West Seattle, Washington
20 Thursday
Thanks to Dina Johnson from Highland Park Action Committee for that photo of West Seattle Reservoir at Westcrest Park and a reminder about a meeting tonight that you might not have heard about if you don’t live in the immediate area — Seattle Public Utilities plans a community meeting at Highland Park Elementary (10th/Trenton), 6:30 pm-7:30 pm. We just checked with Stephanie Murphy, SPU’s reservoir-program manager, and she explained it’s an informal meeting to answer questions about “construction impacts” once the project to underground that reservoir (as has just been done at Myrtle Reservoir in West Seattle, as well as Beacon Hill Reservoir, where we joined the media tour and brought back fascinating underground video) gets under way.
The Rotary Club of West Seattle sends word of an updated deadline for ordering raspberries and blueberries as part of its annual berry sale – July 22nd (one week from today). Pickup will be July 25-26 in the south parking lot at Admiral Safeway, and they’re expecting to offer “walk-up” sales those days too. Full details at the Rotary website.
Just out of the WSB inbox, from Deanna:
I live in the townhouses right next to the old Fairmount Elementary School (next to the baseball fields) and my car was vandalized sometime early Saturday morning (between 12 am and 8 am). These little f***ers for fun just ripped off my passenger side mirror and threw it into the street to get smashed. Good times! Also, they bent my neighbor’s antenna on her car so that it will no longer go up and down as her car starts.
Just thought you might want to know. Not that the police did anything other than take the report over the phone. But I hear kids out here all the time behind the abandoned school, and I think it’s time we start calling this stuff in and make them do something.
As we mentioned in e-mail back to Deanna, filing reports – no matter how small the vandalism, or theft, or other “property crime” seems to be – is really important, because tracking trends helps police determine how to deploy patrol resources, and which areas they need to keep a closer eye on. The nonemergency number is 206-625-5011.
WSB contributing photojournalist Matt Durham sent that photo he shot a while back of West Seattle entrepreneur Ken Ahroni and his Lucky Break Wishbones, with word the Times reported over the weekend that Ahroni won his lawsuit against Sears. The story also says the long legal fight has taken something of a toll on Ahroni’s business, but he’s hoping to get back on the growth curve with a new marketing campaign.
As reported here last month, SDOT is proceeding with the Alki Point sidewalk project, which has sparked controversy on the partly-sidewalkless side of the west end of Alki Avenue. Project manager Sandra Woods expects to present the next major update at September’s Alki Community Council meeting, but in the meantime, resident Bill Leaming wrote to ask what’s in the plan for “traffic calming” — Woods replied, “We are moving forward with a design that maintains existing traffic conditions and provides accessible sidewalks for the entire project area using public right of way. We are also including several traffic calming measures in the design including improvements to the intersection of Alki Ave SW and 63rd Ave SW and raised crosswalks at both ends of the project.” Bill also inquired about the possibility of a Residential Parking Zone (RPZ); the city notes those have to be “community-initiated’ (more info here). He plans to bring it up for discussion at this week’s ACC meeting (7 pm Thursday, Alki Community Center).
On your ballot this November, you’ll find the city levy to raise $73 million over the next six years to fix up the Pike Place Market; the City Council approved it unanimously today. Right now, the council’s Committee of the Whole is discussing the proposed Parks and Green Spaces levy (live via Seattle Channel online or cable channel 21) – a final vote is due before the end of the month; this one’s future is iffier because the mayor doesn’t support sending it to voters this year – if you feel strongly one way or another, you’ll want to contact the mayor and council now (through seattle.gov).
