April 2013

By Maggie Nicholson

Faye Franks was born on a small farm in 1918 in rural Kansas. Her parents, Ebon Rollo and Mattie Mabel Anderson, saw right away, that Faye was a strong and gifted child. The one-room schoolhouse teacher, who periodically boarded with students’ families, grew to know Faye and learned of her aptitude while staying at the farm. Though Faye was soon reading, her father would not allow her to attend school until she turned six the following February. She was then encouraged to pursue education, and she followed this counsel, thoroughly.

According to Eater.com, another brewery is coming Ballard's way: Stoup Brewing. Coming this summer, the brewery will have 15 barrels and owners Robyn Schumacher and Brad Benson want it to have an educational aspect, such as beer tastings or beer dinners (!?!?).

Apparently, the two both have a background in science, which should make the new brewery delightfully nerdy. Benson has 20-years-worth of experience as an environmental chemist and is a former East Coast brewer. His wife, Laura Zahaba, does marketing for Epicurean Wines, and will be using her skills for Stoup.

Here's what Benson writes in his first blog post for the new brewery:

Last night, the Ballard District Council (BDC) celebrated 25 years of existence. Along with the usual crowd of familiar faces, old faces showed up to the meeting, with memories stretching back to the very beginning of BDC's history.

BDC was created out of a neighborhood malcontent with city decisions on the age-old issue of land development. Residents, feeling encroached by development, said the city was not including them in the choices being made.

So, in 1987, the Seattle City Council adopted a resolution creating the "Neighborhood Planning and Assistance Program." This action established the Office of Neighborhoods, created the Neighborhood Matching Fund program and established the Neighborhood District system which authorized the formation of Neighborhood District Councils. Twelve district councils were formed (now 13), and Ballard, with its rag-tag group of engaged citizens, was the first to get rolling.

While BDC began more or less informally in April of 1988, the first official BDC meeting took place in June of 1989, and the first president was Rick McAbee.

If it's one thing Seattle has a lot of, it's trees. Counting just street trees maintained by SDOT, Seattle has 40,000. And that's not including trees in parks or on private property.

City Arborist Nolan Rundquist dropped by the Ballard District Council last night to chat about trees, a subject which curious residents had a barrel full of questions for.

Acting as Mediator

Mayoral candidate Peter Steinbreuck dropped by the BDC and asked a simple question of the Arborist: What do you do, exactly?

Rundquist explained that as City Arborist, he works as a mediator between the departments when it came to trees.

"Trees are one of the chunks of infrastructure that have to compete with a lot of different things," Rundquist said.

It's true: The Department of Transportation (street trees), the Department of Planning and Development (trees near pipes), City Light (trees near power lines) and Parks and Recreation (trees in a park or greenbelt) all have a stake when it comes to trees.

3rd Annual Duwamish Princess Angeline Native Tea Party, Sat., 1pm-3pm

From the Duwamish Tribe: Let's celebrate spring. We're breaking out the china and serving Native & English teas, scones & finger sandwiches with a lump of sunshine. Your hostess is Princess Angeline's great-great-grand-niece, Cecile Hansen, the Duwamish Tribal Chairwoman. Music by NW Native Flutist Paul Wagner. Tasty fun. Suggested donation $10.

Come early for opening of new gallery show by Seattle artist Gerrad Stockdale-- NW Fusion: Unlabeled in Seattle. Seattle icons are transformed by fusion with traditional NW forms. Meet the artist from Noon to 1pm.

More info and tickets at http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/366380

Duwamish Longhouse & Cultural Center
4705 W. Marginal Way SW
Seattle, WA

RSVP (206) 431-1582

Your used digital cameras are needed for a series of free photography workshops for under served youth produced by Art for Animals' Sake.

DROP-OFF LOCATIONS:

*Mind Unwind Gallery’s Treehouse Lounge, Tuesday-Sunday, 5pm-12am
*Beveridge Place Pub, Everyday, 2pm - 2am.

West Seattle Herald photographer Steve Shay is involved, and will help organization with camera donations and workshops. Check out his WS Herald article on project founder, David Walega, about giving cameras to Nickelsville youth to photograph their pets.

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND INFORMATION:

Start Date: April 10th, 6pm - 9pm 
End Date: May 1st


Contact: David Walega 
Cell: 206-713-1750


Email: david@artforanimalsssake.com

By Joshua McNichols

I heard you wanted to start a garden. I remember my first garden. It was in a P-patch. And if it weren’t for nosy P-Patchers offering me unsolicited advice, I’d probably still be buying bland cherry tomatoes in mid-summer at Fred Meyer. So at the risk of putting my nose where it doesn’t belong, I and three of my seasoned-gardener friends will now lean over our shovels and grant you the same favor.

How to Start an 8x8 Garden

The completely remade Roxhill Play area and skatespot will finally make its public debut on April 20 in a community celebration to celebrate the completion of the project. The park is located at 9244 29th Ave SW at the corner of Barton Street SW and 29th Ave. SW.

The event will feature Skate Giveaways, lessons, refreshments and live entertainment and will run from 11am to 2pm.

The play area features an all new Roxhill Castle, designed by Leathers Associates and assembled almost entirely by community volunteers. Just to the north is the new Skatespot built by West Seattle's Grindline Skateparks.

The organizations that will be thanked for their work will be the Roxhill Roxstars, California Skateparks (who worked on the design), Street League Skateboarding Foundation, the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods and Seattle Parks and Recreation.

The process to get the park remade began in 2011 and the plan, with plenty of community input, evolved through various playground equipment choices and skate park features.

Previous coverage of the development of the park:

At the April 10 meeting of the 34th District Democrats the organization passed resolutions opposing the commercial sale of Democratic voter databases, supporting public financing of campaigns in Seattle and opposing the use of chained CPI in Social security.

James Bush spoke in support of the election of Seattle City council members by district, and James Street spoke in opposition.

The meeting was live-tweeted under the hashtag #34thDems if you would like to follow them for future meetings or see a tweet by tweet recap.

Chair Marcee Stone-Vekich also announced the retirement of newsletter editor Jackie Dupras after 12 years of service - Jackie received a standing ovation.

The next meeting is on May 8th, which will be a candidates' forum.

A separate forum will be held on April 29th for Seattle Mayor.

A giant salmon will swim into Burien Town Square next week.

Actually, it’s FIN, a fiberglass salmon that children can walk through and learn about the life cycle of the salmon. It will be at the square next to the Burien Library, 400 S.W. 152nd St., on Wednesday, April 17 and Thursday, April 18, noon-7 p.m. each day.

The fun educational opportunity is hosted by Sustainable Burien and the Community Salmon Investigation (CSI.)

Burien resident Grace Stiller rented the fiberglass salmon from the North Olympic Salmon Coalition for display at Newcastle’s Earth Day celebration, beginning April 20.

Stiller contacted Sustainable Burien to see if the group wanted to display FIN before it swam over to the east side.

Besides volunteers to help with the educational display, Sustainable Burien is seeking a budding actor to “embody” or, more accurately, “in-body” the costumed Bert the Fish, who also may make a Town Square appearance.