West Seattle, Washington

13 Tuesday

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day : 21/10/2013 12 results

PACK YOUR BAG! Day 20: Perfect use for old clothes
October 21, 2013 11:52 pm
|    Comments Off on PACK YOUR BAG! Day 20: Perfect use for old clothes
 |   Preparedness | West Seattle news

Two-thirds of the way through Washington State Diaster Preparedness Month AND two-thirds of the way through the “Go Bag”/emergency kit we’re building one day at a time, with the help of West Seattle Be Prepared:

It’s time to dig through the pile of clothes that you were going to give away: Put in a change of clothing and a pair of shoes for each person. It’s better in our part of the country to make sure you have warm clothing included, rather than just a T-shirt or light pants. If you can fit them, a pair of gloves and a warm or waterproof hat should go in as well.

Items 1 (the bag itself) through 19 are archived in reverse-chronological order here.

P.S. Be extra-prepared by going to the West Seattle Block Watch Captains Network‘s Tuesday night meeting – info here.

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Keeping kids safe: West Seattle families invited to special event
October 21, 2013 9:39 pm
|      1 COMMENT
 |   Safety | West Seattle news

“Safety shouldn’t be scary!” So says the flyer for a special event just announced, with an open invitation to families from around the community:

Hope Lutheran School is sponsoring and hosting (the event) on November 5th, presented by Kim Estes, from Savvy Parents Safe Kids. Due to the recent events at various local schools (including Hope) involving children being approached by strangers, we felt a great need to not only review safety with our students, but also with our parents. We invite the community to attend this great workshop about how to keep our children as safe as possible. The 90-minute presentation followed by a question-and-answer session is free. Child care will not be provided. The event begins at 6:30 and ends at 8:00 pm followed by a question and answer session.

Here’s the full flyer:

(See it here if you can’t see the scrollable embedded version above.) Hope is at 42nd and Oregon in The Junction.

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Looks like NO grocery strike: Unions announce tentative deal
October 21, 2013 5:31 pm
|      12 COMMENTS
 |   West Seattle businesses | West Seattle news

The unions representing thousands of grocery-store workers at chains including QFC, Safeway, Albertsons, and Fred Meyer say they have reached a tentative contract deal. So it looks like NO strike. Here’s their statement via Facebook:

We are very pleased to announce that today at 5 PM the union member bargaining team from UFCW 21 & 367 and Teamsters 38 reached a tentative agreement with the national grocery chains in contract negotiations. This tentative agreement has been unanimously recommended by the union member bargaining team. Details will not to be released until after union members themselves have had the opportunity to review the tentative agreement and vote on it. The times and locations of those vote meetings will be announced in the coming days after arrangements have been made to schedule the vote.

The announcement came with just a few hours left in the strike countdown.

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Navy says Blue Angels, ‘Fleet Week’ ships returning to Seattle in 2014
October 21, 2013 4:28 pm
|      15 COMMENTS
 |   Blue Angels | West Seattle news

(Blue Angels fly over Boeing Field, 2009 photo by David DeSiga)
An announcement by the Navy last Friday was so quiet, they’re shouting it a bit louder today – they’ve figured out how to resume “community outreach” and that means, among other things, that the Blue Angels are back in the air next year, and that some festivals will see Fleet Week ships again, including Seafair here in Seattle.

(USS Bunker Hill passing Alki Point during Seafair 2012; photo by Gary Jones)
Here’s the Navy’s announcement. You’ll recall that this year’s Seafair went without Blue Angels and a visiting fleet because of federal belt-tightening.

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Fight cancer by helping next year’s West Seattle Relay for Life now
October 21, 2013 4:12 pm
|    Comments Off on Fight cancer by helping next year’s West Seattle Relay for Life now
 |   Health | How to help | West Seattle news

(WSB photo from June 2013 Relay for Life)
One of our area’s major cancer-fighting fundraisers, West Seattle Relay for Life, happens every summer – a memorable all-night relay with moments from exuberant to emotional. Like so many excellent events, it doesn’t and can’t happen without major volunteer help, and this is where you come in – maybe your special skills can make a difference:

Right now, the local American Cancer Society signature fundraising event is looking for committee members to help organize the 2013 Relay For Life. With just over nine months left before the Relay, the committee has a place for everyone.

