day : 20/08/2009 13 results

West Seattle Junction parking: What might change, what might not

We’ve been covering the West Seattle Junction parking review since it was first announced a year and a half ago (archived here, newest coverage first). Last month, the city announced pay stations would not be recommended – but the parking review continued, and a committee meeting tonight revealed more of its possible results.

By Jack Mayne
Reporting for West Seattle Blog

Even though paid parking kiosks are off the table for The Junction’s business district, a small contingent of the West Seattle Junction Parking Project Committee expressed worries tonight about parking problems once various apartment projects and new business spaces are finished.

Currently, in terms of potential changes to city-controlled parking in The Junction, it appears only some adjustment in the number and placing of “2-Hour Parking” signs is needed, the city says. Dante Taylor, heading the parking review in the Junction area for the Seattle Department of Transportation, told three members of the committee at the meeting at Ginomai that the city could come back and check how things are going in six months and possibly again six months after that.

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West Seattle outdoor tunes: Hiawatha tonight, Mount tomorrow

August 20, 2009 9:00 pm
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 |   West Seattle news | WS culture/arts

WSB photojournalist Christopher Boffoli reports (and photographed) a big crowd for tonight’s Brian Waite Band performance, second-to-last in the first-ever Summer Concerts at Hiawatha series presented by the Admiral Neighborhood Association (co-sponsored by local businesses and organizations including WSB). Christopher says that “all of the kids were dancing up front and having a fun time. After a few days of heat the weather forecast says the lows will be back down into the 50’s tonight and it was already fairly breezy out there tonight. But the crowd didn’t seem to mind.”

Video to come. (added 10:58 pm – here it is)

Next Thursday night, 6:30 pm, the Admiral concert series concludes with the West Seattle Big Band; tomorrow night, Summer Concerts at The Mount (WSB sponsor) – which, like the Hiawatha series, is free – presents Mariachi Fiesta Mexicana, 6 pm.

Once-in-a-decade chance: Last call for the neighborhood survey

Tomorrow’s the final day – after an extension – to fill out a relatively quick survey (explained here) regarding your thoughts on the state of your neighborhood (or, if yours isn’t in the survey, one that you visit frequently) and how you’d like to see its future shape up. The Seattle Planning Commission has been updating that bar chart lately, and while on one hand it looks like Ballard/Crown Hill is insurmountably ahead, if you add up the five West Seattle neighborhoods that are included (Delridge, Junction, Admiral, Morgan Junction, Westwood Village/Highland Park) the peninsula is number one – but we still haven’t even totaled 1,000 responses – need fewer than 200 to hit that mark – so can you spare a few minutes to have a say on how you think it’s going and where you think it should go? Start here – deadline’s tomorrow.

West Seattle HS football schedule set – and fundraiser under way

(WSB photo from November 2008)
Remember West Seattle High School‘s amazing division-title, 9-2 varsity-football season last year? This year’s football season is coming up fast. We’ve got the schedule, courtesy of new running-backs coach Mike Kreiger, and it starts two weeks from tomorrow with a game against a school from Vancouver, B.C. Before we list the full schedule – we asked Mike about any current fundraisers, and here’s what he told us:

The team is now selling “gold cards” or “adrenaline cards” for $25 to help the team go to camp and pay for new gear. With the school district cutbacks we lost a lot of our funding and we’re trying to get next generation helmets, blocking sleds and more. Players just got the cards and will be going door-to-door from now until Sunday to get support for the team. The card has some great re-usable 2-for-1 deals from local W. Seattle businesses like Subway, Taco Del Mar, Domino’s, Zatz Bagels, Papa John’s, Puerto Vallarta, Great Harvest Bread and more (22 total). … Anybody interested in helping the team or sponsoring us or anything at all is encouraged to call (206-432-2626) …

Lots more about WSHS athletics at westsideathletics.com – now, read on for the football schedule Mike provided:Read More

Election 2009: New results out; Mallahan still leads for mayor

checkbox.jpgKing County Elections’ daily vote update has just come out, and Joe Mallahan remains in the lead for mayor, with Mike McGinn second, incumbent Mayor Greg Nickels third. See those results here. Here’s the table from the results website:

Joe Mallahan 28126 27.22%
Mike McGinn 27586 26.69%
Greg Nickels 26416 25.56%

Full results are all linked here. ADDED 4:36 PM: Browsing through the rest of the results – no big changes but in the King County Executive race, the gap between Susan Hutchison and Dow Constantine has narrowed again – she is now at 34.6%, he is at 24.9%. (Here are the full County Exec results.)