For us, one HUGE reason we appreciate the Southwest Precinct and its law-enforcement team is the fact that they have trailblazed a new path to community partnership through their working relationship and info-sharing with WSB (shown above, your editor and young assistant with a few of the officers on Summer Fest detail keeping watch after a weekend full of lost kid/parent reunions and other actions that helped keep the festival VERY safe and pleasant for all). 99% of their time, of course, it’s a vastly more dangerous task, like the bank robbery/shooting two weeks ago and this West Seattle standoff a few months back:
And the most dramatic evidence of what officers face: The case of what happened to Officer Jason McKissack. All these guys and gals are out there (and at the precinct behind-the-scenes) doing an often-thankless job, so tomorrow’s a chance to offer in-person thanks. We’ll be there for the West Seattle Crime Prevention Council-organized Police Appreciation Day tomorrow and hope you will stop by too – any time between 10 am and 8 pm (so come by after work if you don’t have time till then), at the Southwest Precinct, northwest corner of Delridge/Webster, east of Home Depot. And if you have a chance to help with preparations today, there’s a WSB Forum thread right now to rustle up more donations of snacks and drinks for the event; check that out here.
You can even catch this one before the PR viewing party if you’re inclined to attend both: Wednesday night, the Delridge District Council hosts a screening of “Place Matters,” a half-hour-long episode of the PBS series “Unnatural Causes” which compares and contrasts healthy and unhealthy places to live – and the redeveloped High Point is spotlighted as an example of the former. 7 pm Wednesday, Youngstown Arts Center, everyone’s invited (here’s the flyer).
You saw it here weeks ago, but now it’s official – with the premiere two nights away, Bravo has officially announced the cast of “Project Runway” Season 5, including Blayne, the artistic barista from Hotwire Coffee (WSB sponsor). Here’s his official bio on Bravo’s site (with headshot links below it to the other 15 contestants). As we mentioned last week, Hotwire proprietor Lora Lewis has organized a viewing party for the Wednesday night season premiere in the community room at Ginomai (southwest corner of 42nd/Genesee, right around the corner from Hotwire), 8 pm, BYONABD (bring your own non-alcoholic beverage – and dessert).
Five days to the West Seattle Grand Parade, presented by American Legion Post 160. The Vancouver (B.C.) Police motorcycle drill team (shown above) is one of the 70-ish entries you’ll see (as previewed here earlier this month); the parade will begin with the Vancouver squad following their Seattle Police counterparts. The two have different styles, so having two motorcycle drill teams is by no means repetitive or redundant. And remember, if you loved the Seafair Pirates wading ashore at Alki (WSB coverage here and here), you’ll adore ’em on land. If you’re not already IN the parade, here are two open opportunities for participation: the Rotary Club of West Seattle presents the Kiddie Parade right before the Grand Parade – kids can sign in starting at 9:45 am Saturday at California/Genesee (map here; parade flyer here); and if you do/have done volunteer work of any kind, any amount, come have fun joining us in the first-ever Volunteers of West Seattle Grand Parade Marching Unit — no fancy marching steps required — just showing off the “people power” of volunteering — and there’s a reward involved (read about it here). We’ll continue rolling out more parade info as the countdown continues, leading up to Saturday; if you want to check out our coverage from last year — here’s a post with links to all of it.
Saturday night, we brought you a reader report from Ann, who saw someone drive up to the High Point pond area, release an iguana, and drive away. She got worried about it and tried to find it, and others jumped in to help. Finally – as he first posted in a comment on the original item – Sean spotted it:
I read (the original post) and was thinking of all the different ways he was going to meet him maker: dog, raccoon, car,weather, internal issues from lack of food….
I looked out the window to look at my tree and my neighbors and saw something odd. I went outside and what do you know, the Iguana was catching some rays in my neighbors’ tree. I have always handled reptiles so I knew what I was in for. As I sit here bloody and bruised I can say I have caught the scared little guy. Anyone interested in a pet?
So — interested in an iguana (or know someone who could give it a good home)? Click here to e-mail Sean. MONDAY MIDDAY UPDATE IF YOU DON’T READ COMMENTS: Sean is taking “Lucky” the iguana to the Animal Shelter. We’re there to cover the handoff. He posted that they believed they’d be able to find him a good home. “Lucky” sure picked the right tree to hang out in!
(adding frequent updates, including photos, at the bottom of this post – scroll down!)
