West Seattle, Washington
25 Thursday
Just in case you’re driving this way overnight – the southbound I-5 lane closures south of downtown are over a few hours early, according to an e-mail alert just in from WSDOT. (Next week’s closure involves the southbound collector-distributor lanes and two on-ramps; details here.)
Though school is out all week, West Seattle High School seniors have a clothing drive going for area shelters, with two auxiliary locations until the WSHS campus reopens – donation boxes at the Old Navy stores downtown and at Southcenter. Class of 2014 rep Madison Miller says, “Some items we are looking for (as recommended by shelters) are packages of men’s socks, underwear, and T-shirts, but we are also accepting any kind of clothing donation as well.” Madison says you’ll also be able to bring donations to WSHS when school resumes next week, Monday 2/24 through Friday 2/28.
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
If you’ve been to North Delridge’s Brandon Node business district – home to a cluster of businesses including Pho Aroma and Olympic Pizza restaurants – in the past four days, you might have noticed the “no parking” signs that went up Friday afternoon in what’s been a perpendicular-parking area on the north side of SW Findlay, west of Delridge (map).
The “no parking” signs alongside the mural on the south wall of the Super 24 store have a double meaning: Not only “no parking” because of an impending roadside project, but “no parking” in those spots permanently, once that project is done.
It’s a community-proposed, city-funded project, but Pho Aroma’s owners Melinda Nguyen and Scott Dang say business owners didn’t know about the project until a flyer arrived a few weeks ago announcing it was happening.
The project will remove the six perpendicular public parking spaces along the wall alongside Super 24. As explained by SDOT’s John Vander Sluis:
Early Canada goslings! We showed you Karen’s photo on Sunday – and today, David Hutchinson, who’s photographed the Canada goose families over the years, shares a closer look:
All 7 goslings with their parents were hanging out near the Water Taxi dock today. Photo shows everyone trying to crowd under mom’s wing on this cool February afternoon.
This makes the seventh year David has shared gosling photos here. Quick selection from the archives:
*First 2013 photo
*First 2012 photo
*First 2011 photo
*First 2010 photo
*First 2009 photo
*2008
Two local youth sports leagues have asked us to remind you that it’s signup time:
WEST SEATTLE SOCCER CLUB: 650 players and 100 coaches already have signed up for the Spring 2014 “World Cup” season of WSSC – but there’s still room in U-6 through U-11; signups continue until March 1st, and the season runs from early April through early June. Here’s where to go to sign up.
WEST SEATTLE BASEBALL: It’s priority registration until Wednesday (February 19th):
Time is running out to register for the 2014 baseball season with West Seattle Baseball. There are still open spots in all divisions, 5 years old up to 14 years old. The following divisions are open for registration.
Shetland (ages 5-6)
Pinto (ages 7-8)
Mustang (ages 9-10)
Bronco (ages 11-12)
Pony (ages 13-14)Registration is available online at the West Seattle Baseball site.
By Megan Sheppard
On the WSBeat, for West Seattle Blog
This edition of The WSBeat contains summaries written from reports on cases handled recently by Southwest Precinct officers – generally cases that (usually) have not already appeared here in breaking-news coverage or West Seattle Crime Watch reports, but that might at least answer the question “what WERE all those police doing on my block?” Or on the bridge, or the beach, or …
*Early one recent morning, on the street near Roxbury and Delridge, a woman asked a man to quit leaning on her car. The man punched her in the face and also sent her male companion to the ground, punching him in the face four times and stealing his cell phone. Then along came the suspect’s female friend, who punched the female victim. The victims were also threatened with death. The man was described as black, light-skinned, 5’10”, in his 20s, medium build. He wore a red and black checkered hat with ear flaps, a red sports jersey and dark jeans. The woman was described as about the same age, black, 5’6″, and about 140 pounds, wearing a blue knit cap, an “old-style” gray Seahawks jersey, and carried a large black purse.