From SDOT: This weekend’s official list of event/traffic alerts

August 20, 2009 3:14 pm
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 |   Not WS but we're mentioning it anyway | Transportation

It’s become a Thursday tradition this summer – SDOT’s roundup of where in Seattle you’ll find big events, and how they might affect traffic. (Reminder – as we reported yesterday, the King County Water Taxi will have extra runs for tonight’s Sounders match and Saturday’s Seahawks game.) Read on —Read More

West Seattle Crime Watch: 2 suspects, at least 8 burglaries

The Southwest Precinct says two recent arrests appear to have solved a lot of burglaries — at least eight, and potentially more. We’ve spoken with both Detective Nick Bauer and Sgt. Jeff Durden to get the details you’re about to read: It started with a burglary on August 7th, 3400 block of 47th SW (map) – the resident(s) left the house for just 15 minutes, with a window unlocked or cracked open, and that’s all it took for burglars to get in. With some description information from neighbors, and a GPS-equipped BlackBerry stolen in the break-in, police tracked two suspects – one adult, one juvenile. That led to a search warrant for a house in the 1800 block of SW Brandon (map), where police found stolen property – “tons of it,” as Det. Bauer put it. Read on for the rest of the story:Read More

Golf in West Seattle tomorrow with Ken Griffey Jr.’s mom!

Just got word there are still a few spots left to golf tomorrow in the Seniors for Juniors benefit tournament at West Seattle Golf Course. In addition to the info you see above, there are also tickets available for dinner/auction afterward, also at WSGC (banquet room) – those tickets (no golf) are $25, same contact info. Here’s our original preview; here’s a list of the items being auctioned; even more info here.

Also tonight: “Dark of the Moon” at ArtsWest; parking committee

August 20, 2009 11:20 am
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 |   Junction parking review | West Seattle news | WS culture/arts

(Yusef Mahmoud and Tyler Webster in “Dark of the Moon”; photo by Nichole DeMent)
Two more events on tonight’s slate, in addition to the Hiawatha concert mentioned earlier: First, tonight through Sunday, ArtsWest presents its summer Theater Conservatory production, “Dark of the Moon,” billed on the AW website as “is a dramatic stage play in the vein of Romeo and Juliet set in the Appalachian Mountains during the 1920s,” with a supernatural spin — a “witch boy” falling in love with a “human girl.” More info here.

Second: Though the city announced a month ago that it’s not recommending paid street parking for The Junction, that’s not the end of the Junction Parking Project, which may yet result in other changes. You can find out about the next steps in the process by attending the Junction Parking Project Committee meeting tonight, 6 pm, Ginomai (42nd/Genesee; map). More about tonight’s meeting in our preview from Aug. 11th.

Fundraisers planned to help Morgan Junction salon owner recover

Here’s the news release we received from West Seattle Dawg, a WSB sponsor and one of the businesses in the Morgan Junction block that’s home to Christopher’s Salon, whose owner is recovering from surgery:

A few weeks ago, the owner of Christopher’s Hair Salon fell ill and was hospitalized and had surgery. He spent significant time in the hospital. When he was released from the hospital he had missed weeks of work, and had a mountain of hospital bills.

The neighboring businesses wanted to help Christopher out so we are beginning to do a fundraiser to help him. West Seattle is a great business community, and many business know and support one another. West Seattle Dawg, a few doors down, began contacting people to help Christopher.

“Christopher has been kind to us since day one when we opened our doors, said Rex Post, owner of West Seattle Dawg. “We wanted to do something to help our neighbor who is a kind and wonderful person. So we are asking businesses to do different things to help our neighboring business owner.”