(that whimsical chair’s on sale at the Art Dive tent, just north of Oregon, artist is Alicia Hopkins, mnahopkins (at) aol.com)
Our third and final day of frequent updates from the WSB Summer Fest HQ in the official Information Booth (come say hi, right in the Walk All Ways intersection at California/Alaska) starts shortly. Our team member who’s first on the scene reports things are getting busy already. The booths are scheduled to be open till 7 pm tonight (fixed typo from earlier – it is SEVEN, and the music continues till then too). More to come – you can find all the official info (including the music lineup) here. 11:58 AM UPDATE: Read More
As we got ready to add that video clip from yesterday’s Ercolini Park dedication to the original report we posted shortly after the event (that report is here), we realized it’s worth a breakout to call attention to the other new parks now in queue for West Seattle, all in various stages of development:
Two are right in the heart of business districts, the as-yet-not-officially-named Morgan Junction park on the former Fauntleroy Auto Repair (and, briefly, monorail-station-earmarked) site north of the new Beveridge Place Pub, and Junction Plaza Park, at the northwest corner of Alaska/42nd. The Morgan Junction project just got $90K in additional city funding to make the preferred design happen (funding coverage here; design coverage here) – here’s the most recent rendering shown to the community:
Junction Plaza Park needs more $ for full development (next steps on that are being planned now) but in the meantime is getting some irrigation and grass seeding (recent WSB coverage here) – we took this photo while a Parks crew was working there earlier this month:
There’s also Dakota Place Park, proceeding somewhat slowly at the old substation site at California/Dakota (haven’t gotten a progress report on that lately), and the Myrtle Reservoir park, to be built next year at the 35th/Myrtle site where the city has just undergrounded a reservoir; our recent Myrtle updates are here and here, and this is the latest design (click it to see a larger version):
There are other park-related projects in the works around West Seattle – new playgrounds, playfield upgrades, etc. – but those are the four brand-new parks next to be added, after Ercolini. It’s worth nothing that all four of these parks are being created with money from the citywide Pro Parks Levy that is expiring this fall (you can explore the background on each site, and other area Pro Parks projects, through this city webpage); the City Council is close to deciding whether to recommend a new parks levy be placed on the ballot – we detailed here some of what it would include for West Seattle (we are currently checking the latest version to see if any significant changes were made to the final proposal). The city council’s Committee of the Whole considers it tomorrow; then the Parks Committee has one more public hearing on the proposal this Wednesday, 5:30 pm, City Council Chambers. (All city info on the proposed levy can be found here.)
A few weeks after we talked with Sean Goff and Sofia Zadra Goff for this WSB preview of their restaurant-in-progress Cafe Revo on Avalon, they just sent this update to their mailing list (which you can sign up for here):
Our building plans have been submitted to the Department of Planning. We now wait for the approval so we can begin the permit required buildout. Meanwhile we are hand building all of our wood tables for the restaurant. (see website for photos). The building of our hand-crafted wood bar will also begin soon. Painting continues on the outside of the building. We have been busy meeting with many wonderful companies, choosing our vendors mainly based on that they are local businesses and that their company works in a ‘Green’ friendly way. We have also recently gotten other permits in place (electrical) and our sign permit is in process. The tentative date for the fabulous Cafe Revo sign to go up is August 7th, thanks to our signs creator, Western Neon. We also have decided to use Seattle’s own Caffe Vita for our coffee and espresso. We hope to open by the end of September. Thank you to everyone for the wonderful support already of Cafe Revo. We appreciate it more than words can say. Sean and Sofia
The e-mail update also points to a page on their website introducing “Nonno,” who — as explained in our story last month — is Sofia’s dad, called that by the Goff kids because it’s Italian for “grandpa,” but also how the Goffs hope their customers will come to know him too. They’re inviting people to e-mail him (address is on that page) with questions about the restaurant, his family’s ancestral hometown (and the restaurant’s namesake) Revo, and/or “about growing up in West Seattle in the ‘good old days’.”
