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Long-form interviews and conversations from Mason County, Washington. Host Jeff Slakey sits down with local leaders, legislators, small business owners, and community voices for unhurried conversations about what's shaping the Hood Canal region — government, education, healthcare, the outdoors, and the people making a difference.
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Well, as you can see, spooky season is upon us, and once again it's time for the sixth annual Mason Health Trunk or Treat. It is a fun event where folks park over at OMS and then they walk over to the hospital grounds and they stop by and visit the different departments and different booths and vendors and for-profit, non-profit, all sorts of folks are involved with this. Once again, Chala Gray from WellPoint.
WellPoint, a big sponsor of this event as well. Jen, we've talked about this for years as a great way coming out of COVID for a chance for kids to have a little bit more of the trick-or-treat fun, and every year the different departments just get bigger and better, and now you've really brought in more of the community in this. Tell us a little bit more.
Well, this is such a great event. It's WellPoint has been such a wonderful partner. Chala and her team, they just put their heart and soul into it, and she has her own theme, The Minions.
Yes. So every year we reserve that for her, and we just have so much great involvement from the community, from my team here in the development office, from great people like Jeff Slakey and all the community businesses in our own departments that really put a lot of their creativity in it, and I'll just share some of the themes this year. So the team in the development office are going to be the Disney Princesses.
We've got One in a Million Despicable Me from WellPoint. We've got Hood Canal Communications doing the Duck Duck Boo, so I'm sure there'll be some cool games going on with that. Out of This World Outer Space from the Credit Union.
Of course, we've got the Ecto360 Foundation back again this year. Ghostbusters, always a fan favorite. The Birth Center is doing Spongebob and Friends.
We've got the Gutbengers Assemble from our dieticians who will be doing healthy treats, and then we've also got Mason Transit is doing the See You on the Bus, so we're just pretty excited to have so much variety. It's going to be awesome. We can't wait.
Chala, why does WellPoint continue to support programs like this? Yeah, so we at WellPoint love to engage with our communities, and this gives us the perfect platform to get out there and engage with our communities. What are some of the other things that are going to be happening when it comes to health awareness as we move into kind of the colder months, a lot more things happening? Well, we are going to be offering flu shots, so we're trying to protect the community related to that as well, and it really comes as a great time for all of us here at Mason Health and the community, because as you all may have heard, we have a new Highfield Open MRI that's going to be coming in service in early 2026. We've expanded the eye services, so we had a ribbon cutting for that.
We just have a lot of cool things going on here at Mason Health, and you know with the sponsorship for over $50,000 in total from WellPoint, it really helps us to drive those kind of improvements for the health and wellness of our patients and communities home, so thank you, Chala. Absolutely, it's my pleasure. These are fun events too for kids of all ages.
It's not like you're be going into some scary situation where a little one is going to be startled or something like that. Everybody has a great time, and I love some of those themes that the departments are putting on. I know internally they start thinking about it, well, I'm sure November 1st.
What did we do? It's coming up on Friday the 24th, and it's going to be again at the hospital in their main parking lot. You can go to OMS on K Street, park there across the way, and they have folks that are guiding traffic, so you're not worried about anything like that. Lots of safety.
Bring your treats. Sweetly's is going to be there again this year. Yes, Sweetly's is going to be here again.
We're so excited to have that beautiful, wonderful ice cream for those folks to enjoy while they're here. What is it when you see the kids that are out there just having a good time? It is so heartwarming because they're so excited. They get so dressed up.
I mean, even the parents dress up, so it's a family-friendly family event, and it's just so great because, and all of us big kids too, we love to get dressed up too because senior leadership, we're going to do a nautical theme with some pirates, so more to come on that. Last year was Greece, right? No, we were Ghostbusters last year. So thank you to Ecto 360 for that one.
That's a great cause as well. They do a lot for the community and nonprofits as well. So again, the 24th, it's going to be a Friday night, and it's going to be a lot of fun.
What time does it start? Two o'clock, two to four, two hours. That's perfect right after kids are out of school and make sure they can get out there and have a good time. So come dressed up.
Come bring big, empty bags to fill them up with candy and good treats as well. Healthy treats too. And you'll get to see so many different community partners and folks like WellPoint who just understand how important it is to engage with the public, especially on being health conscious and being safe throughout this kind of season here as we move in.
Flu shots, does anybody need to bring anything specific like paperwork? No, they don't need to bring anything necessarily. We'll take care of it all there, and I'll just say we're just so excited to have a partnership from the school district too because we partner with them to put this event on. So the other thing about this is I remember over the years, again the six years coming out of COVID, I remember doing, when it originally started, it was kind of a winding drive-through thing, and that was a lot of fun.
And we dressed up, and we came through in the car. I remember that. And then it just has made it a lot easier to park at OMS and come through because it gives you time to talk with everybody and really get a sense of how much work the different departments and the different organizations put in.
When you were in the car, you know, the people behind you start honking. They're like, we want our candy. So this works out a little better here.
Two to four on the 24th. It is Mason Health's sixth Trunk or Treat. It's going to be a great event, so come on out and make sure that you enjoy yourself and have a great time as we get closer and closer to Halloween.
Chala, good to see you again. Jen, always good to see you. Yeah, same here.
Thanks, Jeff, for all your help.