News

Washougal’s Hamllik Park is getting a makeover this year. 

The city of Washougal held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the park’s new playground April 18, and plans to break ground on the construction of a basketball court at the Addy Street park later in 2024. 

Later this month, on Sunday, April 28, community members will begin painting a mural designed by the East County Citizens Alliance and Washougal residents on the park’s restroom. 

“There’s lots of good work here at this park,” Washougal Public Works Director Trevor Evers said during the ribbon-cutting ceremony. “This is the first phase of what we hope is many phases. We’re really trying to bring life back into this specific park.”

The City received a $50,000 Community Development Block Grant in 2022 to fund the purchase and installation of a new playground and the removal of the old one, which was more than 20 years old, according to the City’s public works business administrator, Michelle Wright. 

“It was way past its life span,” Wright said of the playground. “When you start trying to buy replacement parts after things start breaking, it’s really time to replace the whole thing. We reached out to our friends at CDBG and started applying for grants.”

The playground, which was installed in late 2022 by the Yacolt-based Western Union Civil Group, features a treehouse play structure, slide, bridge, climbing structures, a swing set and two spinners Wright called “mini merry-go-rounds.”

“The really great thing about when you build stuff like this is that they provide Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) accessibility to some of the playing elements. That was really important for the design. We wanted to make sure it can be used by all,” Wright said.

“We chose the treehouse because the park is so beautiful and open, and has trees and everything, so we wanted to make it look natural, but give all ages different play structures,” Wright said, adding that there are elements of the new playground that cater to a variety of children’s ages and skill levels. 

“That’s really important in the diversity of a playground, too, being able to accommodate all different levels and all different skill sets,” she said. “That’s really what we were looking for.”

The City is also working on a multi-component project that will install a basketball court at Hamllik Park, repair several sections of the walking path that encircles the park, add an ADA-compliant parking stall in the southwest corner of the parking lot, and possibly construct new dugout structures for the baseball-softball field, depending on fund availability. 

The project also will provide stormwater drainage to account for the increased impervious surface of the basketball court, according to Jason VanAalsburg, the City’s public works management analyst.

“We’re trying to give the neighbors in this area what they want as far as features go, and we’re looking for activities that can impact 12 (year olds) to 20 year olds and give them some things to do,” Wright said. “All this was happening during COVID. The disc golf (course at Hartwood Park) was created based on that thought process, too — get people active and moving.”

The City will pay for the $168,000 project using CDBG funding and park impact fees, according to VanAalsburg, who said the City hopes to break ground on the project soon. 

“We have wrapped up the design and received tentative engineering approval from our planning and engineering departments,” VanAalsburg said. “We have design and bid documents submitted to CDBG for approval, and once we have approval from CDBG, we will be putting this project out to bid. I am hopeful that this will happen in the next month or so. Construction would then begin early summer and be completed by the end of summer.”

The full-sized basketball court will be located north of the bathroom building and west of the picnic shelter. 

Residents bring mural vision to life

The East County Citizens Alliance received $2,000 from the city of Washougal’s Arts Commission in November 2023, to install a community created mural on the bathroom building at Hamllik Park. Later that month, the Washougal-based nonprofit held a brainstorming session, during which community members were invited to provide input and feedback on possible mural designs. 

Five Washougal artists transformed the community ideas into a conceptual design, which was later approved by the Arts Commission, according to East County Citizens Alliance volunteer and project co-manager Kathy Huntington.

“Dibond and paints were purchased, then the background grass and sky and the outline of the design were transferred to the dibond, which will be mounted to three sides of the Hamllik Park bathroom building,” Huntington said. “And now we are ready for the first of two community painting days to fill in the colors and bring the mural to life.”

The first “community painting day” will be held from noon to 2 p.m. Sunday, April 28. Pizza and drinks will be served.