Weekend after next, Fauntleroy Church (WSB sponsor) is throwing a whale of a party for its centennial – and getting ready for it now; this morning, Judy Pickens, Pat Gedney, and Marilynn Bernahl were among the volunteers sprucing up the church grounds during a centennial-prep work party. Special events for the centennial weekend celebration July 25-27 include the Friday Night Bean Feed and Talent Show (followed by Vespers on the Beach) on July 25, an open house and dinner/documentary showing on July 26, and a special anniversary worship service and reception on July 27. Full details at the church website.
(adding frequent updates and new pix through early evening – scroll to the bottom of this post)
That’s “Sonic Pezz” from the Rat City Rollergirls, at their dunk tank next to Shoofly Pie Company on the east side of California, north of Oregon. Meantime — three hours till the Street Dance – we’ll be here in the Information Booth at least till 7, then back to cover the Street Dance. Evening music interest is revving up, if the questions we’re getting here at the booth are any indication. Just had a lesson in “you never know who’s within earshot” — a booth visitor was asking some questions about West Seattle development, and where public input comes into the process, so we were giving a Cliff’s Notes explanation of the Design Review process – and then found out that Southwest Design Review Board member Deb Barker was standing barely inches away. (We didn’t misspeak about anything, Deb assures us.) Also dropping by moments ago: Michelle Edwards, former Hi-Yu Festival royalty (and daughter of Jim Edwards, who’s involved in tons of cool things from the West Seattle Big Band to next week’s American Legion Post 160-presented Grand Parade – we’ve got the list of entrants and we’ll post a few notes a little later). 5:27 PM UPDATE: Ryan Reese from Garlic Jim’s Pizza (WSB sponsor) is here talking with us and the Chamber folks now; our booth still has some shade on the east side. When WSB’s Patrick the Sales Guy brought back the RCRG dunk-tank pix you see above, he quipped, “The Rat City Rollergirls say it’s so hot, they’re now self-dunking!” 5:48 PM UPDATE: Not all the food booths are in the “food court” zone on the west side of Alaska – local venues along the street have stands too, like Husky Deli, where we caught owner Jack Miller working with the condiments:
And of course, the festival’s full of kids burning off energy – like the Junction Jam skateboard zone by Wells Fargo at 44th/Alaska:
Just realized we never posted this video clip from first thing this morning (9:30-ish) when Mayor Nickels and wife Sharon stopped by to say hi to Patti Mullen of the West Seattle Chamber, with whom we’re helping staff the Info Booth:
6:09 PM UPDATE: OK, tonight’s hot music act is clearly The Saturday Knights – more than a few people have stopped by the Info Booth (where we’ll be till about 7; the rest of the Info Team has cleared out) to ask when and where they’re playing. (Answer: South stage, at California/Edmunds, 6:45 pm. Beer gardens at both ends of Summer Fest, by the way). Forgot to mention yet another notable visitor from the past few hours — Scott from Central District News, one of the few other serious neighborhood-news sites in the city (Scott was one of the other guests during our KUOW appearance a couple weeks ago) – he joked he’s here to check out the neighborhood-festival competition. 6:45 PM UPDATE: More scenes from today – first, the rock-climbing “wall” that’s part of the kids’ fun zone on Alaska east of California:
Another local vendor we’ve spotted – these are the glass clams from Avalon Glass Works, whose proprietor Shannon Felix has a booth here:
And one more scene of the amazing lion dance/martial-arts demo we mentioned in our first update.
More Summer Fest updates to come … with the street dance tonight, The Junction will jump well into the night. 7:12 PM UPDATE: Spare battery’s about to die, we’re going home to switch gear out and come back for the big dance. More later, including a couple other non-Summer Fest events we covered today.
