Kingston mourning sudden passing of port Manager Mike Bookey

Published 4:15 pm Wednesday, March 18, 2009

KINGSTON — Mike Bookey lived deliberately.

He was a sailor, a problem solver, a nationally recognized broadband futurists guru and a man who simply loved life. He didn’t wait for life to happen to him. Bookey, the Port of Kingston general manager since May 2007, died suddenly Sunday morning.

He lived with the same proactive determination as a salmon swimming thousands of miles to return home. And in the end he found his home in Kitsap, on a spit jutting out into the waters surrounding Driftwood Keys.

“Every storm would would try to push in his living room window and he just loved it. It was more akin to being in a sailboat than his house,” said Poulsbo City Councilman Ed Stern, a dear friend of Bookey’s. “God bless Mike Bookey. He was one of the originals.”

During his nearly two-year stint as Port Manager, Bookey’s accomplishments were many: He secured a grant for a foot ferry projet; he acted as a liaison between the federal government and the port; he lobbied for the port in Olympia; and was in the process of helping to remodel and expand the port and Mike Wallace Park.

“He was a problem solver,” Stern said. “He finished his life trying to solve the ferry problems. He died with his boots on, definitely. But one was already parked in Kingston.”

A funeral service will be held at Saint Luke Catholic Parish, in Shoreline, March 26 at 11 a.m.

Read a full story at NorthKitsapHerald.com.