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Donor Stories

Connie Dunnington

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Connie Dunnington

When her husband Bob died in a motorcycle accident sixteen years ago, Connie Dunnington understood that life as she knew it had changed.

The couple, married 13 years, were parents of two daughters, then 12 and 10.

Connie knew she needed to redefine her family’s life, creating some new traditions while preserving others. So she resumed an old love – horseback riding, sold the building that had housed Bob’s orthodontic practice and built an arena, and introduced her children to the Stirrups and Irons 4-H group, the same club she’d belonged to as a child. She went on to become the club leader, a position she still holds.

She also embraced one of Bob’s traditions – and made it her own. A dedicated community volunteer, he’d signed on early as a member of the board of The Foundation at KVH, a non-profit that works to improve community health care.

Two years after Bob’s death, Connie got a call. Bob’s seat on the board was still vacant, the caller said. Would she be interested in filling it? The answer was yes.

It was a way of continuing his legacy and adding to her own. The board was trying to raise $1 million for an endowment fund but some were questioning whether the effort should continue. She knew Bob had been determined to reach the goal.

“Being on the board maintained some continuation, some kind of a sense of tradition,” she says, noting that she and Bob both served terms as president. And after all, she was no stranger to the nuts and bolts of board service. She’d been there helping Bob from the beginning.

“Back in the early days there was no hired director. The board basically worked out of the trunks of their cars,” says Connie, who recalls putting together the organization’s annual mailing on her kitchen table while her children napped.

Eventually the hospital helped the foundation hire a director. “At that point everything changed,” she says. “Everything got easier. We reached the goal. We came up with a plan for how to use the income off the million dollars.”

Since 2005, The Foundation has donated over $1.5 million to KVH, including income from the endowment along with other fundraising, to support a variety of projects. Currently, the foundation is running a campaign to help fund the purchase of the first digital mammography machine at KVH.

Foundation director Michele Wurl calls Connie an enthusiastic volunteer who helps with “virtually every foundation activity.” That includes helping organize the annual Magical Evening, the foundation’s primary fundraising activity as well as leading the annual Tough Enough to Wear Pink campaign during the rodeo. Last year, proceeds funded a free mammogram day.

“We sell beads, t-shirt, bandannas, anything that isn’t tied down. One year we sold a pink bucket because someone wanted it,” Connie says, laughing.

Her laughter – warm and engaging  – is also energizing. That’s classic Connie, Wurl says. “She’s always willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done. She’s smart, funny and truly dedicated to improving health care in this community.”

That the foundation has been as effective as it has been is no accident, says Connie who lauds the relationship between the foundation and KVH administration. “You have to have a good relationship and work together,” she says. “In the past, it wasn’t always that close.”

What makes her proudest she says is “just to hear the positive attitudes of people working here. Every time this hospital gets named in the Top 100 you know people are doing things right.”

How long will she remain on the board? Connie, now 60, flashes a smile. “It’s the same thing I say about 4-H,” she says. “I will do it until I don’t enjoy it – and right now, I enjoy it.”

Jim & Pam Daly

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Jim & Pam Daly

Jim and Pam Daly know a good investment when they see one.

Case in point: Kittitas Valley Healthcare (KVH), where they’ve been investing time, talent and money for years.

Blame selfishness. They do.

Unabashed Cougar fans, the Dalys’ road to Ellensburg began at WSU. She was 19 and majoring in elementary education when they met; he, 20, and a marketing major. They married 45 years ago this coming September, just before the start of their senior year. Jim landed a banking job in Enterprise, OR, after graduation, then moved on to a job with Pacific Bank in Ellensburg in 1975. They considered it just a stop along his career path until an unexpectedly early promotion to bank manager changed their plans.

Over time, they found plenty of reasons to turn to KVH. There was the night their son Curt landed in the hospital Emergency Department with croup, the C-section Pam had when their daughter Megan was born, the nine arthroscopic surgeries, two knee replacements and shoulder surgery that are part of Jim’s medical history. In the early 1980s, Pam began volunteering with KVH. In 1986, she signed on as a regular volunteer with the hospital’s Imaging Department. That same year, then serving as president of the KVH Auxiliary, she was one of eleven founding members of The Foundation at KVH.

Nearly three decades later, the Dalys decline to specify exactly how much they’ve contributed to the foundation. Suffice it to say, they’re major donors. Pam, now auxiliary treasurer, continues to volunteer in Imaging. Jim, who left banking to become an investment counselor and stockbroker, has served 20-plus years as a member of the foundation board, his expertise instrumental in guiding the foundation’s conservative and successful investment approach.

