West Seattle, Washington
24 Sunday
We met Denny Middle School assistant principal Mia Williams back during mid-winter break, when we covered the music camp at Denny. This afternoon, Seattle Public Schools sends word that after four years as assistant principal at Denny, Williams has been appointed interim principal at Aki Kurose Middle School. ADDED THURSDAY NIGHT: Here’s why AKMS needs a new principal.
Tough economic times mean more people to serve at the West Seattle Food Bank – and now there’s word the WSFB needs some behind-the-scenes help itself: Board president Pete Spalding says, “We have lost a couple of board members recently and are now trying to fill a couple of slots on the West Seattle Food Bank Board with some really committed West Seattleites.” He says the food bank’s mission is as follows:
The West Seattle Food Bank is committed to eliminating hunger in our area. We do this by:
– Securing and distributing quality nutritious food to clients
– Educating clients about good nutrition
– Increasing public awareness of hunger in our community
– Coordinating community services for clients
– Assuring continuity of services to clients through a convenient, accessible location
You can call or e-mail WSFB to find out how to get an application to join the board; contact info is here.
(2007 photo by WSB contributing photojournalist Christopher Boffoli)
The demolition of the ex-Schuck’s/Hancock building at Fauntleroy/Alaska/39th (continuing today) isn’t drawing many tears but other buildings can be a different story. As we wrote here in April 2007 when development plans for 6053 California (above) were first announced, we’ll be sad to see it go. It’s nothing fancy but its unique “Mission Revival” facade has been a semi-landmark of sorts at that California/Graham corner (across from the shuttered Chuck and Sally’s – nothing new on that, by the way – in one direction, the up-for-sale Strata in another). The demolition permit has just been issued. Here’s the project that will replace it, with “live/work” units and townhouses:
The West Seattle architect whose firm designed it, Brandon Nicholson, showed that rendering at the June “can townhouse design be saved?” forum as an example of non-cookie-cutter-architecture alternatives (it’s not a solid block of building – there’s a courtyard among other things). And the city ruled the old building didn’t warrant landmark consideration, despite some unique-for-its-time (1924) features. Nonetheless, we and others have memories, and some wistfulness will linger after the backhoes depart.
Our previous reports on the Admiral group proposing a kids’ play area for the tiny park shown above — California Place, at California/Hill next to Admiral UCC church (map) — have been greeted by some comments suggesting the space might be better left undeveloped. Nobody showed up at the group’s first community meeting last night to express that opinion in person, but those who feel that way will likely be interested to hear that the proposal isn’t what you might suspect — they’re not seeking to turn it into a playground, but rather, per a phrase offered by a Parks Department staffer who attended the meeting to observe, a “play space.” Here’s the explanation:Read More
We chased this one an hour ago but got there as fire crews were leaving — it had been a big “rescue/rope” callout on the 911 log, official address in the 3400 block of West Marginal. Couldn’t tell at the time what had happened but we’ve just gotten an update from a Seattle Fire spokesperson, who says a 50-year-old man suffered “minor trauma” while operating a crane at Terminal 5 (the West Seattle side of the container-ship area). Firefighters arrived, the spokesperson says, and discovered the man was “stable”; they used a harness to help him get down via the crane elevator. He was able to walk once he got down, but to be on the safe side, he was taken to a hospital to be checked out.
No same-night spoilers on the WSB home page for DVR denizens; the most Blayne-centric wrapup we’ve found so far is from a paper in his hometown (Yakima) so if you already know what happened or want to know, follow the link. (We caught up with Blayne here in West Seattle earlier today; here’s that link.)
Out for a walk tonight, we passed the west edge of the Gatewood Elementary playground along Fauntleroy, saw kids on the new play structure (recent photo above), and wondered if we were late to discover that it was finally unfenced and ready for use. Turns out, not so — moments later, we got e-mail from Steve White, announcing … the construction fence just came down today and the play structure is open! This is the culmination of a long process of planning, fundraising, and volunteer work (remember the goats?); a formal dedication/celebration isn’t expected, Steve says, till after the new school year starts.
