Cider Swig was a grab-and-glug affair this year
As a victim of COVID 19 and all its necessary personal safety contact restrictions, the Greater Gig Harbor Foundation’s Seventh Annual Cider Swig fund raiser had to shift plans from its usual site, Sehmel Park, where customarily as many as 5,000 people gather for festivities, music, tasting, fun, and cider. This year, the event was held Saturday at the LeMay Historical Auto Museum in Tacoma and, Sunday, at Gig Harbor’s Uptown Galaxy Theatre parking lot for drive by pickups of pre-ordered Cider Swig kits.
I learned to my dismay that you had to make your orders in advance. None of the kits were available on Sunday where I joined the activity. Sniff!
Making things happen Sunday were Julie Ann Gustanski, GGHF Co-Founder and Cider Swig Chair; Odette Alina, Director GGHF’s Curious by Nature School; Karen Larson, Development Director, EnviroCorps; Toni Gillespie, GGHF Parks & Environment Core Area Board member; Ariel Gustanski, COO and P&E CAB Member; Ken Endo, GGHF Treasurer; Rick Gillespie, GGHF Board Member and P&E CAB member; Rob Rigoni, Jr., GGHF VP and P&ECAB Member; and Lucy Rau, Volunteer. They were a jolly dedicated team.
Getting comments from kids for this story presented an insurmountable problem. The only kid to pass by was less than a year old and chose not to be quoted.
This endeavor supports, among a plethora of good causes, the GGHF sponsored Curious by Nature School on which Kids’ Corner has done a number of photo-supported stories in the past.
”The Cider Swig (a/k/a the Greater Peninsula Cider Festival) evolved out of an idea born in 2013 that tied our regional agricultural heritage to environmental education and efforts to protect and preserve our greater peninsula’s lands and waters,”noted Julie Ann Gustanski. “The overarching goal of the festival – to raise funds to support the Lu Winsor Memorial Environmental Grant program.
”Luther (Lu) Winsor was a retired U.S. Park Service Manager/Ranger appointed in 1996 by the Pierce County Council to serve on the Key Gig Harbor and the Islands (KGI) Watershed Planning Committee to help develop the KGI Watershed Plan.,” said Gustanski. “Lu served on the KGI Watershed Council until his passing in 2003. The grant program was started in his honor, as an offshoot of the Peninsula Light Company’s ‘Green By Choice’ program that same year. The program provided an opportunity for PenLight members to add green power to their fuel mix. In return, PenLight has provided $5,000 annually for the grant program.”
Odette Alina, Curious By Nature School’s Director, shared that “funds received through the Lu Winsor fund over the last several years have made it possible for us to continue providing engaging environmental education and opportunities for children and their families to connect with and care for nature – inspiring the next generation of environmental stewards in our KGI Watershed community and beyond.”
Pierce County, which supports the initiative, agreed to match PenLight’s contribution, which increased the grant program to $10,000 annually. In 2014, GGHF joined in supporting the annual grant program with proceeds from the Cider Swig that has helped to more than double the annual funds available through the program to about $25,000 each year. In 2015, GGHF agreed to provide a permanent home for the grant program.
When GGHF was asked to take over the fund and help in the allocation and distribution of grants, the Cider Swig became a vital element to these grant funds and increasing the fund opportunities for recipients. Over the past six years, the Cider Swig has helped to assure GGHF’s contribution of more than $77,500 in grants to area schools, nonprofit organizations, and local agencies involved in environmental education, on the ground conservation, and watershed enhancement programs. Among the past recipients are Key Peninsula Park District, YMCA Camp Seymour, Harbor WildWatch, Evergreen, Minter, and Vaughn Elementary Schools, Friends of Pierce County, Curious by Nature School, Pierce Conservation District, and many more.”
Christina Hallock, Key Pen Parks, advises, “these grant funds have enabled us to develop summer day camps for lower income students on the Key Peninsula, where they were able to learn about our local ecology and how to care for it.”
Since its inception, the largest recipient organizations of Lu Winsor grants have been Harbor WildWatch for its diverse youth-based education programs, such as Harbor Outreach, Get Your Feet Wet, and the Citizen Science Experience; and YMCA Camp Seymour, in coordination with area schools for its outdoor environmental education programs and camps.
”Postponed, canceled, or to-be-determined,” said Gustanski. “These are all descriptions we are used to regarding our favorite community festivals and events of 2020. Well, not today, folks! The Greater Gig Harbor Foundation found a way to continue the tradition of Cider Swig, knowing the importance of the festival’s proceeds going to so many community organizations and the hundreds of area youth whose lives are enriched each year through these programs.
”While 2020 has adjusted the platform of our normal Cider Swig, our community still has the opportunity to impact our children and the generations to come, by donating to the Lu Winsor Environmental Grant Fund: gghf.info/LuWinsor, or contact Ariel Gustanski, Chief Operating Officer at agustanski@gigharborfoundation.org or 253.514.6338.
You’ll being doing our kids - and seniors - a BIG service!
This story was originally published September 30, 2020 at 5:30 AM.