“On this day, the sections of the mural that will cover the back side of the building will be painted,” Huntington said. “In May, there will be another day for the community to paint the sections of the mural, which will be mounted on the sides of the building. The artist group will do touch-ups and add a protective coating to the mural surface. Then we’ll coordinate with the City to mount the mural and celebrate the creation of a lasting piece of art developed and produced through community input, cooperative design and shared painting.”

The Washougal Art and Culture Alliance (WACA) has agreed to provide some funding for the project, which is estimated to cost $3,723, according to WACA President Molly Coston.

“We hope this project becomes a model for collaboration amongst Washougal organizations and the city to bring creative, joyful, impactful projects to life — projects (that) value the input of a broad cross section of community voices, involve cross-generational collaboration and add value not only in the end product, but also in the process of bringing the vision to life.”

After moving back to his hometown of Camas in 2000, Gary Abrahamsen decided to get into better physical shape. After watching the television show, “The Biggest Loser,” he turned to his wife and said, ‘The contestants run a marathon at the end of their weight-loss journey. Why can’t I do that?’”

But Abrahamsen soon realized his effort to complete a 26.2-mile run would have to start with something much less ambitious —  a short walk down the street.

“I was 230 pounds or something like that,” he said. “I started by walking one block, then running one block. The next time, I ran the two blocks. Then I ran one mile, then another mile added onto that — just a little further each time. It’s like blowing up a balloon. At first, it’s kind of tough to blow up, but as you blow it up a little bit more, it gets a little bit easier and a little bit easier. The challenge is to blow it up enough but not break it.”

Nearly a quarter of a century later, Abrahamsen’s health journey has led him to places and accomplishments he never could have imagined back in 2000. 

On April 15, after completing the Boston Marathon, Abrahamsen, 64, earned the prestigious “Six Star Finisher” medal given to runners who complete six Abbott World Marathon Majors’ races. 

“It means a lot,” said Abrahamsen, a network engineer for the Camas School District. “It means you’ve spent many years of your life trying to accomplish something that if you looked at it years ago, you would say, ‘That’s too big to accomplish.’ But by just taking it apart, day to day, week to week, month to month, step by step — even though I got turned down for certain races or didn’t get picked for the lottery — all of the things that go into it to try to get there, that’s what I appreciate.”

Introduced by the Abbott World Marathon Majors — a championship-style competition for marathon runners — in 2016, to honor the runners who complete the six major annual marathons in Boston, London, Tokyo, Berlin, Chicago and New York, the Six Star Finisher medal has been given to around 11,000 runners over the past eight years, including Abrahamsen’s wife, Satomi Sano, who earned her medal in 2023, after finishing the Tokyo Marathon.

“We didn’t even think about doing the Six Star until my wife ran in Boston (in 2018),” Abrahamsen said. “We’re standing around in the cold for my ‘spousal conciliatory’ 5-kilometer run, and we were talking with a lady, and she was talking about the ‘Abbott Wall.’ We were like, ‘What are you talking about? What is this thing?’ I could see the twinkle in my wife’s eye, and I thought, ‘Uh oh, here we go.’ She started to go on this journey, and I (followed) right behind her. She was the start of it. There was almost a palpable feeling of, ‘This is something I have to do.’”

Abrahamsen completed the Berlin and New York marathons in 2021; the London Marathon in 2022; and the Tokyo and Chicago marathons in 2023.

“It’s a combination of being really physically worn out and mentally giddy,” Abrahamsen said of marathon running. “Once you cross that line, you forget about any kind of pain you’ve had or any kind of problems you have. … To be able to set a goal, to be able to do the little steps and sometimes the big steps to get to that goal, and then once you finish that goal, the success you feel lasts a longer time than you would realize. That’s something you can’t take away. You’ll never be able to take away the fact that I finished that race.” 

Abrahamsen has lived in Camas his entire life, with the exception of an eight-year stint in Tokyo, where he and Sano were married. He began running in 2000, and after six months of training participated in his first 5-kilometer run. Several years later, at the age of 58, he ran his first marathon. 

