West Seattle, Washington
19 Monday
Out of the WSB inbox this morning, a reader reports her house getting egged — for the third time in the past few months — in the Seaview neighborhood, and wonders if it happened to anyone else. (Otherwise, we haven’t heard much about this particular brand of vandalism since last month.)
This hour, Mayor Nickels delivered the 2008 “State of the City” address. 
Its full text is online; we see just one West Seattle-specific shoutout, a mention of Myrtle as one of the reservoirs getting new parks along with covers. (WSB coverage of the last Myrtle public meeting is here.) More intriguingly, he ends the speech saying he will be asking for citizens’ thoughts on a “Customer Bill of Rights” for the city (this news release has some details); certainly WSB-ers have had much to say about the city’s responsiveness or lack of same – what do you think such a “Bill of Rights” should include?
We now know a lot more about the woman hit and killed while crossing Barton by Westwood Village a week and a half ago — 55-year-old Therese (Teri) Marie Soike — the first pedestrian killed in West Seattle since 85-year-old Oswald Clement last October. The photo you see at left was provided by Teri’s daughter Shelby Hampton, who says the family is “still in shock” and “completely devastated” — Shelby adds, “My sister and I were very close to our mother and nothing can prepare you for a death like this.” They are hoping to find witnesses to the crash, and agreed to talk with WSB:Read More
ELECTION: Presidential primary, 7 am-8 pm if you haven’t voted by mail; more info here.
RAPIDRIDE: Last of 4 West Seattle open houses to share information and take comments for this phase of Metro’s West Seattle RapidRide bus-service planning, 6-7:30 pm @ Southwest Library.
CRIMEFIGHTING: West Seattle Community Safety Partnership, under new leadership elected last month, invites you to tonight’s meeting, 7 pm, Southwest Precinct. If you have a neighborhood crime or nuisance concern and would like to ask local police what’s being done, or what can be done, about it — this hour is well worth your time. (WSB coverage of last month’s WSCSP meeting is here.)
If you didn’t have to go to work today – you probably missed the rising sun reflecting off the downtown buildings, as photographed by Steve (thanks for sharing) … Here are some other photos shared by folks in WSB-land:Read More
Another reminder that summer (not to mention spring) is getting closer: Just got a note asking us to tell you that the dates are set for this year’s Alki Art Fair (photo above is from last summer’s event) — July 26-27 — and organizers have set up a website too (check it out here) with info on how to register to participate this year as an artist or craftsperson vendor.
FOR TEENS: Think you can find anything online? Delridge Library invites you to test your skills – and win prizes! – at the Teen Internet Scavenger Hunt this Wednesday, 4 pm. Find out more here, including how to preregister.
FOR ADULTS: The Madison Middle School PTSA is extending an open invitation to anyone interested in attending its next meeting featuring two UW researchers who are looking into how teens use tech — specifically, instant messaging and blogging, and video games. After the presentations, Madison PTSA co-president Adrian Lee tells WSB, “the researchers will lead a discussion of youth and emergent digital technologies.” That meeting is 7 pm March 12 @ the Madison library; more info here.
If you lose track of either of these events, just keep an eye on the WSB Events page, where they’re listed along with dozens of other West Seattle events for the days, weeks, months ahead.
(Photo from PR Newswire)
Target has just bought a fleet of Segways to patrol parking lots of its stores in several cities including ours. Gotta wonder if they will be deployed indoors too; per the police reports we read 2 or 3 times per week, their security team is pretty busy chasing – and often catching – shoplifters. (We’d call to ask but they might not take our call.)
Crazy from the sun? We just noted a big white pickup nearly take out a small sedan in The Junction by turning right onto northbound California from the INSIDE lane on westbound Alaska. And upon our return, this was in the inbox from watchful Admiral resident Meredith:
Just called in to PD:
Two men pulled into the neighborhood to ‘discuss’ an incident of poor driving along Admiral Way. Driver of small silver passenger car stayed in car but brandished a box cutter, driver of black Lexus sedan (license ending in VKA) got out of car and, once he pulled his baggy pants up so he could walk, started threatening the other drivers. While pacing around the silver car, the angered man demanded to know if first driver had a gun, wanted to shoot him (’cause he ain’t afraid of that s**t’), and calling the silver-cared driver a p***y for driving ‘like that’ in a family neighborhood.
Some VERY FOUL language went down between the two, but most frigtening was the Lexus driver who got out of his car: about 6’2″ caucasian, dark brown hair and eyes, light skin, very big pants.
Witness called this and the license plate of silver car into 911 as the guys sped off, likely back onto Admiral Way.
No crime committed but you never know what someone that agitated might go on to do next (or might have done previously), so we note, in the spirit of watchfulness.
The latest listing: 2112 Alki (map), a newly built 6-unit apartment building, offered for $4,200,000 with a description that uses the word “condominium” twice. (We reported the listing of another Alki building just last Friday.) 5:14 PM ADDITION: While taking the above photo to add to this post, we noticed prominent signs out front, CONDOS FOR LEASE.
Five days into the search for Nicholas Francisco, the South King County man (and former West Seattle church member) who’s been missing since Wednesday (his photo’s at left; the full poster with other pix is in our post here), his car has been found at an apartment complex in Federal Way. Thanks to everybody who e-mailed to let us know. Details are on various citywide news sites including here; the searchers’ official website is here.
