Happy members of the Blue Lake Union Elementary School receive two checks from the Blue Lake Rancheria, one to the after school program for $10,000 and the other to the school system itself for $160,000. From left are Patti Ohman, After School Program coordinator; Kathy Miller, school board member; Dorothy McKinnon and Diane Holliday of the Blue Lake Rancheria Business Committee Council; Eric Ramos, president of Blue Lake Casino; Claudia Brundin, Rancheria Business Committee chairwoman; and Dennis Potter, school board member. Inset: Bill Rossig. Photo by Scott Stoddard

Blue Lake Rancheria has been busy the past few years. Since the opening of the Blue Lake Casino, which employs more than 300 people, the tribe has been able to contribute more time, money and services to the community.

In 2004 and 2005, the tribe donated more than $400,000 to local organizations, including funding for two full-time Sheriff's deputies, to Blue Lake School, and thousands of dollars in scholarships to local college students and sporting teams.

In 2001, the tribe created the Blue Lake Rancheria Transit System, which is now a five-day-a-week, 13-hour-a-day, city-to-city bus service. This bus system has helped reduce the gaps in the Humboldt County transportation system. The Blue Lake Rancheria Dial-a-Ride provides transportation to and from the Mad River Adult Day Health Care program daily, as well as low-cost rides to physical therapy, hospitals and doctor appointments.

In 1988, the Rancheria created the Elder Nutrition Program. The hardworking staff and volunteers began cooking lunches five days a week for the elders of the Rancheria and surrounding area. A caregiver program was added in 2001. Funding for both came from Administration on Aging grants and donations.

At least 35,000 meals annually are distributed to both American Indian elders and non-native seniors. In 2001 the Rancheria received a national award for excellence.

This year the Rancheria has begun sponsoring the new St. Vincent De Paul dinner program in Old Town Eureka, paying the cost of the dinners and a security guard.

In addition, the Blue Lake Rancheria has a beading and jewelry-making class offered several times a month in the Sylvia Daniels Memorial Library.

The Rancheria programs would not be a success without the volunteers who have helped us along the way. This year our Exceptional Volunteer award winner is Bill Rossig, born Nov. 11, 1916, in Bucksport (Eureka) near the Wiyot Reservation. He is a full-blooded Wiyot Indian and a member of the Wiyot Tribe. Bill has lived in the Eureka area all his life.

Bill has been a volunteer for the nutrition program for more than 11 years. He packages at least 220 meals a week, totalling tens of thousands. While undergoing cancer treatments in 2004, he continued to come in to the Rancheria kitchen and help package frozen meals every week. He did not slow his busy schedule throughout the entire ordeal.

Bill has served on the Wiyot Tribal Council for five years and sits on two United Indian Health Services boards. He also tends the lawn at Moose Lodge in Cutten and volunteers to cook, set up or clean up at the Humboldt Grange dinners. He has helped build two houses on the Table Bluff Reservation and set up the children's playground. He is Santa for the Wiyot Tribe's youth Christmas program every year and started his own wood program. He acquires scrap wood from different vendors and delivers it to Indian elders on the Wiyot Reservation.