West Seattle, Washington
25 Thursday
That’s Seattle Channel video of today’s City Council committee meeting resuming consideration of HALA Mandatory Housing Affordability upzoning. The meeting was a refresher of sorts, including an update on city staffers’ progress working on a historic-resources addendum to the HALA MHA Environmental Impact Statement, as ordered by the city Hearing Examiner. It’s expected to be completed by the end of the month, councilmembers were told. (Here’s the slide deck from that part of the briefing.) The briefing also looked at potential amendments to the HALA MHA housing – those are detailed in this memo, along with a different type of amendments – proposed changes to the city comprehensive plan.
Among the latter are neighborhood-planning-related proposals made by the Morgan Community Association two years ago. Speaking in the public-comment period at the end of today’s meeting were MoCA’s Cindi Barker and Deb Barker, who observed that it’s been frustrating to await their fate; “We could have had a really nice neighborhood planning process since then.”
Of note, West Seattle/South Park Councilmember Lisa Herbold, who met last week with local neighborhood advocates about HALA MHA issues, wasn’t at today’s council meeting. She and at-large Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda were in New York City speaking to an organization that is upset about Amazon’s plan to locate part of its second headquarters there, Make the Road. That group paid for Herbold’s trip, according to her staffer Alex Clardy. In case you’re interested in what she said – the event’s host, New York’s Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, published this video; Herbold’s speech starts about 39 minutes in:
The event included New York politicians with whom Herbold was shown in photos on Twitter:
It was great to join @SeattleCouncil Members @Lisa_Herbold & @TeresaCMosqueda for RWDSU’s #AMZHQ2Brief. Their experiences fighting Amazon’s anti-union, anti-progressive tactics in Seattle should be a lesson for us all in NYC. Amazon must respect workers & our #LIC community. pic.twitter.com/q5E5d2hPP8
— Jimmy Van Bramer (@JimmyVanBramer) January 7, 2019
Seattle City Council member Lisa Herbold shares how her city’s experience with @amazon HQ became the perfect model for this company to try to take over the world, “this company has to put in place a new model for accountability and better conditions for workers” #AMXHQ2Brief pic.twitter.com/fGFmC3WM2F
— NYCC (@nychange) January 7, 2019
Herbold and Mosqueda were not the only absences from today’s HALA meeting; also not there, Councilmembers Lorena González and Kshama Sawant. As Deb Barker detailed to the Southwest District Council last week (WSB coverage here), the council has a busy schedule of HALA-related meetings from hereon out – including Monday and Wednesday of next week (January 14 and 16) – with a final vote on the upzoning proposal expected in mid-March.
With crews resolving the last West Seattle outage of note from Sunday’s windstorm, Puget Ridge has power again and the main South Seattle College (WSB sponsor) campus will reopen tomorrow. That word is just in from SSC. One of Puget Ridge’s two triple-digit outages was fixed this morning, the other one this afternoon. Seattle City Light is now down to just over 50 customers out of power around its service area – it peaked at more than 50,000 after wind as high as 60 mph moved through early Sunday.
As of today, with days to go until the Highway 99 closure (starting at 10 pm Friday) kicks off the Seattle Squeeze, second bikeshare option is available in West Seattle. The fluorescent-red e-bikes of JUMP have started popping up, joining the green Lime bikes. We noticed them in several areas including Junction Plaza Park, where we photographed by the one above, shortly after JUMP’s parent company Uber sent the announcement that the local service area has expanded to add West Seattle. JUMP bikes have been available in some other parts of the city since November. The expansion announcement notes that “Seattle is one of the first cities to receive JUMP’s next generation bikes, which feature integrated cable locks and a QR code unlocking mechanism.” The company says it’s waiving its $1 unlock fees through February 15th, and that it also has a special price plan for lower-income riders. Today’s expansion also added South Seattle and parts of Queen Anne and Magnolia, Montlake, along with more of the University District. The entire city will be in the service area within “the coming months,” the announcement says.
4:41 PM: Thanks for the tips about the police response at Roxbury Safeway. King County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Sgt. Ryan Abbott says it started as a shoplifting incident and a suspect who was being sought hit a deputy with (updated) her car. Non-life-threatening injuries. More to come.
P.S. Those are TV helicopters.
