West Seattle, Washington
25 Thursday
Tomorrow (Monday) night, Downtown Emergency Service Center reps come to Delridge to answer questions about DESC’s proposal for a 75-apartment project housing homeless people dealing with mental illness/substance abuse challenges. (The site, at right, is in the 5400 block of Delridge – note the real-estate shingles; DESC says it’s “under contract.”) The day after North Delridge Neighborhood Council chair Karrie Kohlhaas brought up the proposal at the last NDNC meeting, we spoke with DESC’s executive director for a detailed followup (read it here if you missed it).
DESC has long since expanded outside the “downtown” in its name and runs projects around the city with about 1,000 “supportive-housing” units – 1811 Eastlake, Canaday House, Evans House, Kerner-Scott House, Lyon Building, Rainier House, The Morrison, and The Union Hotel, with Aurora Supportive Housing in its pipeline ahead of the proposed Delridge project. Tomorrow night’s meeting is at Delridge Library (less than a block southwest of the project site) at Delridge/Brandon, 6-7:30 pm (here’s the DESC-circulated letter/flyer).
The Rotary Club of West Seattle is helping get the word out about a month-long Group Study Exchange for “young businesspeople.” They’re taking applications for a team that will spend a month in Nepal next winter. Though Rotary pays all costs, only non-Rotarians, ages 25-40, are eligible; other qualifications and more information can be found here. If you are interested in hearing more about how the Group Study Exchange program works, West Seattle Rotary’s Steve Fuller tells WSB that this coming Tuesday’s West Seattle Rotary lunch meeting (noon, Salty’s on Alki) will include a presentation by this year’s Group Study Exchange team, which went to India.
(WSB photo of Jim Ercolini with then-Mayor Greg Nickels at Ercolini Park dedication, 7/12/08)
A Funeral Mass is planned at 11 am Wednesday at Holy Rosary for Jim Ercolini, who died last week at age 76, three years after his family-homestead site west of The Junction became home to Ercolini Park. As shown in our photo above, Mr. Ercolini participated in the park dedication in July 2008. When the Parks Department agreed in late 2007 to the community request to name the park after the Ercolini family, he had said that he was the last descendant with that surname – so the park now carries it on. The city bought the park site with money from the 2000 Pro Parks Levy, and community volunteers took it from there to muster the money, material, and labors to turn it into a park. The full obituary for Mr. Ercolini, a longtime Boeing engineer and native West Seattleite, was published in today’s Seattle Times. (Thanks to Wendy for the tip.)
While West Seattle Outdoor Movies in The Junction (co-sponsored by WSB) is still four weeks away, another outdoor-movie series has just been announced, and it’s tied to the launch of a new community group. Unique Families of Seattle is hosting a “Movies on the Lawn” series at a home near Fauntleroy Park. Movies are scheduled every other Saturday night, starting next Saturday (July 2nd). Joanna Hall says Unique Families of Seattle is “a brand new non-profit organization that aims to validate each person’s choice to create the family that suits them best even if it means stretching out beyond social and cultural norms. We are currently gaining traction through community events but plan to expand into a much broader organization that covers many factors of urban family living.” The movie schedule is listed on this page of the UFoS site – each link on that page takes you to an Evite you can use to RSVP for that movie if you’re interested in going.
The August 16th primary is seven weeks from Tuesday, but your vote-by-mail ballot will arrive a lot sooner, and candidates are making the rounds to make their pitches. Thursday night, the West Seattle Democratic Women hosted candidates for the two Seattle City Council positions that are on the primary ballot – Position 1 and Position 9. Our video above shows the forum, unedited, while the candidates were speaking and answering questions – the first hour is on the first clip, with the ensuing 12 minutes on the second. (You can watch either in a larger window by clicking the YouTube logo to go to the YT page; please note that YT chooses the freeze frames you see on the video “play” boxes above, we did not.)
WSDW vice chair Lynne Ingalls moderated the forum. All four Position 1 candidates participated – Maurice Classen, Bobby Forch, incumbent Councilmember Jean Godden, and West Seattleite Michael Taylor-Judd; from Position 9, two of the three candidates participated, incumbent Councilmember Sally Clark and Dian Ferguson. WSDW decided on endorsements before the meeting at the West Seattle Golf Course ended; they backed the incumbents, Clark and Godden (note the WSDW’s endorsement rules/qualifications on the left side of their website’s home page). None of the other three council positions up for election this year has more than two contenders, so those candidates all go straight to the November general-election ballot.
A postscript from Saturday’s Morgan Junction Community Festival. While we were tabling there, we found out about a dog a few booths away, visiting with Animal Aid and Rescue Foundation (AARF):
That’s Roxie. She needs a new home. We didn’t get a chance to feature her in our stories during the festival but we have a chance right now, so here goes.
