Once again, garbage trucks, a tow truck, a school bus, and a police car all collided to provide the children and families of Maple Valley a safe alternative to Trick or Treating.

This year marked our fifth Annual Trick-or-Trucks extravaganza at the Maple Valley Community Center. Even though we had to brave a few raindrops, it didn’t stop us from dressing up in our creative, scary and beautiful costumes.

Children collected candy from each truck and had the opportunity to climb in a wide variety of fun vehicles.

Of course this would not be possible without the generous participation from the businesses in our community as well as our new event sponsors.

This year we are pleased to welcome two new sponsors: Republic Services and Flynn Development. This beloved family tradition continues only from the valuable support from outstanding community supporter such as these two businesses.

Special thanks to Jim Flynn for bringing his backhoe loader for his fifth year and for handing out candy throughout the evening.

We would also like to thank Republic Services for joining our team this year and sending Jeff Wagner and Tike Dever to distribute candy as well. GMVCC would like to recognize and thank the following organizations and volunteers who made the evening so very special by giving out candy and allowing kids and parents alike to explore their big rigs: PJ Knowles of Maple Valley Fire & Life Safety for bringing the big red fire truck; Smith Brothers for donating chocolate milk; Dan Nicholas and the Maple Valley Historical Society for allowing the kids to sit in their beautiful antique fire truck; Lee Kessler and his very cool historic Kenworth truck; to Markus and Isaac Schuur from Girard Resources and the dump truck; to Officer Tanaguchi, Bailey and Joel Pricco from the Maple Valley Police who brought a police car and let us see the instruments and lights; to Joe Masterson for bringing the flat bed tow truck  from Motor Plex Pro-Tow; to Evonne Kruger (AKA  Evil Queen) for letting all of the little future Tahoma School District students explore a real school bus from the Transportation Department; to Mike Fingerson and Eric Griffin from Waste Management for showing the kids how a real garbage/recycle truck works; to Mike Sundstrom and Jennifer Maraschky from Cedar Grove Compost for bringing a dump truck filled with donated bags of compost for all of the community; Phil Wills and Madison White of  Wills Dozer Service Inc. for allowing us to check out the huge equipment; to David, Becky and Kiley Zarzosa from Fajita Z’s for cooking up delicious dinners for everyone; to One.7 for providing a street sweeper; to Doug Madsen, Nichole McVicar, and Kiara Phillipy from The Spot Coffee and Wine for attending for the first time; Ellen Dagley for representing the SRS Transportation bus; to Jim Dagley for his excellent work  photographing the event; and finally, the following generous volunteers from St. George Episcopal Church who served snacks and drinks and helped all of the damp kids have fun in the hall,: Lois Smith and Margarete Schede for organizing volunteers, Sharon Turner, Margie Marcus, Siegi Schede, Nona Azizeh, Linda Beardsleey, Mary Joan Lapp-Broderick, and Mortessa Azizeh.

This event is provided by GMVCC Children & Family Programs and all proceeds go to support children’s programming at the Community Center.

In expressing our thanks, Brandy Rowland and Cindy Pettigrew noted that GMVCC is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization and it is volunteers who make it possible for the small staff of the Community Center to offer the wide variety of programs and services it does. We deeply appreciate the efforts of the many community volunteers.

The Maple Valley Community Center is celebrating 36 years of offering drop-in programming as well as special events and activities for children & families, 50+ seniors and teens.

To learn more about your Community Center and how you can volunteer, visit www.maplevalleycc.org or call 425-432-1272.