Apr 18, 2018

Seattle Housing Authority

Robert Crutchfield, Paul Purcell and Gerald Smiley were appointed to Seattle Housing Authority's board of commissioners. The board oversees policies, budget and the executive director, Andrew Lofton. Crutchfield is professor emeritus of sociology at the University of Washington. Purcell was president and founder of Beacon Development Group, where he oversaw development of nearly 5,000 affordable housing units. Smiley is an organizer at Laborers' Local 242, and serves on the board of a nonprofit that develops workforce housing. Each will serve for four years.

Visit Seattle

Visit Seattle partnered with WeChat, a Chinese instant messaging app, to launch CityExperience Mini Program for Chinese visitors to Seattle. The program is a guide to attractions, hotels and tours, in written and audible Mandarin. Last year, nearly 200,000 Chinese visitors stayed in Seattle. Visit Seattle is a nonprofit marketing organization.

Operation Warm

Operation Warm, a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit providing new coats to kids in need, has opened a one-person office in Seattle. The organization has done events in the Seattle area and recently launched a “volunteer brigade” to hand out jackets nationwide. More information is at http://www.operationwarm.org/volunteer.

First Financial Northwest

Renton-based First Financial Northwest opened its 10th branch at The Junction in Bothell. The address is 18505 Bothell Way N.E., Suite 104.

Apr 17, 2018

King County

Hannah

Tanya Hannah is chief information officer in King County's Department of Information Technology. Hannah joined the 450-person department in June 2017 as deputy director, and served as interim CIO since October. She was a senior manager at Amazon and Computer Sciences Corp.

City of Bainbridge Island

Drew

The city of Bainbridge Island hired KOMO news reporter Kristen Drew as communications coordinator. Drew starts next week.

Washington PTAC

Scroggs

Tiffany Scroggs is president of the Association of Procurement Technical Assistance Centers. Scroggs is program manager of Thurston Economic Development Council's Washington State Procurement Technical Assistance Center, which helps businesses that sell to federal, state and local governments. APTAC has 600 members from 94 centers.

City of Tacoma

The city of Tacoma has a new GeoHub GIS portal at geohub.cityoftacoma.org. The portal can be used to access all of the city's public GIS maps, applications and data. It replaces the govME portal that the city operated since 2000. A news release says the new portal is part of the city's effort to enhance transparency.