Positions available include:
Sponsorship Chair: Get local businesses involved in this community-based event.
Online Chair: Manage the online fundraising arm of the American Cancer Society’s most successful event!
Team Development Chair: Help teams fundraise and recruit new teams to join the fight.
Many more!

This year’s Relay For Life of West Seattle will take place overnight in July (date TBD) at West Seattle Stadium.

Want to know more, or just go ahead and volunteer? Contact chair Santina, santinarigano@yahoo.com, or ACS staff partner Nici, nici.eaton@cancer.org. An organizational meeting is coming up in early November and they can tell you more.

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Junction demolition update: Teardown of 2nd building begins
October 21, 2013 2:57 pm
|      12 COMMENTS
 |   Development | West Seattle news

You won’t notice it yet if you drive by on California or Alaska, but from 42nd SW, you can see that demolition has indeed begun on the remaining building on the site of Equity Residential’s 2-building, ~200-apartment project. A closer look shows long-hidden interior brick walls:

As discussed in comments on recent WSB coverage of teardown elsewhere on the site, this building was once – when it had a second story – home to the West Seattle Hospital, which later moved to the site on SW Holden that is now home to Navos. Meantime, another reminder that sidewalks on California and Alaska are closed – temporarily, as noted here Friday – while this stage of demolition continues for several days.

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West Seattle Hi-Yu royalty: No longer just for girls
October 21, 2013 1:01 pm
|      14 COMMENTS
 |   West Seattle Hi-Yu Festival | West Seattle news

Stopping by the West Seattle Hi-Yu table at the Fauntleroy Fall Festival on Sunday, we found out Hi-Yu has just announced a big change: Boys are now welcome to apply to be Hi-Yu royalty, as well as girls.

The full announcement is on the Hi-Yu website, along with this link to the Junior Court application (which will download as a Word doc). The application has to be in by November 5th; this year’s Junior Court coronation is planned for the Hi-Yu Community Breakfast on November 9th. Girls and boys 8-12 years old are welcome to apply.

The Senior Court also will be open to both male and female candidates, and Hi-Yu says it’ll announce the application period soon. The next royalty will be part of a milestone – Hi-Yu’s 80th anniversary!

If you would like to get an application in person, Hi-Yu reps will be at the Hiawatha Community Center Halloween carnival this Friday night (one of the events are in the just-launched WSB Halloween Guide).

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West Seattle Crime Watch: See what’s happening where
October 21, 2013 12:30 pm
|      35 COMMENTS
 |   Crime | West Seattle news

Relatively quiet weekend – no major incidents – but we do have reader reports to share in West Seattle Crime Watch today, and we’ve checked the Seattle Police map for current trends, noting for starters that burglaries are still running above average:

The map shows 23 burglaries reported in West Seattle since last Monday. That’s compared to 24 the previous week, and up from last October, which SPD online stats say averaged 18 a week. Eighteen is also the weekly average this year, through August, the most recent month for which SPD has published monthly stats. To see addresses, go to the map and click on any icon, which will tell you the street/block number and when it was reported.

Ahead – a stolen-vehicle report plus a look at the map/numbers for how that category of crime is trending in West Seattle right now, as well as other reader reports on car break-ins, mail theft, and two likely stolen items found:

Read More

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West Seattle Monday: Duwamish River’s future; Luna Girls on Alki; I-90 bridge tolls; music education for preschoolers…
October 21, 2013 11:06 am
|    Comments Off on West Seattle Monday: Duwamish River’s future; Luna Girls on Alki; I-90 bridge tolls; music education for preschoolers…
 |   West Seattle news | WS miscellaneous

More fencing went up this morning around the building on the southeast corner of California/Alaska, where sidewalks will be *temporarily* blocked off during the Equity Residential project demolition over the next several days (full details in this update from last Friday). Also happening today/tonight – highlights from the WSB West Seattle Event Calendar:

MICROHOUSING-RULES COMMENT DEADLINE: Speaking of development, have something to say about the city’s proposed rules regarding so-called “microhousing”? In case you missed our earlier story about the proposals (and the West Seattle projects in process) – see it here; today’s the city deadline for comments.