Connie tells us she found Roxie “scavenging for food by the side of the road last December. She had severe skin problems from being fed the worst human food – cereal, bread, and cold cuts as her main diet.” Connie’s vet said Roxie needed about six months to recover from that and “she is almost there.” But now Connie has a problem – her landlord won’t let her keep Roxie. “This will be extremely difficult, since I just spent 6 months bathing her, feeding her healthy clean food and loving her to pieces. So, we are looking for someone who can take her on and love her and take care of her. She loves long walks in Lincoln Park, greeting all people and all dogs. She is super sweet, very happy, very gentle, loves kids, and is completely house trained. She is a very young 9-year-old who is experiencing a lot of things for the first time. She is really, really smart! She loves to learn, thrives on praise and she will make you proud if you take her to any training class! She is very loving, affectionate, sensitive and rather lady like. She will make someone feel very loved and protected!” You can reach Connie at 206-718-0399 to ask about Roxie.
(August 2010 Alki Beach 5K photo by Christopher Boffoli for WSB)
It’s a gorgeous course for a great cause – August 28th is this year’s date for the Alki Beach 5K walk/run benefiting Northwest Hope and Healing, which helps newly diagnosed breast-cancer patients. You can save the online registration fees if you stop by West Seattle Runner (WSB sponsor) to sign up – and in fact, while you’re out and about, they’re having a registration party right now, till 4 pm.
ADDED 2:16 PM: At the store this afternoon, we found Shari Sewell (left) and Camille Boushay (right) from NW Hope and Healing, with WS Runner’s Lori McConnell. Treats for those who stop by to register! The table is right inside the store door, upstairs on the west side of the building.
The Viaduct’s back open today, but citywide, some big events are on tap – here’s that roundup – but as usual, there’s a stellar slate here in West Seattle – from the WSB Events calendar:
NORTHWEST PADDLING FESTIVAL, DAY 2: Pay the admission fee for instruction (including quiet corners like the one we photographed above) and on-the-water demos, or wander around the vendor booths and see the just-opened Jack Block Park shoreline (plus its amazing overlooks). 9 am-5 pm, full festival-events schedule here.
RADIO COMPETITION: If you haven’t seen the ham-radio operators in the southeast field at South Seattle Community College – their round-the-clock competition (details here) wraps up at noon.
WADING POOL! The Lincoln Park wading pool should open for the season since the weather is forecast for 70+ degrees (wading pool schedule here).
WEST SEATTLE FARMERS’ MARKET: Market management sent word last night that they’re expecting live music by Farm Report,, Panzanella (bread salad), and freshness on sale including strawberries, cherries, artichokes, fava beans, fresh salmon, morel & porcini mushrooms, and “almost…apricots!” 10 am-2 pm at 44th/Alaska in The Junction.
BREAST CANCER FUNDRAISER YARD SALE: Check the WSB Forums’ Freebies/Deals/Sales section for yard sales today; one that we know of is at 2644 Walnut SW, 9 am-4 pm, raising money for a local team going to the Susan G. Komen 3Day.
FOOTBALL AND CHEER SIGNUPS: SWAC Cougars (WSB sponsor) have another signup event today, 11 am-2 pm at Roxbury Safeway.
TWO TO VISIT ON ALKI: If you go to the beach, there’s more to do than laze on the sand. Log House Museum (61st/Stevens) is open noon-4 pm; Alki Point Lighthouse is open 1 pm-4 pm.
ATHLETES IN ACTION: Pacific Northwest Track and Field Junior Olympics at Southwest Athletic Complex (details on the organization’s website)
BOOK SIGNING: Metropolitan Market (WSB sponsor)’s 40th anniversary celebration continues with a 4-6 pm book signing at the Admiral store today, Amy Pennington with her cookbook “Urban Pantry.”
The journey to 50,000 diapers begins with a single donation (to paraphrase the maxim). The “price” of admission for Saturday’s Recess Monkey show at WestSide Baby‘s White Center donation headquarters was, not surprisingly, diapers, since it was the kickoff to this summer’s “Stuff the Bus” diaper drive. WestSide Baby’s executive director Nancy Woodland talked about it while introducing the band:
As you heard Nancy say, there are two big differences this year: One is that the actual “Stuff the Bus” day, Sunday, July 24th – four weeks from today – will be at Viking Bank (4022 SW Alaska) instead of the old location alongside the West Seattle Farmers’ Market. (But don’t worry, we’re told kids still get to honk the school-bus horn!) Another – the push to have lots of individual diaper drives feeding into the one big day (contact WestSide Baby if you’d like to host one). As explained on the WS Baby site, if they get 50,000 diapers, Huggies will match with 100,000 more. And don’t worry, volunteers are standing by to handle them:
Every package of diapers helps – as the number of kids helped by WestSide Baby continues to grow. WSB is proud to be co-sponsoring “Stuff the Bus” again this year, and we’ll look forward to seeing you in the Viking Bank parking lot 10 am-2 pm on July 24th, diaper donations in tow.
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