Maple Valley is a newer city being only 20 years old and isn’t known for a whole lot yet, but now it can be known as a Purple Heart City thanks to a Boy Scout with an inspiration.

Chase Beyer, 17, a senior at Tahoma High School, has been a Boy Scout for a very long time. Since he is turning 18 in a month, he wanted to earn an Eagle Scout rank.

To do this, he needed to fulfill a large project within his city, so Beyer chose to make his hometown a Purple Heart City.

He got the inspiration for this from his great-grandfather who is a World War II veteran.

“With him being a Purple Heart recipient, it sort of motivated me to make Maple Valley a Purple Heart City,” Beyer said. “Knowing my great-grandfather wants to be here, but can’t, motivates me.”

Beyer said he keeps his great-grandfather on his mind everyday to remember why he started this long and difficult process.

To get this process started, Beyer said he had to send out “hundreds” of emails. He said once he started getting responses back about his project, he spent the next few weeks getting the signatures he needed for his plan to go forward.

Aug. 22 is when Beyer said he really started to feel like it was happening. This is when he started putting the most time and effort into the project.

Beyer said he spent almost everyday after school working on this project and even had to miss some football practices.

Next, Beyer said he needed to get the City Council to approve of his idea and to make sure everything went perfectly for the Sept. 11 deadline Beyer had in mind.

At the Sept. 11 City Council meeting, with more than 100 people attending, the council approved Beyer’s plan to make Maple Valley a Purple Heart City.

“When the council approved it, I thought that it was fantastic. All the time that my family and I spent, it was worth the time,” Beyer said.

He said this is not like any other title, “it’s actually saying they back up veterans who risk their lives so we could have the freedoms we have today.”

Beyer said he put a lot of work into his time as a Boy Scout by earning badges and doing all the other requirements needed to move up, but he said this was by far the hardest. There were obstacles and considerable time he had to put into it, but these weren’t even the hardest parts to Beyer.

“I’m not the best public speaker, so that was pretty nerve racking for me,” he said.

Beyer said trying to figure out where to put the display case that he and some of his friends and family built on Sept. 23 was a little hard as well.

In the end they decided to put it in the Greater Maple Valley Veterans Memorial, which is going to be displayed in front of the Maple Valley Community Center.

Looking back, Beyer said the only thing he would have really changed was starting his project earlier than he did, but other than that he is extremely happy with how everything turned out.

He said his best part was telling his great-grandfather what he was doing.

“My favorite part was when I went to Wisconsin to see my grandfather and told him I was making my city a Purple Heart City, and just seeing the giant smile on his face, that was my favorite part,” Beyer said.