TOLLS ON I-90 BRIDGE? As previewed here over the weekend, the state has two meetings this week for your comments on potential I-90 bridge tolling, and the first one is tonight, 4-7 pm at Mercer Island High School. (If you can’t make it to a meeting, our preview also includes how to send your comment via e-mail.)

DUWAMISH DREAMS: The Duwamish River is more than an industrial waterway, more than a Superfund cleanup site – it’s a river within a city, home to wildlife, and the center of hopes, dreams, and years of work, past, present, and future, to help bring it fully back to life. Tonight, hear and talk about it during a community forum presented by Sustainable West Seattle at C & P Coffee Company (WSB sponsor), 7 pm. (5612 California SW)

HEAR ABOUT ‘LUNA GIRLS’ PLAN: As first reported here earlier this month, there’s a new plan for where to install local artist Lezlie Jane‘s new “Luna Girls on Alki” sculpture, and you are invited to hear about it and comment on it during a 6:30 pm meeting tonight at Marination ma kai (WSB sponsor) at Seacrest Pier. (1660 Harbor Ave. SW)

EARLY CHILDHOOD TEACHER? HOMESCHOOLER? You’re invited to an event presented tonight by the West Seattle Preschool Association – “Sing Into Reading” with Nancy Stewart, regarding the “importance of music and singing in early childhood development … In this workshop participants will learn the six early reading skills, and how singing is vital in building them.” 7-9 pm at Sweet Pea Cottage Preschool. (7141 California SW)

IT’S NOT TRIVIAL: Check the calendar – only place you’ll find EVERY listing we have for today, tonight, and far beyond – for tonight’s three listed trivia and pub-quiz events!

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Before 60-foot-deep excavation – pre-construction meeting November 6 for Murray overflow-control project
October 21, 2013 10:34 am
|      8 COMMENTS
 |   Utilities | West Seattle news

(WSB photo from last week, looking south across the project site)
Demolition work is over at the future site of a million-gallon storage tank meant to reduce combined-sewer overflows across the street at the Murray Pump Station on Lowman Beach. As King County’s Doug Marsano told the Morgan Community Association last week, this is going to be a BIG dig – 80 feet wide and 60 feet deep. It’ll all be previewed at a public meeting planned for 6:30 pm Wednesday, November 6th. The official announcement has just arrived:

Construction of King County’s new water-pollution-control facility near Lowman Beach Park gets underway later this year.

Do you have all the information you want about the project activities, schedule, and potential impacts to the community? Please join King County’s Murray Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) Control Facility project team for the project’s pre-construction public meeting!

Wednesday, November 6, 2013
6:30-8:30 pm
Fauntleroy Church, 9140 California Avenue SW

· Meet and share concerns with the project team
· Understand how the project protects public health and safeguards Puget Sound
· Review the project schedule
· Learn more about the project’s potential impacts to neighbors and park users
· Discuss how the County project team will work with the community to reduce disruptions

You can see the project’s final design plan on the county website.

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West Seattle Halloween: 2013 guide up; additions welcome
October 21, 2013 9:31 am
|    Comments Off on West Seattle Halloween: 2013 guide up; additions welcome
 |   Fun stuff to do | Holidays | West Seattle news

Halloween is ten days away but since it’s on a Thursday, many – but not all! – of the events are this weekend. From community-center carnivals to business-district jackols.jpgtrick-or-treating, we’ve gathered together all the upcoming Halloween/harvest/fall-festival events from our calendar and you’ll find them in one place, westseattleblog.com/halloween – or click the HALLOWEEN tab beneath the header photo on any WSB page. If you haven’t let us know about your business/organization/school’s event, though, it might not be there – but it’s not too late for us to add it; e-mail editor@westseattleblog.com. No need for a long announcement – just send the basics, and if you have a web and/or Facebook link for the event, please include it. Thanks!

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TRAFFIC/TRANSIT TODAY: Monday on the move
October 21, 2013 6:07 am
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 |   West Seattle news | West Seattle traffic alerts

(East-facing camera on the West Seattle Bridge; see other cams on the WSB Traffic page)
Welcome to a new week! Just one alert for today – reminder that a TEMPORARY closure of sidewalks on the southeast corner of California/Alaska is scheduled to start today as demolition work begins on the west half of the development site there. Here’s our story from Friday.

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