It was the first community meeting for Interim Superintendent Brian Lowney. The first noticeable difference, after 23 years with Tom Seigel, was humor. He had the room laughing several times in the first few minutes. The meeting is called Faith Leaders. It began almost 30 years ago with the Bethel Superintendent and leaders of local churches. An early product was the Core Qualities program.

Now, in 2024, the Bethel Learning Center had a room lined with tables hosting almost 60 school social workers, local pastors, school counselors, McKinney Vento specialists, Tacoma Rescue Mission, Family Promise of Pierce County, Kiwanis, Habitat for Humanity, Safe Streets, and more.

Everyone agreed, the community has considerable need. The Bethel District qualifies for, and provides, students with free breakfast and lunch across the board. A feature of today’s presentation was Power Packs that local organizations prepare for kids to take home so they can eat in the evenings and weekends. Randy from Parkway Community Services serves 19 schools with 100 packs a week. Stephanie from Harvest House serves 10 schools with 350 packs a week. Three other schools are served by High Pointe Church.

The Bethel School District covers 200 square miles, much of it is inside the urban growth area and it is growing like crazy. This year’s newly built apartment units alone could bring an additional 2 school worth of students into the district. Yet, the area does not have sufficient employment to support all the new housing and many of the local businesses hire at wages much lower than the markets in Tacoma and Seattle. Much of the local employment is the school district itself.

Currently Bethel has 19 elementary schools, 6 middle schools, 4 high schools, two academies, and the Skills Center which is shared across the county, but sited in the district and the budget is managed by the district.

The theme for this morning’s meeting was optimism. That is the faith that in spite of all the issues 21,000 Bethel children and their families present, the people in the community will rise to the occasion. Stepping up and showing up is key. It begins with the ones who showed up today and the projects they represent.

If you are interested in helping out, please contact a local school and volunteer or look on the top of the page on the PPP banner where it says “ORGS” that page give names of local community service groups and their contact information.

Family Promise of Pierce County provides daily counts of people who contact them regarding homelessness to people on their board and significant leaders. Today there are 56 families on the waitlist and 116 children unhoused. Please step up if you can.