June 2009

ArtsWest has been awarded a grant from The Paul G. Allen Family Foundation of $50,000. The grant will go toward Full Speed Ahead, ArtsWest’s capital campaign.
 
“The Paul G. Allen Family Foundation is proud to make a grant of $50,000 to ArtsWest,” said Susan M. Coliton, the vice president of The Paul G. Allen Family Foundation. “In these tough economic times, we need to ensure that we leverage every dollar to have the greatest possible impact so we can continue the Foundation’s longstanding commitment to the arts. Our grant to ArtsWest recognizes its valuable commitment to strengthening its West Seattle community and transforming lives.”
 
“The Allen Foundation grant is a great indicator of the buy-in ArtsWest has from our community,” said KayLee Jaech, ArtsWest’s development director, “It’s that support that both drives us and allows us to continue enriching the culture of West Seattle. I think it will lead directly to support from other foundations, civic-minded corporations, and individuals who value ArtsWest and support Full Speed Ahead.” 
 

At this year’s Fremont Chamber Picnic in the Park, all mayoral, city attorney and city council candidates were invited to an afternoon lunch at Gaswork’s park to discuss their platforms for this coming fall’s elections.

One-by-one, each candidate was given a few minutes to discuss how they could improve Seattle followed by a round-table for concerned citizens to be given a chance to ask questions, discuss concerns and get to know the candidates.

Candidates for Seattle Mayor

Jan Drago
Current Seattle City Council member Drago said her priority is to revitalize the economy and create more jobs in the city. In order to move forward with that agenda, Drago said the city has to work with its regional partners, empower the neighborhoods and give them a seat at the decision-making table during the budget process.

Joe Mallahan
Born and raised in the Northwest, Mallahan said he brings 20 years of experience in working in the private sector bringing large groups of diverse people together to solve problems. Hoping to pick up the pieces of what he called a "broken city," Mallahan hopes to be a mayor the city can trust again.

James Donaldson

(Editor's note: The following letter was sent to Barbara Gray with the Seattle Department of Transportation from the Ballard District Council regarding the draft Seattle Pedestrian Master Plan.)

Dear Ms. Gray:

The Ballard District Council has completed its initial review of the draft Seattle Pedestrian Master Plan, dated May 2009. The District Council’s Neighborhood Plan Update Committee presented its draft recommendations to you following your briefing on the plan at the June 10 council meeting.

Overall, the committee was very impressed with the depth of information and detailed analysis provided in the draft Seattle Pedestrian Master Plan. We hope that this living document will become a useful tool for the city and neighborhoods when determining prioritization for projects and for setting guidelines for project identification and implementation.

We feel, however, that this draft plan is missing a few, very key, components, which we have outlined below under “Overall Recommendations," “Implementation Recommendations" and “Recommendations for Further Clarity."

Overall Recommendations

Hoping for good weather this Saturday, Whittier Elementary second-grader Nathan Feliciano will be setting up shop in front of Arcane Comics and More to once again raise funds to fight breast cancer.

“My neighbor was doing one too (lemonade stand) so I thought I could do one too to raise money for my mom and the Breast Cancer (3-day) Walk,” Nathan said. “I thought it would be fun to have a lemonade stand to earn money for it.”

Sharon Feliciano, Nathan's mother, said she had chosen to support breast cancer research when her aunt was diagnosed several years ago.

“I began speaking to people about my aunt’s situation and we came to realize that we didn’t know anyone that didn’t have a breast cancer story to tell us,” Sharon said. “Everyone had been touched by it in some way or another whether it was themselves, through their parents, a sister or a friend.”

Before becoming an at-home mom, Sharon had a lot of experience doing fundraising for Nathan’s school along with political fundraisers when she was working professionally. She decided to try her hand at fundraising for breast cancer research and turned to the Breast Cancer 3-day Walk.

Just over 800 donor bricks have now been set in the ground around the Alki Statue of Liberty Plaza, and into the steps leading to the statue from the sidewalk as Phase II wraps up. That adds up to more than 2,300 bricks. Messages on the bricks range from sentimental to whimsical to symbolic.