Call it green beer – without the usual St. Patrick’s Day food-coloring angle. West Seattle-based Elliott Bay Brewery‘s head brewer Doug Hindman sends word that EBB has become the first certified brewer of organic beer in King County. Here’s the news release.
Tomorrow’s the day the Sound Transit board (members listed here) is expected to vote on whether to put a money measure on the November ballot. You can read about the proposal here; it would raise the local sales tax half a cent on the dollar.. West Seattle’s County Councilmember Dow Constantine is on the Sound Transit board; he just sent a news release saying he’ll vote to send it to voters – here’s his statement:Read More
Driving Delridge, we spotted work under way alongside that row of portables at Chief Sealth High School‘s new temporary home (the former Boren Junior High), a short time after getting a quick update on the start of the two-year Sealth renovation project. A doorhanger’s gone out to neighbors, says Pauline Sugarman, assistant to Robert Evans, the Project Manager for the Denny/Sealth construction process — but if you were expecting to see demolition of the CSHS portables, once expected to be among the first visible signs of work, you’ll be waiting a while longer. Sugarman says one portable has been moved and the others won’t be demolished “for quite a while” because another permit is needed. She adds, “Most if not all of the construction right now is happening in the inside of the existing buildings.” You can check this city webpage to track the various permits that have been applied for and granted; the Sealth website has its own page with info-links about the relocation to Boren.
Today is Blayne‘s second day back on the job at Hotwire Coffee (WSB sponsor) since his return from taping “Project Runway 5” (don’t even ask him about the show, totally off-limits per all sorts of paperwork) so we had to go say hi and grab a photo, looking ahead to the viewing party his boss Lora Lewis is organizing again tonight at nearby Ginomai. Blayne says it’s a relief to be back – the taping schedule was hectic and intense – but he did get to see some of the New York sights. Direct quote: “I tanned in Central Park.” (His skin hue has been a major topic of media discussion.) He told us he’s got a conflict that’ll keep him from the viewing party tonight, but if he makes it to episode 3 (and of course he can’t even hint), he’ll be there. Ginomai is on the southwest corner of 42nd/Genesee, with a (free!) parking lot you can access from 42nd on the south side of the building; doors open at 8 pm, bring a nonalcoholic beverage to share, and a small dessert.
We suppose photos like that MIGHT bore us someday when coyotes are in residence at all hours in all front yards, back yards, parking spaces … but that’s probably a ways off. At least a week. Vanessa sent the photos a few days back, saying she’d taken them at 46th/Willow (map) a few weeks earlier (believed to be the same coyote shown here). We’d been looking for a timely excuse to run her pix, and got one this morning when another sighting report came in, this time from Pat in Fauntlee Hills:
Late last night my wife and I saw a coyote trotting down 39th Avenue SW near Henderson St. [map] walking south. A good reminder to keep your pets safe!
From the sidewalk on the SW Alaska side of the building that’s coming down to make way for Whole Foods and the rest of Fauntleroy Place, you can still see into the ex-storefront, and beyond to the former parking lot. We’re just back from another visit to the demolition site, where Fauntleroy Place project manager Easton Craft from BlueStar told WSB that the crews are not expected to tear down the actual structural shell before tomorrow. They’ve been assessing as the work proceeds, he says, and there’s more clearing out to do inside the old Hancock Fabrics (which will have a new store in the new building) and Schuck’s (which won’t) building; if you go by the site, you’ll see the debris in almost-neat piles:
It’s being arranged this way because much of the debris will be taken away for recycling. As previously mentioned, demolition (to be followed by excavation) is proceeding even though a final design for the mixed-use building (including almost 200 apartments) hasn’t been approved yet — the most recent version will go before the Southwest Design Review Board three weeks from tomorrow, on August 14th; the site for that meeting now has been set — High Point Community Center. Fauntleroy Place will be reviewed at 8 pm, after the design for the 35th/Graham project is reviewed at 6:30 pm.
