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closeBill Sehmel seeks re-election to PenMet Parks board seat
Goals include getting city to join department, acquire more property
Nate Hulings
of the Gateway
Bill Sehmel, the current president of the Peninsula Metropolitan Parks Board of Commissioners, is running unopposed this fall.
Sehmel has been with PenMet Parks since its inception five years ago and has a family history with the area that dates back to the late 1800s.
Sehmel’s great-grandfather homesteaded in Rosedale in 1884 on the current site of the Sehmel-Homestead Park, which is set to open partially this fall.
The additions of a YMCA and the nearly complete Boys & Girls Club have helped refine the park department’s goals and mission, Sehmel said.
“I look at our main goal and vision to provide open space and recreational space,” Sehmel said.
The young district still has some growing pains, but it’s getting better, Sehmel said.
“I think the district is working pretty good,” he said. “We’re new. We’re, in some cases, still getting out feet wet. There are niches in the community that we can fill that we haven’t yet.”
Sehmel’s decision to run for another term came down to finishing what he started.
“I ran because there was a lot of things we started that haven’t been completed yet,” Sehmel said. “I thought it is right to finish what we started.”
Included in that list of ongoing projects includes the completion of Sehmel-Homestead Park, a 96-acre property complete with football and baseball fields, and also tying up loose ends with the Pierce County Tacoma Narrows Airport.
Sehmel said he’s also in negotiations to acquire more property for the department.
Sehmel has lived in the Gig Harbor area his entire life and said he’s been a park advocate since the early 1990s. He was involved in the Peninsula Parks and Recreation Department, the precursor to PenMet Parks.
Sehmal also is advocating that the City of Gig Harbor join PenMet Parks. The change would be a “benefit to all citizens,” he said.
He added that the consolidation would increase services and the tax base to provide more funding.
“My main thing is, we all live here,” Sehmel said. “The children ... that live in the city will be using the facilities. We (PenMet) have a good stream of money strictly for parks and recreational uses that we can dedicate to projects — especially when the city is short of funds.”
Sehmel is a “semi-retired” plumber who also has been a carpenter, commercial fisherman and working in real estate. He has three children and one grandchild. His hobbies include vegetable gardening and reading.