The next big event will be the placing of the time capsule, a Log House Museum effort. That date has not been, well, set in stone.

CLICK ON PHOTO FOR SLIDE SHOW.

More than a dozen alumni from West Seattle High School Class of 1940 take a monthly trip down memory lane to the Chelan Café for lunch. It is Tuesday’s at 1:30 when they pull in with much to unpack; yearbooks, photos, and recollections dating back to 1928 when some shared the same first grade class at Lafayette and Highland Park elementary schools in becoming West Seattle High School “Indians.”

“There is always something new from somebody,” said Vera Bemis Hall, who stayed after school almost every night at West Seattle to play a variety of sports. She drives to the café from Kirkland and seldom misses a month. Hall attended E.C. Hughes, then Highland Park Elementary.

“The conversation can be fun, or funny, but too often it’s something that’s not,” added Hall. “We’re all getting up there. You have to expect that when you hit 87.”

Bernice Benson Link attended Lafayette Elementary with Barbara Hagquist Smith. Both sometimes sit together at the Chelan.

West Seattle’s real estate market could be recovering with a significant increase in sales this May.

Total sales in West Seattle increased by 100 percent between January and May. Prudential Northwest Realty Associates reports that they sold 45 homes in March, 53 homes in April and 76 in May—an increase of 18 percent and 44 percent, respectively.

“Everything has really turned,” said Mike Gain, president and chief executive office of Prudential Northwest. “When the Market crashed it was down for so long, but we are really starting to see the momentum now.”

Since prices continued to drop in February, May was the first month that prices began to increase in West Seattle after local homes were priced lower in April than they had ever been in the past three years.

However, prices have dropped further after short term increases around June of 2008 and January of 2009, and Gain said such “bounces” in median prices are fairly typical.

Buffalo Exchange, a consignment clothing store, will open on Market Street in the former Supercuts space Saturday June 20.

"We'll be ready and rearing to go tomorrow when we open," store manager Geeta Sood said.

The store has had a lot of positive feedback from potential customers leading up to their opening, and employees have high hopes for the store because they are right in the middle of everything in Ballard, Sood said.

"We are very excited to open," she said. We're excited to be in Ballard."

The 2,500 square-foot space was secured by Buffalo Exchange on April 20. The shop is at street level in the Ballard Square at 2232 N.W. Market St.

The Ballard location is Buffalo Exchange's second store in Seattle, since the Capitol HIll location closed. The other Seattle store is in the University District, which opened in 2001. The chain has 36 locations nationally in 13 states.

Next door, Boeing Employees Credit Union is under construction on their new space in the former Tux Shop location. They will be closing their location in the Ballard Safeway.

A letter was sent to Mayor Greg Nickels Thursday, June 18 by Wayne Barnett, executive director of the city's Ethics and Elections Commission, stating his agency found no evidence of favoritism in removing snow around the mayor's Admiral District home during the snowstorm this past winter.

This was in response to the mayor's March 20 letter sent to the commission requesting the investigation a day following The Seattle Times front page story reporting that favoritism did occur.

The letter from Barnett states:

Dear Mr. Mayor:

You asked the SEEC to investigate whether any aspect of the response to the December 2008 snow storm violated the Ethics Code, and to mete out any penalties if we found evidence of Ethics Code violations. We have completed our review and I have made the determination that
there is insufficient evidence to charge anyone with a violation of the Ethics Code. A copy of our report is attached."

Mayor Nickels recently told the West Seattle Herald, "There was a TV news van stationed near my driveway waiting to report on plows clearing the snow on my street first. No plows came. Our street was as bad as the others."

The June 18 Ballard Avenue Landmark Board election was a sweep for Conor Byrne.

Joseph Herrin, owner of the Conor Byrne building, beat Steve Mako, owner of the BalMar building, in the race for position one, reserved for property owners..

Patrick Wellnitz, owner of Conor Byrne Pub, beat John Burreson, owner of Old Town Alehouse, in the election for position two, reserved for business and property owners.

There were no candidates for position three, which is reserved for district residents, so the position will be filled by a mayoral appointment and city council confirmation.

The Ballard Avenue Landmark District was established in 1976 to protect the unique architectural heritage of the street.