Listen to 102.3 FM KIXP either on your radio or online at kixp.org and press the play button at 10 AM to hear an interview with Bruce Benton, who went from Peace Corps work in West Africa to the US Treasury Department’s Deputy-Director of the Office of Raw Materials and Oceans Policy to a career managing the World Bank’s efforts to defeat parasitic riverblindness in Africa. He’s even written a book of the same name: click here to read more about it.
Bruce continues to work hard here on the island as well to help the Island Rides program, as you can read about in this article on The Sounder, and because of his work, they received a massive grant for electric vehicles and charging stations around the island.
In 2022, Orcas resident Bruce Benton secured grant funding totaling $800,000 for electric vehicle infrastructure and transportation initiatives for the island…The grant encompasses $400,000 from Washington State Commerce for the EV Charger Project and $400,000 from the Washington State Department of Transportation for the Green CarShare program, sponsored by Island Rides, which received $200,000 in 2024 and $200,000 in 2025.
This man is not only passionate about helping in big ways, but motivated to see them through.
For more about Bruce’s life, there are some good local articles, one on OPALCO’s site and another on the Community Foundation’s site.
This episode will appear on the Life on Orcas Island with Edee Kulper podcast after it airs on the radio. You can also find each weekly episode online on Amazon Music (tell your Alexa: “play the podcast Life on Orcas Island with Edee Kulper” and the latest episode will begin playing), ApplePodcasts, Spotify, iHeartRadio, PlayerFM, Podchaser, BoomPlay, and PodBean.
Quote from an article on July 30, 2025 in The Islands’ Sounder
