and Separately Elected office. “The Nonprofit Expos are about enabling quality conversations between employees and nonprofits,” said Junelle… Read More

Emergency Sign Language at your fingertips

Does your work ever require a sign language interpreter to assist a customer in an emergency situation? The Emergency Sign Language Interpreter Program (ESLIP) provides sign language interpreters for emergency and time-sensitive situations on a 24-hour basis, every day for King County and City of Seattle programs. These services are provided to ensure effective communication during emergency encounters and situations with individuals who are Deaf, Deaf-Blind, or hard of hearing using on-call interpreters. Situations when ESLIP interpreters should be called include, but are not limited to:

Macklemore speaks at 20-year celebration of Drug Court

King County’s Drug Diversion Court celebrated 20 years of changing lives yesterday at an event at King County Courthouse. Drug Diversion Court is a rigorous minimum 11-month, four-phase program that holds participants accountable for their sobriety. Drug Court participants are required to meet with a Drug Court judge once every two weeks, go to chemical dependency treatment three times a week and are randomly drug tested twice a week. The celebration, dubbed “20 Years of Changing Lives,” was attended by County Executive Dow Constantine, King County Councilmembers Kathy Lambert and Larry Gossett, U.S…. Read More

KCIT employee gets some help from technology and four-legged friend

Next time you contact KCIT for email or SharePoint help, you may be talking to an employee who has a four-legged friend helping him in his work day. Dan Johnson, a Systems Engineer with King County’s Department of Information Technology, has been with the County since 1997, initially in the KCIT Help Desk, and now supporting a range of Exchange email, SharePoint and cloud-based services for employees. “My work focus has expanded far beyond Exchange email to include unified communications, the Office 365 suite, and distributed administration and security,” Dan said. “I used… Read More

Get to know four participants in 2014 Annual Giving Drive

Whether your passion is protecting animals, improving literacy, preventing hunger, helping seniors or young people, or supporting the arts, there are more than 950 participating nonprofit organizations that you can choose to contribute to in the 2014 Annual Giving Drive, which kicked off September 24. If you make a pledge to any of the more than 950 nonprofit organizations by 5 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 24, you will be entered into a random drawing for two lift tickets to Stevens Pass. If you have already made a pledge, you will be automatically… Read More

Kudos! Vickie S. Stanley, Metro Transit Operator

We took bus 7037 on route 14 Saturday, June 28th. We accidentally went the wrong direction but the bus driver, Vickie Stanley, was so helpful. She recognized we were from out-of-town and pointed out the sights we went by. And she assured us she would help us find our stop. She even offered to meet us later with coupons to get discount prices at the tourist places. We exchanged phone numbers and plan to keep in touch, especially if she ever makes it to Arizona. A bus driver became a fast friend… Read More

Ebola information and resources

As you know, the news coverage from Dallas and West Africa has heightened community concerns about Ebola. Public Health has been actively working to provide information and guidance to King County residents, health care providers, and partner agencies. They also want all King County employees to be up-to-date with information and resources about Ebola. First, it’s important to know that no one in King County has Ebola and  health officials have determined that the risk of an outbreak is extremely low. Although the healthcare system is getting ready to quickly identify and… Read More

Teachers get Public Health immersion to help student career choices

Two high school teachers spent an intense eight days with Public Health’s Environmental Health Services division (EH) – and set the stage for teaching students about career opportunities in Public Health. Each teacher shadowed eight different staff in EH. They learned about food and facilities, solid waste and hazardous waste materials, how information technology serves the mission, and more. The teachers are part of a Teacher Externship Program sponsored by the Washington Alliance for Better Schools which is affiliated with 11 school districts. The program trained 22 local teachers in Science, Technology, Engineering… Read More