Since then, Abrahamsen has completed five more marathons and numerous shorter races, and has run on behalf of a variety of charities, including Gold Ribbon Network, Northwest Parkinson’s Foundation and the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.

“I don’t feel like I’m 64,” said Abrahamsen, who now weighs 175 pounds. “I look at people the same age, and it’s almost like they’re a slave to their age. They’re like, ‘I’m retired now, I can sit and relax.’ To me, that’s almost the opposite of what I would want to do. Movement is key to life, I think. If I stayed at 235, what would I be like now? I don’t know. I feel pretty good. I don’t have some of the ailments other folks my age might have. I feel pretty good.”

Abrahamsen and Sano almost always run together, three times a week, and cover an average of 14 miles a week, sprinkling in longer runs when they’re training for a race.

“It’s become kind of a health journey as we get older, making sure that we’re taking care of ourselves,” said Abrahamsen, who was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2017, about 15 years after his wife was diagnosed with cervical cancer. 

“I can’t think of anything (better) when it comes to being married or part of a couple where you really spend a lot of time, just the two of you, doing something you both like to do, having a common subject that you’re spending that much time with. We have that,” he said. “I think one of the reasons we run together is we both have the same accomplishments, so there’s the ability to talk about a race afterward — things we saw, things we did, how we felt, good things, bad things. It’s a bonding experience.”

Abrahamsen and Chicago resident Lisa Le were selected to run the Boston Marathon on behalf of Health Imperatives, a nonprofit with a mission to improve the health and well-being of low-income and vulnerable families and individuals in Massachusetts.

“We are thrilled to have two incredible runners representing Health Imperatives at our first Boston Marathon,” Health Imperatives Chief Executive Officer Julia Kehoe stated in a news release. “We are inspired by Lisa and Gary’s dedication to their sport, and we are humbled by their passion for helping others, serving their communities, and raising awareness about our work.”

The news release stated that “Abrahamsen, who works in school administration and witnessed firsthand the impact of a widening wealth gap in his hometown, was drawn to Health Imperatives’ dedication to serving those who have fallen through the cracks of existing healthcare systems.”

Runners can qualify for marathons in one of several ways, according to Abrahamsen. The most straightforward method is posting a qualifying time in a race held on a certified course. Otherwise, runners can join a charitable organization’s racing team in exchange for a racing bib or hope their names are picked from a lottery. 

“I had five tickets to this year’s Boston Marathon, and none of those were picked,” Abrahamsen said. “I lost out on the lottery, I (wasn’t selected for a team), and it looked like no Boston for me. My wife said, ‘Well, why don’t you join the Boston Charity Facebook organization?’ They sometimes post for organizations that may have lost a runner to injury, or need another runner, or something last-minute.”

A little over one month before the Boston Marathon, Abrhamsen saw a post on the Facebook page and quickly sent his information in for consideration.

Abrahamsen committed to raising at least $7,500 for Health Imperatives in exchange for his racing bib. As of April 18, he had raised $7,403. He carried a list of the names of his donors, sealed in a plastic bag, in his right hand during the race. 

“My progress has been good, surprisingly,” he said. “Because I’ve worked in the school district for so many years, I know a lot of people. You don’t realize how much people know you and will step up, and it’s been very humbling to see the amount of people that have stepped up.”

Abrahamsen said that he “truly believes” in Health Imperatives’ mission.

“We’ve grown from a small town,” Abrahamsen said about Camas. “We’re generally thought of as a fairly well-off school district, but we forget about those who aren’t. We don’t have a lot of (students who qualify for) free and reduced lunch here. We’re pretty low when you compare Vancouver or Evergreen. (Health Imperatives is) in that same kind of boat where they’re helping those who have been sort of left behind economically, or from health care standards. Same thing that’s happened here — we forget about that wage gap. We just think of Camas as being this rich town, and it’s not fair to those who aren’t.”

To donate to Abrahamsen’s fundraising efforts, visit givengain.com/project/gary-raising-funds-for-health-imperatives-74289.