November 2008

(Editor's Note: Al Sneed was the owner of the Highline Times from 1955 until Jerry Robinson bought it from him in 1974. He is now retired, living in Enumclaw and is collaborating with Jerry in a book on the history of this newspaper. From time to time we will bring you tidbits of the early years.)

There were four business leaders, in Burien, for whom I had the utmost respect. They were Joe Jaffe, Leo Thomas, Vin Menella, and Merrill Bell. Of these four, I was most in awe of Merrill Bell.

King County Sheriff's Detective Joe Gagliardi told participants in a Burien gang awareness seminar on Nov. 13 that the gang problem in King County is growing, but something can still be done.

"We are not Los Angeles," he said.

The City of Burien is providing a graffiti-removal pilot program, T.A.G. --"Taking Aim at Graffiti"-- for commercial properties.

In the past all property owners were responsible for removing graffiti within 10 business days.

Under the new pilot program, the city will remove the graffiti free of charge.

Kennedy jumped out to a 17-0 halftime lead on Liberty of Issaquah in a Class 3A football playoff opener at Highline Stadium Friday, but it disappeared like a morning mist in the second half.

“It’s 17-0, and we said let’s make it 17-7, then 17-14 and then 17-21,” said Liberty head coach Steve Valach.

The Seattle Christian Warriors continue to keep the ball rolling in girls soccer as this traditional 1A power had a good showing to open up state tournament play, blasting Onalaska, 4-0, in a first round match at Foster High School Wednesday.

Showing up for a game is something the Warriors have done most of the time this season. They took first place in their Nisqually League with an 11-0-1 (14-3-1 overall) mark. That is an excellent league win-loss record for the Warriors.

It’s the little things sometimes that turn out to be big differences, for instance, like Kennedy coach Doug Stamnes getting his girls to just have fun in half two, after a deadlocked 0-0 tie through the first half with Camas, before beating them, 3-0, in a first round socccer state tournament quarterfinal at Highline Stadium Wednesday.

Kennedy had its hands full but the No.

Cross country

3A boys state meet

Michael Miller of Mount Rainier High School won the individual title for Class 3A boys at the state cross country meet held Saturday, Nov. 8 in Kennewick.

Miller posted a time of 15 minutes, 18 seconds.

Steven Dolan of the Rams placed 81st in 17:10 and Devin Powell came in 96th in 17:33. Trevor Larson came in 110th in 17:35 and James McLean of Mount Rainier placed 114th in 17:41. Tyler Hall of the Rams was 131st in 18:31 and Benjamin Brodin was 136th in 18:50.

3A girls state meet

As a budget balancing strategy beginning in 2009, the City of Des Moines approved Nov. 13 a surface water management utility tax.

The tax is expected to bring in almost $125,000 in revenues for the city. Even with the utility tax, the Des Moines is still struggling to come up with another $339,499 to balance next year's budget.

The utility tax is a six percent tax on the city's surface water management utility. The utility currently is $11.55 a month for every household in Des Moines.

Though we were not publishers of the Highline Times during most of the early days of the Battle of Burien and the Port expansion, we did join the fray when we bought the paper in 1975.

We did watch the creeping dissolution of much of the Highline community from our perch at the White Center News and were stressed at the ugly decay of the once vibrant shopping community.

As Burien lost thousands of homes and Southcenter grew like tipsy a mile or so down the hill, the newspaper went from three times a week with 48 pages to half that number once a week.

When the d

10 year old Lexi just moved here a month ago from Florida with her owner Pat Manns and she loves it. Why?

"She had allergies in Florida and we had to feed her a special diet of venison (deer meat)," explained Pat, "But since she has been here she's been allergy free so now she is on a regular dry dog food diet."

She's a part Chow mix dog and has a very regal attitude. "I'd lost my previous dog and a friend called and said she had a dog for me," said Pat. "At first I said no, because she was so hairy.