(frequent updates, including photos and video, added at the bottom of this post throughout the afternoon)
If you want to see the West Seattle Hi-Yu Festival float up close and personal before the Grand Parade (one week from today; want to join the marching unit that WSB is part of? here’s how – and watch WSB later this weekend for some advance scoop on parade highlights) — it’s on display toward the north end of West Seattle Summer Fest today, just north of Oregon. Buy a “Luna Park” Hi-Yu button and support the festival, whose volunteers put on so many fun events each summer (Concert in the Park at Hiawatha, with West Seattle Big Band, is coming up Tuesday night). Not far from the float, you’ll find the first-ever Summer Fest Art Dive tent:
Again today, we’re with West Seattle Chamber of Commerce reps in the Information Booth (California/Alaska, heart of the “Walk All Ways” intersection) – stop by and say hi if you have a moment (and answer the informal survey we’re taking, with questions including “where are you originally from?” and “does West Seattle need a hotel?”. We’ll continue posting new pix, info, sightings, etc., all day as we did yesterday; already today, Mayor Nickels stopped by the booth on the way to the Ercolini Park dedication (video later; see the previous post for a photo from Ercolini), Peter Wolf from Neighborhood House stopped by to chat about the upcoming groundbreaking for the new center in High Point, and shortly afterward, High Point Neighborhood Association president Andrew Mead happened by. 12:25 PM UPDATE: We managed to catch up with “The Velvet Bulldog” (from the WSB Forums) during her volunteer shift at the West Seattle Food Bank booth, where you can buy $5 raffle tickets for some great prizes (including 2 unrestricted R/T tickets on Alaska Airlines or Horizon Air; the raffle ticket itself is good for discounts at Elliott Bay Brewery or Christo’s on Alki) – that’s her with the dark hair, with Barb Bollero, Elva Dodd, and Dee Hayward. The WSFB booth is on the east side of the block between Alaska and Edmunds.
Random note – following up on one of our stories from yesterday – Junior Member of the Team was off buying some sunscreen in Jefferson Square; he ducked into the Starbucks and (no, we didn’t ask him to do this) asked “Is this store closing?” and they said “Yes.” Future journalist, perhaps. 12:45 PM UPDATE: Dave Montoure from the festival-presenting West Seattle Junction Association just stopped by to tell us about the results of an impromptu veggie-hotdog-eating contest on the South Stage: Manny from Georgetown Brewing Company won, putting away 6; close behind with 5 1/2 was Marcus from West Seattle-based Schooner Exact. 12:50 PM UPDATE: A lion-dancing group just went by, from Belltown Martial Arts – down one side of California and back up the other, and now they’re performing right in front of us – here’s a photo from their first passby:
Video later (the show’s continuing – martial-arts demo now.) 1:45 PM UPDATE: Just talked with Alan Harrison from ArtsWest, who reminded us of something that Forum members had discovered — a season-ticket special that’s only being offered during Summer Fest weekend — buy a season ticket this weekend and you get a free ticket to “bare,” plus a $10 gift voucher. On the east side of the same block as ArtsWest, you’ll find Furry Faces Foundation, whose Teri Ensley is famous for the fabulous “F-Cubed” plant sales, among other things:
2:08 PM UPDATE: Lt. Smith and Sgt. Strand (seen in yesterday’s coverage) are back – just reunited another lost child with parent(s) – now they’re “14 for 14.”
Less than an hour ago, Mayor Nickels and various other city dignitaries joined neighbors of Ercolini Park – and Jim Ercolini (with the mayor in that photo) from the family whose homestead was on the park site west of The Junction — for the official dedication, just a few weeks after it opened to a joyful reception.
Others on hand from the city included West Seattle-residing Councilmember Tom Rasmussen (chair of the council’s Parks Committee) and Parks Superintendent Tim Gallagher:
Also, Parks Board Commissioner Jackie Ramels of Alki. But the real stars of the show all along have been the community members who banded together to push for this park, and then to give the time and money it took to make it reality — including Friends of Ercolini Park chair Katie Hjorten, who acknowledged that during the ceremony:
The next big gathering at Ercolini Park will be the community gathering for Night Out on August 5th (you can still sign up your neighborhood for an event that night – go here to get that done).
