Dec 08, 2023

Spectrum Effect

Mangat

Kirkland-based Spectrum Effect announced that Boulder Ventures has invested in the company, and that Kishen Mangat has been appointed to its board. Mangat is general partner at Boulder Ventures, where he leads the firm's enterprise 5G investment strategy. Mangat previously served as Cisco Systems' vice president/general manager for mobility, and co-founded multiple startups, including BroadHop. Charles Immendorf is Spectrum Effect's CEO. Spectrum Effect created Spectrum-NET, which analyzes and mitigates radio frequency interference using machine learning.

Northwest Seaport Alliance

Bellerud

The Northwest Seaport Alliance named Jeff Bellerud chief operating officer. In this role, Bellerud will oversee marine operations including rail, road, terminals, breakbulk operations and management of the waterway. With strategic level experience in terminal operations and Class 1 railroads, Bellerud's career spans the West Coast from Los Angeles to Vancouver, B.C. Most recently, he was director of intermodal and port operations at CN Rail, where he led port operations, including 14 marine terminals across seven port authorities in North America. Bellerud holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Nevada Las Vegas and an MBA from the University of Northern British Columbia. The Northwest Seaport Alliance is a marine cargo operating partnership of the ports of Seattle and Tacoma.

AM 770 KTTH

Benson

Seattle's AM 770 KTTH is adding FOX News Radio's “The Guy Benson Show” from noon to 3 p.m. as part of a revamped lineup starting Jan. 1. Benson is the political editor of Townhall.com and a FOX News contributor. He joined the network in 2013, providing political commentary across FOX News Channel and FOX Business Network's daytime and primetime programming. Benson has served as a media fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution and a visiting fellow at Harvard University's Institute of Politics. As part of the lineup shuffle, KTTH also is adding FOX News Radio's “FOX Across America with Jimmy Failla” to weekday overnights from midnight to 3 a.m. The radio station is operated by Bonneville International Corp., an integrated media and marketing company headquartered in Salt Lake City. Founded in 1964, Bonneville operates radio and TV stations, local websites, podcasts and other digital distribution assets in six western U.S. markets.

Dec 07, 2023

Home First

Pray

Justus

After nearly 15 years and close to 1,500 new homes built, affordable housing advocate and developer Rob Justus is stepping away from Home First, the affordable housing company he co-founded in 2009 with retired Portland General Electric executive Dave Carboneau. His last day with the company will be Dec. 31, 2023. A 1987 graduate of the University of Portland, Justus got his first experience working with Portland's homeless population as a volunteer in the St. Francis Dining Hall in Southeast Portland. In 1992, he started a service organization called JOIN. To date, Home First and its development partners have built 1,425 units of affordable housing with a development cost of more than $381 million. Most units are in the Portland metro region, but Home First has also developed affordable housing in places like St. Helens, Hines, Ontario, Salem, Tillamook and Vancouver, Washington. At present, Home First has another 530 units of affordable housing under construction and 359 more in the pipeline. Justus will continue to serve as a member of Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek's Housing Production Advisory Council. Ben Pray, a co-owner of the company who joined in 2015, will assume leadership. Home First partners with public and private investors to help make sure affordable housing is available and accessible across the Northwest.

Ben B. Cheney Foundation

Henry Cheney

Brad Cheney

Tucci

The Ben B. Cheney Foundation has appointed Erika Tucci as executive director. She will succeed Brad Cheney, who is retiring from the role at the end of December after spending more than 20 years leading the foundation. Cheney will remain as the foundation board chair. The Ben B. Cheney Foundation makes grants in Washington, Oregon and Northern California communities where the family's lumber mills operated. Since 1975, the foundation has awarded more than 6,000 grants to over 1,500 organizations. Tucci has served as senior program officer for the foundation since 2019, and she will be the first female to lead the nonprofit. She is active on several nonprofit boards and committees, including chairing the governor's Serve Washington Commission. During the pandemic, Tucci's ties to the nonprofit sector led her to initiate the Pierce County Daily Report. The effort provided coordinated human services information to policymakers, nonprofit leaders and funders making critical intervention decisions. Tucci previously led community affairs at Tacoma Public Utilities, where she instituted a leadership program encouraging volunteerism and service. Cheney, the son of the foundation's founder, will continue to provide leadership on the foundation board and on other local boards and committees, including the Boys & Girls Club of South Puget Sound and the Baseball Club of Tacoma. The board now includes three third-generation family members, and Cheney's son Henry Cheney will join the board in December. Henry Cheney played and coached baseball for the University of Portland while getting his undergraduate degree and then a master's in nonprofit management. He is the assistant athletic director at Charles Wright Academy in Tacoma.

Dec 06, 2023

Thurston Chamber Foundation

Slaughter

The Thurston Chamber Foundation has named Schelli Slaughter as its new director. In the role, Slaughter will expand the foundation's impact and community engagement within Thurston County. Slaughter previously served as the director of the Family Support Center of South Sound for 13 years. Before that, she worked as the Thurston County public health director. For the last two years, Slaughter has contributed to health initiatives at Providence-Swedish and Choice Regional Health Network. Slaughter has a master's degree in health administration from the University of Washington and a bachelor's degree from the Evergreen State College.

Origami Solar

Origami Solar, a developer of sustainable and domestically produced steel solar module frames, appointed Lauren Busby Ahsler as vice president of engineering. Busby Ahsler brings over 15 years of experience leading mechanical and structural engineering teams and developing solar products. In her new role, she will head Origami Solar's engineering and testing team, driving innovations in extending the structural performance of Origami's steel module frame technology to support future market needs. Previously, Busby Ahsler served as director of structural engineering at Valmont Solar. She has a track record of building high-performing engineering teams, developing design and testing methodologies for novel product types, optimizing product designs for extreme environmental demands, and delivering differentiated solar products to the global solar market. In 2022, Origami Solar was awarded the grand prize in the U.S. Department of Energy's American-Made Solar Prize competition. The company is based in Bend, Oregon.

Idaho National Laboratories

The U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory, along with Idaho National Laboratory (INL), was chosen by the DOE for a demonstration project to validate a long-duration energy storage system developed by battery manufacturer CMBlu Energy. The collaborative project aims to improve microgrids in cold climates and make fast charging of electric vehicles more affordable in underserved communities. Over the course of the project, Argonne and INL will deploy and evaluate CMBlu Energy's Organic SolidFlow battery technology. The materials used in the construction of these batteries are non-metallic and abundant, with a goal to build resilient and domestic supply chains. The batteries are targeted for community, industrial and utility-scale applications of medium and long duration. The project also seeks to make fast charging of electric vehicles more affordable in rural and underserved communities by reducing charging facility installation and operational costs. The project will span two regions. In the Midwest, Argonne researchers plan to demonstrate the effectiveness of CMBlu's Organic SolidFlow batteries at the lab's Smart Energy Plaza. At the INL Battery Test Center in Idaho, researchers will conduct performance tests, including assessing how well the Organic SolidFlow batteries perform at different temperatures. This testing is crucial to ensure the technology's reliability in diverse environments. The INL center serves as the DOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy's (EERE) primary center for battery life and performance testing.