New information tonight about another change resulting from city budget cuts – how the city’s Neighborhood Service Centers and District Councils will be staffed. You might recall the mayor originally proposed closing the Southwest Neighborhood Service Center in The Junction. Outcry, led by the Southwest District Council, helped cancel that plan – but we now know that the district coordinator who’s been based there, Stan Lock, is moving elsewhere in the city, as the Department of Neighborhoods reorganizes the coordinators who remain after it cut three jobs elsewhere. Details ahead:

According to a memo from DON this afternoon, addressed to “community partners,” the 10 remaining coordinators will be organized into three teams, with each team having responsibility for a certain region of the city. The department calls this an “interim” model till it reports back to the City Council at midyear:

Neighborhood District Coordinators (NDC) Interim Service Model:

The 10 NDCs will serve the city through a team approach over three large geographic areas:

· The South area consists of 4 districts (Southeast, Greater Duwamish, Delridge and Southwest) and will be served by the South Team (NDCs – Ron Angeles, Steve Louie, Yun Pitre, and Ed Pottharst).

· The Central area consists of 5 districts (Central, East, Downtown, Lake Union and Magnolia/Queen Anne) and will be served by the Central Team (NDCs – Christa Dumpys, Tim Durkan, and Stan Lock).

· The North area consists of 4 districts (Northeast, North, Northwest, and Ballard) and will be served by the North Team (NDCs – Karen Ko, Rob Mattson, and Beth Pflug).

The remaining Neighborhood Service Centers are being reorganized for drop-in work space for the NDCs. They will also have drop-in work space in DON’s offices at the Seattle Municipal Tower.

The new team approach to serving neighborhoods and community partners is intended to continue providing the connection between you and the City. However, due to the fact that there are three fewer NDCs, there will be a decrease in the amount of time or depth of efforts any particular NDC will be able to spend with you and your group.

After reading this, we called DON’s Lois Maag for some clarifications. Since Lock, now on the Central Team, had worked out of the Southwest center, we asked who if anyone would be there; she says the South Team members will all be based out of Delridge, though they are expected to be “on the road” a lot.

Second question: Since previously one coordinator was assigned to each of the District Councils – which meet monthly and include reps of area organizations and community councils – how will they be staffed? Maag says that’s still being worked out, and she’ll have details on Monday, which is two days before the first potentially affected District Council meeting here in West Seattle, the SWDC, which meets Wednesday at 7 at South Seattle Community College.