From reports filed at the Southwest Precinct in the past several days (downloaded last night so we haven’t seen the very newest ones yet): 
We start with somebody taking on trouble in his neighborhood – and getting trouble in return: In the 5600 block of SW Teig around 9:20 pm Saturday night, a man in his 50s told police he had seen teenagers using drugs and urinating in the street near his home, so he started taking pictures of them and their VW Rabbit with his cell-phone camera. They told him to stop; he didn’t, and he told police one of them “jumped on him” and scratched his face. The report says officers couldn’t see any visible injuries but a witness confirmed the attack; it also says they advised the man to call police next time rather than trying to take matters into his own hands, but he wasn’t very receptive to that advice. More summarized reports ahead, including a bartender attacked while working and an alert business owner helping bust up a possible underground burglary attempt:Read More
We went back a little while ago to check on the 45th/Trenton (map) tree, finally taken down today (WSB coverage from this morning, including links to previous reports, here) after years of conflict with power lines and trimming work related to those lines. Looking at the circumference of its remains, we realized the tree obviously was there long before the power lines – how long, you ask?
Nearby resident Elise, who provided photos for this morning’s story, sent that one, and the one below, with the report that a neighbor had decided to estimate the tree’s age. On its rings, he marked a timeline:
Final estimate: About 140 years, dating back to about 1868, only 17 years after the Denny Party got here. One notable West Seattle event in 1868, according to HistoryLink: Doc Maynard sold his 320-acre farm on Alki Point for $450. The first electric service in Seattle was still 18 years away, according to Seattle City Light‘s history webpage.
We first showed you that bus in our coverage of Saturday’s West Seattle Grand Parade – First Student agreed during West Seattle Summer Fest to loan it to WestSide Baby for promotion of, and use during, the annual Stuff the Bus diaper drive this Sunday. You’ll see the bus again starting Thursday — Nancy Woodland from WestSide Baby, which is sponsoring WSB this week to give Stuff the Bus an extra promotional push, says it’ll be parked at the old Huling Buick showroom site as a reminder (with permission from BlueStar, which is developing Gateway Center at the site), till it moves on Saturday to the site where you’ll find it Sunday: Alongside the West Seattle Farmers’ Market, 10 am-2 pm. The diaper drive is vital for WestSide Baby because, as is scrawled on the promotional bus above, “food stamps don’t buy diapers” — and this year, WestSide Baby is expecting to donate 300,000 diapers to families in need — but they need your help first. More on this as the week goes on – but here’s first word of a new addition that might be of interest to your family: This year, WestSide Baby is partnering with the King County South chapter of the national SafeKids Coalition to offer diaper-drive donors FREE car-seat inspections at the Junction Wells Fargo Bank parking lot (right across from the bus you’ll be stuffing); note that the last car will be admitted at 1:30 pm. Find out more about WestSide Baby by going here.
We told you on July 4th that the date for the first meeting about the proposed Delridge Skatepark was set for July 30. Now that’s just eight days away – and the city has issued its official announcement — saying, “at this meeting the community will focus on creating a vision for the park and will learn about scope of work for the design of the skatepark” as well as setting up an official page on the Parks section of seattle.gov (see it here). 7:30 pm, 7/30, Delridge Community Center.
Just out of the WSB inbox – a question about a note left on a door, followed by an alert about a suspicious sighting – read on:Read More
The Schuck’s/Hancock building (Fauntleroy Place) isn’t all that’s coming down today. Elise sent the shown-above photo of the tree on the southwest corner of 45th/Trenton — known at her house, she says, as “the sad tree” — posted last month for removal (June WSB coverage here) after utility-related tree trimming in the area (May WSB coverage here) left it in somewhat unsustainable shape:
City Light had told WSB that its owner agreed to have it removed (at city expense), with two “power-line-appropriate” trees to be planted in the spot. From one of our previous stories, Jenny had sent this photo of how what she called the “candelabra tree” once looked:
Though City Light said the work on this tree was done appropriately, and its demise can instead be blamed on the unfortunate fact it grew under power lines, the utility also told us in May that the trimming on another tree nearby was botched badly enough that the crew that did it was removed from the contract.