Just before our sudden downtime, this came in from Ann:
My husband and I just witnessed a couple abandoning an iguana near the High Point pond. They were driving a newer compact gray 4 door pickup, license was something like (WA plate that appeared to start with A). We saw them take it out of a styrofoam container and they seemed to be walking it on a leash. Next thing we knew they took off so we went over to investigate and sure enough, it was climbing the hillside just east of the pond. We called Animal Control but they were closed. Then called the Seattle Police non-emergency number and they told us they couldn’t do anything. We flagged down an officer patroling the neighborhood and she told us that she was sorry, but that there was nothing she could do. I’ll call AC again in the morning to see if they can come look for it. Just doesn’t seem right to abandon an animal that surely is going to die in our cold weather as well as put our neighborhood kids at risk of possible danger, in broad daylight and get away with it.
WSB contributing photojournalist Christopher Boffoli sends first word from the scene: “Some kind of electrical fire” on the industrial waterfront. Huge callout, per the live 911 log, which describes it as “pier fire”; nobody hurt, according to what Christopher’s been told at the scene. ADDED 9:53 PM: Photos from Christopher. No further details on exactly what happened, except for re-confirmation everybody’s OK:
Hours after we noted that West Seattle’s Jefferson Square Starbucks is reported to be on the list of 600 company-owned stores to be closed in coming months, the company has announced the first 50 – the ones that will be closed by the end of this month. Here’s the list; no Seattle stores are on this one, but the other 550 are yet to be announced.
(adding new info and photos frequently; keep checking the end of this post)
(video added 2 pm, WSHS cheerleaders rooting for the football players’ food both; updated clip shortly)
Junior Member of the Team and your editor here just arrived to join The Sales Guy — and the West Seattle Chamber of Commerce — in the Information Booth at the heart of Summer Fest. There’s a great crossbreeze along Alaska, and we’re facing north, so if you need a place to cool off, this is it — stop by and chat a moment, and if you can spare a couple of moments, we’re informally collecting answers on some important community questions including the Water Taxi’s future and whether West Seattle needs a hotel — plus we want to know “where are you originally from?” just for fun — Summer Fest T-shirts are for sale here at the booth too, “I LOVE WEST SEATTLE” BUMPER STICKERS!!! too … 1:43 PM UPDATE: Lots of great people have come by already. West Seattle Hi-Yu Festival is selling buttons – you can get a Hi-Yu program (listing activities including Concert in the Park on Tuesday and the Grand Parade a week from tomorrow) for free here at the Info Booth – Carol Winston from Hi-Yu stopped by to say hi and leave a stack of programs. WestSide Baby is nearby drumming up support for its upcoming “Stuff the Bus” diaper drive – here’s WestSide Baby’s leader Nancy Woodland:
We’ve also talked with Suzanne Kellar from the Seattle Opera Guild, which brings opera previews to West Seattle and elsewhere – she says the guild makes money off the sale of the Entertainment books that’ll be out soon – if you’re interested, e-mail her: srkellar@aol.com … More to come as the afternoon goes on! Good crowd here but not too insanely busy yet. 2:25 PM UPDATE: Free Jones Soda! On the east side of the street between Alaska and Edmunds. Also, police are here to help keep an eye on things – we got Sgt. Strand and Lt. Smith on camera:
2:46 PM UPDATE: Carol Johnston from West Seattle Senior Center just stopped by. She’s handing out flyers for “Rainbow Bingo: Hot Summer Nights” coming up August 22nd at the Senior Center — adding it to the Events page now! We’ve also chatted with Nancy Driver, who’s organizing the big September 13th cleanup along the Fauntleroy end of The Bridge, from Walking on Logs to 35th/Fauntleroy. As we wrote the other night – e-mail her ASAP if you think you’ll be able to volunteer for one of the biggest and most important West Seattle cleanup operations in a longtime: ndriver@quidnunc.net – she needs to have some semblance of a head count sooner rather than later, and she’s got some big organizational milestones coming up. 3:01 PM UPDATE: The Jones Soda freebies are so popular, Deni Tyler (shown below) told us they handed out 2,400 cans in the first 3 hours of the festival. We recommend “Fufu Berry.”