This Friday West Seattle Dawg will begin giving half of their baked-goods sales to Christopher. We will donate 1/2 of Friday, Saturday, and next Friday and Saturdays sales to help him. We are also coordinating a raffle that will have various items from businesses and do a raffle on August 30, 2009 at Christopher’s Salon. The tickets will be $5 each and available for purchase at Christopher’s Salon beginning this Friday August 21st.

We will also have a list in participating business that will donate items, services, and have donation jars available.

If you own a business, and would like to have something in the raffle, please contact: info@westseattledawg.com. Tickets will be for sale [starting] this Friday [tomorrow] at Christopher’s Salon at: 7009 California Ave SW.

On Sunday, August 30th, from 9 am – until ?, Caryn and Nick will be doing haircuts all day, with 100% of all sales going to Christopher.

If you have any questions please contact Rex at info@westseattledawg.com or call Caryn at 206-932-1760. West Seattle is not just a city, it’s a wonderful community that wants to help one another.

The block with Christopher’s and West Seattle Dawg is between Myrtle and Frontenac on the west side of California SW (map).

Another bicycle accident, same spot on Delridge

We received a text and this photo a short time ago (thank you!) about another bicycle accident at almost exactly the same spot on Delridge, south of Holden (map). This one apparently involved only the bicyclist, according to Seattle Fire Department spokesperson Dana Vander Houwen (whom we called because there were no police at the scene, and the fire truck left as we were arriving, barely 15 minutes after the 911 dispatch). We saw the victim taken off in a private ambulance, also as we were arriving, which usually means not-major injuries, and the road is clear now, so this seems to have been fairly minor, but we’re mentioning it because what happened two mornings ago (which police still have not solved, according to our check with them late yesterday) is still fresh. By the way, we heard back last night from Amy, a friend of the bicyclist hurt on Tuesday, and she says her friend is “still (in) icu and she’s very broken to say the least, she had to have surgery this morning and will have to have a few more. She is still here though thankfully. but mostly right now she and her husband and extended family just need a whole bunch of prayers.”

Tonight: Summer Concerts at Hiawatha, with Brian Waite Band

August 20, 2009 7:06 am
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 |   Fun stuff to do | West Seattle news | WS culture/arts

That’s the Brian Waite Band – in the middle of their “20,000 Volts Under the Sea” tour and plugging into the Admiral Neighborhood Association‘s Summer Concerts at Hiawatha series tonight. 6:30 pm, east lawn of Hiawatha Community Center (map), free admission, bring your own chairs/blankets/picnic dinner. And if you’re bringing kids – there’s face-painting tonight, too! Weather looks promising, unlike last week. (This is the second-to-last concert of the first-ever series, which concludes next week with the fabulous West Seattle Big Band.)

West Seattle’s next big festival: Arts-in-Nature this weekend

marcoartsinnature.jpg

(2008 Arts-in-Nature Festival photo by Marco, featuring Pyrosutra performing at Camp Long)
It’s the hottest ticket in West Seattle this weekend – The Nature Consortium is getting ready for its annual Arts-in-Nature Festival this Saturday and Sunday at Camp Long, and joined WSB as a sponsor this week to help get the word out. The arts at the festival span multiple disciplines, from visual to audio, from performance to participation, and the artists include musicians like now-West Seattleite Chris Ballew (from Presidents of the United States of America) performing as Caspar Babypants – here’s our video of CB at West Seattle Summer Fest last month:

He’s scheduled to perform in the Geodesic Sound Dome (one of five venues) at 2 pm Sunday; festival hours are 11 am-9 pm Saturday, 11 am-6 pm Sunday. Lots more highlights – including The Cabiri (aerial dance), plus your last chance to see Mandy Greer‘s art installation Mater Matrix Mother and Medium, a crocheted river by Polliwog Pond:

(July photo by Sharonn Meeks)
Here’s a printable version of the Arts-in-Nature Festival schedule; here’s the schedule as an online grid. Admission is by donation, $5/person. And if you haven’t been to Camp Long – here’s where to find it.