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Early in 1999, Robert Smith, a member of Candlelighters, talked to Dewey Harris, the city's financial officer, about starting a ballroom dance program. Dewey directed Robert to Richard Follette, the recreation supervisor, who asked Robert to find potential instructors.
Robert, who has taken ballroom dance classes for several years, contacted local dance instructors and received an enthusiastic response from Cherie Ponder, a Pacific resident, and Paul Hart. Cherie and Paul had been teaching dance in Federal Way under the name, DanceArt.
Cherie and Paul recognized that Pacific is a "natural" for a dance program. The City Hall Complex, where the dances are held, is accessible to city residents and surrounding communities due to the Valley Freeway. And the dance floor at the Pacific gym (a.k.a. the Pacific Ballroom) is as large as the dance floor at Seattle Center, where public dances are held every week.
Since that early start there have been four community dances, and the city has gained a public relations asset — the Pacific Ballroom Dance Company, which is a troupe of teen performance dancers that has been representing the city at public appearances throughout the summer. (Read about the Pacific Ballroom Dance Company.)
People have come to dance at Pacific from as far as Issaquah, Lake Tapps, Puyallup, Graham, Tacoma and Olympia.
At one dance the diverse audience included representatives of
- the Filipino community who had just completed a tango class at the Filipino-American Community Hall in Algona
- the Tico Tico Dance Club in Lakewood
- some youthful Lindy Hoppers who captivated the dance crowd one evening with lively dance moves from the 1920s
Ballroom dance brings to mind images of couples performing Waltz and Fox Trot. But it also includes Swing, Mambo, Cha Cha and other dances that are fun and which bring people together in a positive way.
The community dances are open to all ages and are intended to make it fun to meet other people within our community. As the program develops, we also look forward to theme dances. For example, dances can become a means of promoting the community food bank or recognizing the police and volunteer fire departments.
This didn't all happen easily. Instructors had to be recruited, and we had to discover means of publicizing the program in a community that doesn't have a frequent and well-used communications medium.
This took place under trying conditions: The Pacific gymnasium was being remodeled, and summer was arriving, so the dance facility at times was uncomfortably hot.
However, the instructors have stuck to the program, and going into the cooler months, Pacific has a dance program that has endured and which has promise.
We look forward to the community becoming increasingly aware of the opportunity here for people to get in the swing with the ballroom dance movement that is sweeping the country.
This program is good for young people and for adults. It represents an opportunity for residents of our community to participate in dance without having to travel to Seattle or Tacoma.
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