Seven more summaries ahead:
Though school is out this week, we suspect many young readers are in training as the Global Reading Challenge continues. We showed you Arbor Heights Elementary‘s winning team last week; today, we have a report from Concord International Elementary 4th-grade teacher Marina Pita:
My 4th Grade Dual Language Students (The Black Mythical Mustangs) won our school’s Global Reading Challenge and will advance to the Semi-Final at the Seattle Public Library on Wednesday, March 5th. Attached is a picture of the team with our principal Dr. Zavala, our Librarian Mindy Terr, and our local librarian Ms. B. Our whole 4th Grade Dual Language team (students included) will be at the library to cheer the team on for the Semi-Final!
Concord is in South Park but is part of the district’s West Seattle region. To be ready to compete in the GRC, students have to read 10 books – see this year’s list here. They get to choose their own often-whimsical team names. Other participating schools in West Seattle and the rest of the city are listed here; the city final is March 18th.
(Photo by Lloyd Moody)
No salmon, no Puget Sound resident orcas. Find out how the fish are doing at The Whale Trail‘s next event, just announced:
The Whale Trail Presents: Salmon Recovery Efforts in Puget Sound
Presentation by Jeanette Dorner, Puget Sound PartnershipThursday, February 27, 2014, 7 – 9 PM
C & P Coffee Company, 5612 California Ave SW
$5 suggested donation, kids free.
Tickets available: brownpapertickets.comSalmon are the key to the recovery of the endangered southern resident orcas. How are the salmon populations of Puget Sound doing, and what can we do to help?
Jeanette Dorner, Puget Sound Partnership, will discuss the current health of salmon populations in Puget Sound, what kinds of challenges salmon face for their continued survival, and what people are doing to recover salmon populations to healthy harvestable levels in Puget Sound.
Jeanette is the manager of the Ecosystem and Salmon Recovery Program at the Puget Sound Partnership and coordinates the regional partnership to implement the federal ESA Puget Sound Chinook Salmon Recovery Plan.
Join us on February 27 to learn more about this iconic species.
Buy tickets ahead of time and we’ll save you a seat! And hurry – this will likely sell out.
This is the second in a series of Orca Talks 2014 presented by The Whale Trail. The event also features updates from Laura James (tox-ick.org) and Seal Sitters, and photography from Judy Lane.
Don’t wait to get tickets – it’s usually a sellout crowd.
Stormy as it has been lately, we’ve seen beautiful morning moonsets; thanks to Don Brubeck for the weekend photo. Now the weather has calmed for a mostly, but not entirely, quiet Presidents Day. A few calendar notes:
OPEN AND CLOSED: Most government facilities are closed today, libraries included. No banks, no USPS mail. In the non-WS areas with paid street parking, it’s a free-parking day. Seattle Public Schools are closed all week; most if not all independent schools are closed today too.
16 CATS NEED HOMES: Holdover from this weekend’s adoptathon, 8 cats and 8 kittens are hoping to meet their new humans today at Kitty Harbor, 10 am-2 pm. (Harbor Ave. just north of the bridge)
PACK A.D. AT EASY STREET: Live, free in-store performance by Pack A.D., described by Easy Street as “two gals from Vancouver BC who never fail to tear it up with their bluesy garage rock explosions!” 7 pm at Easy Street Records in The Junction. (California/Alaska)
SNAKETOPUS AT SKYLARK: Free live music at Skylark Café and Club with Snaketopus, 9:30 pm. (3803 Delridge Way SW)
(More cameras, and other info, on the WSB Traffic page)
Notes as the day begins: Though it’s a holiday, Metro is on a regular weekday schedule; its most recent service change took effect Saturday – details here. No Water Taxi service today, West Seattle or Vashon. School’s out for most (if not all); Seattle Public Schools is on midwinter break all week.
ROAD WORK: The southbound I-5 expansion-joint-work lane closures on the south side of downtown are scheduled to continue through today.
10:29 AM: Crash on northbound I-5 at the Convention Center – so probably a good idea not to go that way for a while.
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
Will Metro‘s next “service change” include a service cut?
Decision time is down to the wire. The King County Council has to decide soon whether to ask voters to approve a local tax package. Various Metro-related conversations are on its schedule this coming week.
With West Seattle and White Center bus service having the most to lose, because of Highway 99 “mitigation” money expiring as well as the $20 tab fee, local groups are taking their official stands.
The one taken by the 34th District Democrats this past week was a little unusual.
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