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Summer Fund Drive

The Trump Administration has sent Congress a rescissions package that would claw back already-approved funding for public media, including KBCS. A vote could happen any day. These cuts would leave KBCS with a 10% gap in its budget. Our Summer Fund Drive starts next week, but you can help safeguard your favorite KBCS programs today. Please, donate now and thank you in advance.

$75,000 Goal

24.49%

Drive ends: June 30, 2025

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World Water Day: The One Minute Challenge

It’s the United Nations founded World Water Day today, March 22, 2022. 

Here’s a prompt for you to submit your own one-minute groundwater story.  Five story submissions will be picked to present to the United Nations.

Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women – A Series of Six Stories

A report released by the Urban Indian Health Institute in 2018 shows that over 500 cases of missing or murdered indigenous women have been found throughout the United States – many since the year 2000. 70 women had gone missing or were murdered in Seattle and Tacoma. 6 were reported in Portland. How are indigenous families impacted by this and how are our communities coming together to help? (more…)

Honoring the Nikkei Farmers of Bellevue

 
Prior to World War II, Bellevue, Washington was home to a powerful and vibrant Japanese American community.  In 1942 the United States government forcibly evacuated and incarcerated sixty Japanese American farming families from Bellevue.  They were among 120,000 Japanese Americans who were sent to incarceration camps from along the west coast.  
 
After the war, only a handful of these families returned to Bellevue because many of them lost their land and work here. 
 
Local artist, Michelle Kumata and creative director, Tani Ikeda, honor this community with an art display at Bellevue Arts Museum.  It’s titled ‘Emerging Radiance: Honoring the Nikkei Farmers of Bellevue.  
 
Kumata also has a solo exhibit titled Regeneration at Bonfire Gallery in Seattle’s Chinatown International District through April 7th
 
 
 
 
Audio Story Producer: Yuko Kodama
 
Photo: Courtesy of Michelle Kumata Taken by John Lok
 

Artist, Lauren Iida

 
Lauren Iida is an artist who works with cut paper and paint.  Iida is artist-in-residence with Densho Project.  She recently completed an art installation for Densho Project’s community space.   The piece was created in commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the day Franklin D. Roosevelt signed  Executive Order 9066.  This order authorized the US military to forcibly remove and incarcerate 120,000 people of Japanese descent in relocation centers across the United States in during WWII. 
 
Listen in on excerpts of an interview with Lauren Iida.
 
 
Producer: Yuko Kodama
 
Photo: courtesy of Lauren Iida
 
 

Remember and Resist – Day of Remembrance

 
On February 19th, a number of Japanese American organizations and La Resistencia partnered to observe the 80th anniversary of Executive Order 9066, signed by President Franklin Roosevelt.  This act authorized the US military to forcibly remove and  incarcerate 120,000 people of Japanese descent across the west coast in 1942. 
 
The action started at the Puyallup Fairgrounds. Most Japanese Americans in the Seattle area were detained at the Puyallup Assembly Center before their transfer to concentration camps at Minidoka, in Idaho and Tule Lake, in California. Formerly incarcerated Japanese American elders attended alongside their families and the public.   Then the group gathered at the ICE Northwest detention facility in Tacoma to raise their voices in support of the detainees inside. 
 
 Listen in on some of the speakers and sounds from the event.
 
Producers: Kasumi Yamashita and Yuko Kodama
 
Photo: Pictured are Kennedy Philbrick (left) and Erin Matsuno (right). Photo taken by Kasumi Yamashita
 

ICE and Detention

Antonio Guerrero, whose name is changed to protect their identity,  describes what it was like to be picked up by ICE and to live and work for roughly a dollar a day at the US ICE detention center in Tacoma.

Producer: Yuko Kodama

Photo: University of Washington

 

Day of Remembrance Remember and Resist Event 2/19/22

Saturday, February 19, 10:00 am–1:00 pm
At 10 am, meet at the Puyallup Fairgrounds (Blue Lot Parking, 311 10th Ave SE, Puyallup, WA 98372).
At 11 am, we will move to the Northwest Detention Center (1623 E J Street, Tacoma WA 98421) for a continuation of the program starting at 12 pm.


Weather permitting, there will be some outdoor programming. Masks and social distancing required.