Supporting KVH is a no-brainer, the Dalys say. The seed for their involvement was planted in the soil of pragmatic self-interest.

“We did it for selfish reasons,” Jim insists. “When you have children you know there are going to be times when they’re going to need medical care and you want them to have good medical care. Our philosophy has always been that we wanted a good place for our family to turn to – and we knew as we got older we’d need a good place, too. It’s putting our money where our mouth is.”

Good investments pay good dividends.The Dalys are pleased with the return they’ve seen on both their time and money.

In the past five years alone, the foundation has raised more than $1.1 million through special events, major and estate gifts, an annual donation appeal and investment earning. In recent years that money has helped fund a new entrance to the Emergency Department, a security system for the Family Birthing Center, state-of-the-art orthopedic surgical equipment and renovation of the Medical Surgical Unit. The auxiliary, which operates the hospital gift shop, helps in various ways, from awarding scholarships to students studying medicine to providing teddy bears for the Emergency Department to knitting caps for newborns to providing flat screen TVs for patient rooms after the hospital was remodeled.

“We’ve seen some really great things happen that we’ve been able to be part of,” Pam says. Jim says he’s “proud of the quality of care and the people who give it – and I’m not just talking doctors. The whole staff really cares about you.”

While there are many good causes, Pam prefers to give locally which makes KVH a slam-dunk. “We believe in this hospital and its focus on community,” she says.

Jim nods agreement, smiling broadly. “Giving back,” he says, “is what we do.”

Jim Pappas

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Jim Pappas

From minor injuries to the most painful day of his life, retired Central Washington University administrator and professor Jim Pappas has relied on KVH Hospital for quality care and outstanding compassion.

He’s seen both up close and personal. Case in point: what happened when Pappas’s wife Denise fell critically ill.

The love of his life and the heart of her family, Denise was also afraid of doctors – so fearful that for several years she ignored symptoms of potential heart problems, repeatedly refusing pleas from her family to see a doctor.

Flash back to May 19, 2006. Unable to shake persistent shoulder and back pain that eventually spread to her chest and legs, and with her husband begging her to go to the hospital, Denise refused — right up until 11:30 p.m. when Pappas called 911. “I know now,” he says, “that she was dying before my eyes.”

Paramedics put her in the medic unit. Alarmed when he saw them struggling to get a heartbeat, Pappas walked circles in the front yard until the ambulance pulled away, then drove himself to KVH. Relief mingled with fear, he says. “I was so scared. But I thought she would finally get the help she needed.”

At the hospital, Pappas sat beside his unresponsive wife, holding her hand and talking to her as medical staff tried to restart her heart with defibrillation multiple times. The effort failed. “They did everything they could. They were just outstanding but Denise passed away in ER,” he says.

She was 67. They had been married 42 years. Stunned and numb with grief on what he calls “the worst day of my life,” Pappas sat beside her waiting for family to arrive, a nurse and doctor at his side until a pastor came in. “They didn’t leave me alone,” he says.

It’s not the only time Pappas has witnessed a level of care – and caring – that he finds unforgettable.

When a longtime friend dying of cancer was hospitalized, Pappas was a regular visitor – so regular, he says with a smile, that some staff assumed he was a son.  The 97-year-old patient and his 94-year-old wife had been married 73 years. “What I saw was that everybody who came in, the guys as well as the gals, took time to talk to her,” says Pappas who at 77 is a walking testimonial to a hospital he believes in.

There’s good reason. Since arriving in Ellensburg from Chicago in 1980, he’s turned to KVH for care on multiple occasions. There was treatment for diverticulitis, emergency room visits for a fish hook that got stuck in his hand and a nosebleed that wouldn’t stop, treatment for a stomach ulcer and bacterial infection, endoscopies, colonoscopies, MRIs and X-rays, rotator cuff surgery and surgeries on his fingers and both knees.

“Dr. Dan Hiersche (an orthopedic specialist) repaired me so many times,” says Pappas who lauds a host of other providers. Among them: his longtime primary care physician Dr. Don Solberg whom he calls “cerebral and a straightforward professional with good bedside manners.”

Nurses consistently have been “absolutely professional and caring, showing interest in me, explaining what they were doing but most importantly answering my questions,” he adds.

While some people may think they’ll find better care at a bigger hospital, Pappas says, he’s found everything he’s needed in a comforting high quality setting close to home. “This hospital has served me well,” he says. “They identify what the problem is, address it, operate if they need to and you get it fixed. I’ve been very pleased.”