Busy morning so far. In addition to the Hancock/Schuck’s demolition and a notable tree takedown (report to come), we were going through a sheaf of police reports downloaded last night at the precinct – when something too new to have been in that stack arrived in the WSB inbox from Dr. Elise Mullen:
(At) Seattle Wellness Programs, 5617 California Ave SW: We had someone come through the office, at approximately 8:20 pm (last night), while the massage therapist, Leah Bowman, was working and stole her purse which was in a back room. A police report has been filed Please let police know if anyone saw someone at that time or recovers the purse. 206-388-2929
Those are two of the three backhoes working on the ex-Hancock/Schuck’s building. We talked with BlueStar‘s project manager for Fauntleroy Place, Easton Craft, at the scene a few minutes ago – he said the crews aren’t expected to take the entire building down today — just the facade and some internal work — though the plan could change. Though the official “groundbreaking” ceremony was more than a month ago, the building couldn’t come down until asbestos-abatement work was done; Craft tells WSB that went uneventfully, without anything unusual turning up in the building beyond some of the tile/ceiling asbestos routinely used back when buildings like this went up. He also says City Light crews are in the area today doing some preparation work for the utility undergrounding that BlueStar plans to do (including the poles along 39th). While we were talking with Craft, a woman came up to ask what’s going to happen to the old Hancock/Schuck’s sign:
Well, he began, we think it’s going to the dump. No! she said, alarmed, identifying herself as a longtime West Seattleite who wants to see the sign preserved as history – at least, the Hancock’s part. Craft said he’d see what he could do, though he’s worried the sign might be welded to its metal poles and hard to separate. We’ll let you know how it turns out. ADDED 10:39 AM: Demolition video:
We’ll check back on the progress a bit later. As for the project itself, its new design will be considered by the Design Review Board next month, but as BlueStar told JuNO two weeks ago, they planned to proceed with demolition and excavation work in the meantime.
The primary election, that is — August 19th, our state’s first “top two” primary since the court fight shook out. The candidates and ballot measures already are listed online; among the notables you’ll see on your ballot, Seattle’s 7th Congressional District Rep. Jim McDermott 
(now described on the ballot as “Prefers Democratic Party”) has five challengers (including perennial candidate Goodspaceguy Nelson); Gov. Chris Gregoire and Dino Rossi are just two of 10 people going for governor; all three of West Seattle’s state legislators (34th District Sen. Joe McDermott and Reps. Eileen Cody and Sharon Nelson; scroll down this page) are opponentless. On the ballot-measure front, you’ll only face one in August — King County Initiative 26, which seeks a November vote on a proposal to make the county executive, council, and assessor jobs all nonpartisan. If you’re not registered to vote, it’s too late for August unless you’ve never registered in WA before, in which case you have till August 4th (more info here)
So you’re a festival queen at the end of your yearlong reign, about to turn over the tiara – and you tell the audience about your fondest memories:
Yes, as reported here before, the Hi-Yu float has needed help for a while, and even that will be a fond memory for good-humored Sivona Lingle. Last year, she was the only candidate for the senior court in the Miss West Seattle Hi-Yu Scholarship Program, and therefore has served the past year as a one-woman senior court. Last night, quite a different scenario – she crowned her successor, and two princesses, from a field of five candidates, during a high-spirited event in the expansive (and warm!) sanctuary of Grace Community Church. Watch video of all three crowning moments – and a few other highlights, including the Talent Award-winning performance – as our story continues just ahead:Read More
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