For our state’s Democrats, the February 9 caucuses (final West Seattle results linked here) were the main event in the presidential-nominee-choosing process, because those are the only results used to choose delegates. (Next step in the process, delegates from precinct caucuses go to legislative-district caucuses April 5.) But tomorrow’s vote (7 am-8 pm at your polling place if you don’t vote by mail) will likely get some national-media attention regardless, particularly on the Democratic side, since things aren’t quite settled yet. And for Republicans, the vote does count toward delegates – roughly half will be chosen from the Feb. 9 caucus results (here), half from tomorrow’s primary results. More primary info here.
When we stopped by West Seattle Bowl a month ago to ask about a reader-e-mailed rumor that it might close, not only did co-owner Andrew Carl say it wasn’t true, he implored us to write about it — which we usually don’t do when rumors don’t pan out (here’s what we ended up writing). At the time, we also told him we’d love to talk with him more about his business sometime, with high-profile closures elsewhere in the city leaving WS Bowl as one of the last pins standing. Last week – as Carl also got a spotlight in the latest Seattle Weekly – he finally had time for that chat:Read More
CITY-METERED PARKING: Free.
TRASH/RECYCLING: Regular schedule.
GOVERNMENT OFFICES: Generally closed.
SCHOOLS: Closed (and if it’s a Seattle public school, it’s closed all week).
METRO BUSES: Most are on Sunday service.
SOUND TRANSIT: Some service changes.
STATE FERRIES: Regular schedule.
BANKS: Depends (WaMu at Thriftway, for example, is open till 1 pm).
LIBRARIES: Closed, both city and county.
PRESIDENTS DAY OR PRESIDENTS’ DAY? No apostrophe.
WSB contributing photojournalist Christopher Boffoli was shooting from Queen Anne when he captured that ferry passing Alki. His next two photos were taken from West Seattle:
Next photo is from John LaSpina (who also contributed this morning’s Junction sunrise) — the afternoon moonrise over Holy Rosary:
And though this wasn’t taken today (last Wednesday, to be exact), Vanessa Hutchinson e-mailed it to WSB tonight to share:
We appreciate your photos and video, as well as news tips – best address is westseattleblog@yahoo.com – thanks!
New information since we first posted yesterday about Nicholas Francisco, the South King County man who’s been missing since Wednesday. (His photo’s at left; his car at right; the full poster with other pix is in our post here.) Searchers say they’ve raised the reward; Mars Hill-West Seattle has issued a statement of support that notes “the Francisco family recently left” the church, while also asking members to pray for Nicholas’ safe return. The searchers’ official website is here.
Thanks to Justin Fallstrom for sending that photo. He writes:
Generally there is not much exciting going on down here in Highland Park; however, this morning, while working outside on the second sunny day in a row, the local murder of crows caught my attention. Apparently crows and bald eagles do not get along very well, however, the fellow in the attached photos did not appear to be too bothered by the very noisy crows. Thought the readers might be interested. The high voltage pole the eagle is perched on is at the intersection of 13th Ave SW and SW Cambridge.
Just got a message from Illusions (WSB sponsor) asking us to let you know that they’ll be closed tomorrow for cleaning because of a trash-can mishap on Friday. Your editor here was actually there (incognito) getting a haircut when it happened, as, it turned out, was Rhonda from Beach Drive Blog, who had a camera handy. It seemed too small to bother noting here at the time – we’ve seen a lot of smoldering trash cans in our day – but a salon spokesperson says they’ve since decided to bring in professional cleaners to get rid of some extinguisher residue, so they’ll be closed tomorrow and hope to reopen at noon Tuesday. (More info on the Illusions website.)
Just out of the inbox from Olympic Heights Laundry (7347 35th) owners Paul and Dave:
Just wanted to let you know, that I just spoke with one of our customers who was using the Laundromat last night about 10:30 and she was attacked and robbed. She is one of our regular customers who comes in to do laundry around 10:00 PM, we allow our customers to start as late as 10:00 PM, and the door has an auto lock on it. She said that 2 heavy set African American girls came in and asked to borrow 50 cents, and then left. They returned a short time later to “warm up” and when she was in the back of the laundry they pinned her and took her credit cards, phone, and some change. She did state that they appeared to not be very good at their robbery, with one giving all the directions and the other doing the job. She did report this to the police and I believe I know who these suspects are as they wait for a bus right across the street.
They say they plan to beef up laundromat security. Meantime, as in any crime case, let police know if you have any information that might help them make arrests; 625-5011 is the nonemergency lin.
President Steve Fischer of the Westwood Neighborhood Council, which organized last Tuesday’s panel-discussion meeting at CSHS (WSB text/video coverage here), sent the list of audience questions that remained when time ran out. As promised, he has forwarded them to the district to request answers online the same way they answered questions (here) from their 2/4 meeting at CSHS. Here’s the list (reading it, we see there is one toward the end that we can answer, as it involves WSB):Read More
Wendy broke the news (in comments on this item last weekend), and now it’s confirmed in e-mail from the West Seattle Farmers’ Market parent organization: “We are currently in the processing of securing the Market site in West Seattle for all the Sundays in March and April so that the market can stay open until spring without interruption.” Otherwise, WSFM was set to close temporarily after next Sunday. So keep your fingers crossed – and now, here’s the “fresh sheet” for today’s market, 11 am-2 pm in The Junction:Read More
As of about an hour ago, Radio 33 is on at 87.7 FM, as announced earlier this month.
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