More freebies – Leslie Thomson (left in the photo below) from Dream Dinners (WSB sponsor) has been handing out lemon-bar samples:
3:42 PM UPDATE: A sample of music – 30 seconds of Verona, playing earlier at the South Stage:
4:01 PM UPDATE: Lots of nice folks we only previously “knew” via e-mail have stopped by to say hi. So glad to meet you all in person. We’ll be here at least another hour tonight, and we’ll also cover evening events even once the Info Booth shuts down – then we’re here starting at 10 am tomorrow. Also here tomorrow, among many others — the Hi-Yu folks tell us their Luna Park float will be on display tomorrow toward the north end of Summer Fest (around California/Oregon) — also we’ve heard from Furry Faces Foundation, which will be set up near Petco tomorrow and Sunday. That’s the same area where you’ll find the free Jones Soda; a rep from the promotional firm came by to tell us this is the first major event where they’re doing this – their goal is to give out a quarter million cans by summer’s end; they’re also proud to be the exclusive soda provider for the upcoming Seafair hydro races, and the Capitol Hill Block Party among other things. WSB contributing photojournalist Christopher Boffoli stopped by to say hi and has since sent some photos — first one is the midday crowd via long lens (really, it’s not a total zoo, but there are lots of people here having fun), second one is what Christopher describes as “Tow trucks being kept busy by people defying No Parking signs along Oregon”:
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4:34 PM UPDATE: Two more pix. First, Tamar getting her face painted (Alvis left a comment wondering if we’d be getting the classic festival kids-with-face-paint pix, this is the best we could do for starters); second, one of the many artist vendors here – Christy Varonfakis Johnson of On Focus Photo, who has contributed photos to WSB before, posing with her husband, Jeremy, in their booth here at Summer Fest, where they’re selling her work:
5:14 PM UPDATE: Quarter past five and the info booth hasn’t shut down yet, so we’re still here. As we just mentioned in a response to a comment from “d,” the pet area that will be set up by Next to Nature tomorrow and Sunday sounds great – water, a wading pool for pets, a cool place for them to get their paws off the asphalt, and more – Louis from Next to Nature stopped by and was telling us all about it. Lora Lewis from Hotwire Coffee (WSB sponsor) also stopped by the booth a few minutes ago and gave us the scoop that barista Blayne will be back in town next week sometime (he’s on the new season of “Project Runway,” which debuts Wednesday; here’s the scoop on the viewing party at Ginomai). Still a nice breeze blowing east-west on Alaska, where we are, and a great crowd but not too insanely busy – of course, the evening has just begun; live music will continue till about 9:15 tonight, but it’s not overwhelming if you’re not near the stages at the north and south ends – we really can’t even hear it from here in the central part of the setup. 5:47 PM UPDATE: Info Booth “officially” shutting down in a few minutes, we will likely stay here till about 6:30 posting updates. “Busy today for a Friday!” pronounced the Chamber’s Patti Mullen, with whom we’ve been sharing the booth today along with Chamber volunteers, as well as a volunteer selling Summer Fest T-shirts on behalf of the Junction Association. (Check back here tomorrow after 10 am for the “I Love West Seattle” bumper stickers that the Chamber’s selling, as seen in the photo below from earlier this year.)
7:02 PM UPDATE: Finally ready to fold it up, though events here are going to continue another hour plus. In addition to the official vendors with booths, there are folks working the crowd getting the word out about various endeavors, from political petitions to personal projects – among them, local musician Philip Mariconda (you may have seen him perform at C and P Coffee), who’s got a new album (Corporate Dysfunction; read about it here) – we asked him to pause and pose for WSB Cam:
Speaking of music … Coffin Break must be pretty popular … several people have just stopped by to ask which stage they’re playing on (answer: south stage, right now), and that’s the first band-specific question we’ve fielded all day. P.S. There are at least half a dozen Seattle Police officers here, and they have just reunited another lost child with his/her parent(s) – to quote one of the officers, “So far today we’re 8 for 8.”
As reported in recent weeks, both Roxhill Elementary and Schmitz Park Elementary lost their principals. The district has just announced who’s replacing them:Read More
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