February 19, 2022, will mark 80 years since the signing of Executive Order 9066, which authorized the forced removal and mass incarceration of all Japanese Americans on the West Coast and beyond. Most Japanese Americans in the Seattle area spent their first few months in detention at the Puyallup Fairgrounds (“Camp Harmony”) until their transfer to the concentration camps at Minidoka, ID, and Tule Lake, CA. The trauma of family separation, child imprisonment, poor sanitation, bad food, inadequate health care, and uncertain futures persists—and continues today at the Northwest Detention Center (NWDC) in Tacoma.
Gathering in the same location where barracks once housed incarcerees, survivors, their families, and community members will share the history of Camp Harmony and personal experiences there, before rallying at NWDC to remember and resist the injustices of the past and present. The program will also include a live taiko drumming performance by Fuji Taiko and a special ceremony to remember Japanese American concentration camps and incarcerates.
For RSVP or information: info@seattlejacl.org


Notes: Dress warmly. There will be one porta-potty facility available on the Puyallup site. Feel free to
bring signs, tsuru and noisemakers for the Tacoma portion of the program!

Who Helped When We Were Incarcerated

On Feb 19, 1942 Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed an Executive Order authorizing the involuntary evacuation of Japanese American people from the West Coast to relocation centers throughout the country. As a result, most of the US Japanese and Japanese American population, 120,000 people, were forcibly incarcerated.
 
Paul Tomita was sent to Minidoka Relocation Center in Idaho with his family when he was a toddler. Today he advocates against the current detention of immigrants. He starts this story by describing his participation in an action at Fort Sill army post where child detainees were proposed to be held by ICE in 2019.

Producer: Gol Holghooghi and Yuko Kodama

Photo: Paul Tomita

(Audio story to be posted soon!)

 

Day of Remembrance Remember and Resist Event 2/19/22

Saturday, February 19, 10:00 am–1:00 pm
At 10 am, meet at the Puyallup Fairgrounds (Blue Lot Parking, 311 10th Ave SE, Puyallup, WA 98372).
At 11 am, we will move to the Northwest Detention Center (1623 E J Street, Tacoma WA 98421) for a continuation of the program starting at 12 pm.


Weather permitting, there will be some outdoor programming. Masks and social distancing required.

February 19, 2022, will mark 80 years since the signing of Executive Order 9066, which authorized the forced removal and mass incarceration of all Japanese Americans on the West Coast and beyond. Most Japanese Americans in the Seattle area spent their first few months in detention at the Puyallup Fairgrounds (“Camp Harmony”) until their transfer to the concentration camps at Minidoka, ID, and Tule Lake, CA. The trauma of family separation, child imprisonment, poor sanitation, bad food, inadequate health care, and uncertain futures persists—and continues today at the Northwest Detention Center (NWDC) in Tacoma.
Gathering in the same location where barracks once housed incarcerees, survivors, their families, and community members will share the history of Camp Harmony and personal experiences there, before rallying at NWDC to remember and resist the injustices of the past and present. The program will also include a live taiko drumming performance by Fuji Taiko and a special ceremony to remember Japanese American concentration camps and incarcerates.
For RSVP or information: info@seattlejacl.org


Notes: Dress warmly. There will be one porta-potty facility available on the Puyallup site. Feel free to
bring signs, tsuru and noisemakers for the Tacoma portion of the program!

Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year celebrations kicked off on Tuesday.  The season is marked with celebrations involving food,  feasts with loved ones, firecrackers and lion and dragon dances.  KBCS brings you some tape from lion dance trainings in Renton and an interview about the dances and rituals of this season with Dr. Connie So.  Dr. So is a Teaching Professor at the American Ethnic Studies Department at the University of Washington, Seattle and President of OCA Asian Pacific Advocates of Greater Seattle.

Lunar New Year Events 2022:

Lincoln District Lunar New Year Celebration Feb 5 10 am to 3 pm Lincoln District, Tacoma

Lantern Festival Shoreline Feb 12 starts at 4 pm Morka Brewing & Uplift Climbing 17211 15th Ave NE, Shoreline, WA

Tet in Seattle Feb 12-13 noon to 6 pm Seattle Center

Asia Cultural Center Annual New Year Celebration Feb 19 11am to 6 pm Sharon McGavick Center, Clover Park Technical College, 4500 Steilacom Blvd SW, Lakewood, WA

Ongoing School Lunar New Year Tours and New Year Exhibit at the Wing Luke Museum of the Asian American Experience

 

 

Sankofa Impact – Jimmie Lee Jackson and the Fight for the Right to Vote

(This story originally aired in February of 2020.)

During the 1960’s, Jimmie Lee Jackson tried registering to vote multiple times without success in Marion Alabama.  These experiences activated him to take up the cause for the right to vote.  His efforts, and finally his murder, led to a march which resulted in Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama during 1965.

(more…)

Environmental Medicine

Dr. David Buscher is a Medical Doctor in Environmental Science; the study of the interactions between the environment and human health.  He describes his experiences working with patients alongside Dr. Theron Randolph, the father of Environmental Medicine.

Producer: Yuko Kodama