4:59 PM: More info from KCSO: “1 female suspect in custody, another female suspect intentionally struck deputy with vehicle and fled at high rate of speed.” No description yet of the vehicle/suspect they’re seeking.
10:48 PM: Just in from KCSO, here’s who they are seeking:
The King County Sheriff’s Office has PC [probable cause] to Arrest KHALIA WIMBERLY for Assault 1 and Robbery 1. There is a temporary warrant in the system for Wimberly’s arrest.
The evening of 1/7/19, Wimberly, her boyfriend Davevion Irving, and another associate did a shoplift at the Safeway in White Center. Law Enforcement was called and arrived on scene as they were exiting the store being chased by loss prevention. Wimberly and Irving ran past a Deputy that was on foot and in full uniform, got into a black 1996 Lexus LS 4 door. Wimberly, now the driver of the Lexus, struck the Deputy head-on causing serious/ non-life threatening injuries. The associate was arrested on scene but Wimberly and Irving escaped.
There is NO PC or temporary warrant for Irving but he does have an active felony warrant and misdemeanor warrant for his arrest.
Wimberly and Irving are dating and said to be couch surfing, possibly in the Tacoma area.
Please call 911 if you know where either Wimberly or Irving is or the King County Sheriff’s Office at 206/296-3311.
11:12 PM: A little more information: First, we asked Sgt. Abbott a followup on how the deputy’s doing. Still in the hospital, but in stable condition. Regarding the suspects – Wimberly is 18 years old, 5’3,” 180 pounds, last known address in Top Hat; Irving is 19 years old, 5’10”, 150 pounds, last known address in Kent. The car’s plate is BJX9158.
The staff at West Seattle’s only Pizza Hut (6501 35th Ave. SW) confirms a tip we received over the weekend – it’s closing in two weeks. January 21st is the last day, we’re told. Why? That, we don’t know, and staff declined comment; we have an inquiry out to Pizza Hut corporate media relations. (No redevelopment proposals in the file; county records do show the property had a change in the owner of record last year, not a sale but an estate situation.) This is the latest change of several in the chain-pizza scene in West Seattle – a second Domino’s opened in South Admiral a year ago, not long after the lone West Seattle Papa John’s closed (that site is scheduled to be redeveloped into townhouses). After the 35th SW Pizza Hut closes, the nearest one will be in White Center.
As part of the preparation for the so-called Seattle Squeeze – starting with the upcoming Highway 99 closure and continuing through years – the city set up mailing lists for traffic alerts on certain “corridors,” as part of the creation of a new traffic-resource website, seattletraffic.org. When we covered the announcement two months ago, the only West Seattle corridor was for The Junction. Highland Park community advocate Michele Witzki contacted Councilmember Lisa Herbold suggesting this area needs more – and she got word from SDOT today that her request has led to the creation of two new “corridor” alerts – one for Westwood, and one for Georgetown. You can sign up for those and/or others by going here. You also can find the current corridor times, and predictions, on this page.
Three months after we reported that the Westwood Village Barnes & Noble would close this month, it’s in its final days. As the sign says, January 12th is its final day – the store staff tells us the hours on Saturday will be 9 am to 9 pm, and then it’s closed forever, after 13 years. No official word yet on the space’s future.
Seen that 24-foot Fleetwood Jamboree motorhome? It was stolen within the past few days from the 3700 block of 38th SW, with its owner’s house broken into at the same time. The plates are Washington ARF9265; SPD incident # 2019-007891. Call 911 if you see it.
Update from South Seattle College (WSB sponsor) – the power is not back yet so the West Seattle campus will be closed all day, all classes canceled.
(SDOT MAP with travel times/ Is the ‘low bridge’ closed? LOOK HERE/ West Seattle-relevant traffic cams HERE)
7:02 AM: Good morning! No incidents or transit alerts in our area so far.
Toplines:
-Back to school post-winter break
–South Seattle College (WSB sponsor) starts 10 am because of Puget Ridge power outage
–Washington State Ferries now on winter schedule
-Highway 99 closure starts 10 pm Friday (here’s the timeline)
7:10 AM: Not mentioned by SDOT yet but JayDee says there’s a crash on the eastbound high bridge just before Delridge.
8:41 AM: SSC has updated – closed all day.
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