August 2015

On Tuesday evening Michael Taylor-Judd and Pete Spalding, representing VIEWS, presented a check to Angie Ramirez (Manager of the Delridge Community Center) and Jesus Aguirre (superintendent of the Seattle Parks Department).

This check is in fulfilling a portion of VIEWS commitment to building community in our Delridge neighborhoods. The check is a donation of a portion of the sponsorship dollars from the 10th Annual Delridge Day Festival that was held on August 8th at the Delridge Community Center complex.

VIEWS (Visualizing Increased Engagement in West Seattle)is a non-partisan community organization comprised of local citizens creating programming toeducate, engage and mobilize West Seattle citizens to sustain and improve
the quality of life and services available across the peninsula. To learn more about VIEWS we invite you to visit our webpage at www.wsgathering.org
or www.views.community .

Two brothers living in Ballard have started the first African-American winery in the state.

Their label, Carter-Lamour, takes its name from the middle names of the Dreux and Dain Dillingham. Between the two of them, they have almost 15 years in the industry, and being the first of it’s kind is something they said they didn’t try for, it just worked out that way.

“It’s important for us to recognize that and for people to recognize it. It really wasn’t our intention, it just kind of happened. It’s super cool, and we are happy to be the ones who are doing it. Our mother always said to break down walls, and this is one that we ended up doing, I guess,” said Dreux.

The brothers learned their craft working in Walla Walla, and their winery is the fruit of their love for wine and their bond as brothers. Not only is it the first black owned winery, Carter-Lamour is a project Dreux and Dain started to support long term care for a spinal injury Dain sustained in August 2013.

The 2015 Champagne Gala Brunch fundraiser for the Southwest Seattle Historical Society set for Nov.7 got a rousing kick off with more than 60 people in attendance at a preview party for the event, held at the Colman Estate on Aug. 27.

The November event, themed as “Coming Home to the Homestead” will feature local broadcaster Marty Riemer is taking place at 11 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 7, 2015, at Salty’s on Alki, 1936 Harbor Ave. S.W.

The “Coming Home to the Homestead” theme takes off from the launch of restoration for the Alki Homestead. Rimmer will host a podcast at the event called “Wait, Wait, West Seattle … Don’t Tell Me!”

He will head a panel of West Seattle-based luminaries and quiz them on how much they know about the Alki Homestead and the rest of the Duwamish peninsula.

Also featured will be a presentation by Catherine Gruye Alexander and Rob Gruye, daughter and son of 1950s Alki Homestead chef and manager Robert Gruye.

information from Washington State Lottery

It was an ordinary day at work for Jerry Nitschke of Seattle, until he took his lunch break and scratched a winning $150,000 Lottery ticket. Nitschke purchased the “Extreme Crossword” Scratch ticket on August 8 from a local Safeway (2622 California Ave SW).

“I drive a bus in West Seattle and decided to pick up a Scratch ticket on my break. When I scratched it, I thought it was for $500! I didn’t realize until a few hours later the ticket was for way more,” he shared with a laugh.

Nitschke told Lottery officials something unusual – his friends weren’t surprised at all. “First, I told my friend Joe. All he said was, ‘Oh boy, here we go again.’” It turns out this wasn’t the first time Nitschke has won. “In December of 2012, I won $50,000 on a Scratch ticket. I guess I’m just lucky!”

When asked how he plans to spend the money, Nitschke came up with a few ideas, but was most excited about making his favorite hobby a little more spectacular. “Maybe I’ll buy a new hot rod, a Chevy El Camino! I’ll absolutely use some of the winnings to work on restoring some of the cars I already own.”

“848 steps. 52 stories. 1 memorable climb,” goes the tagline for the October 3 climb from the base of the Space Needle all the way up to its Observation Deck via two intertwining stairwells, a.k.a. the Base 2 Space stair climb.

This is the first time in the iconic structure’s 53 years that the public has been granted access to use the stairs and for the occasion the Space Needle has partnered with the Fred Hutch Cancer Research Center.

For this historic benefit the West Seattle Herald’s own reporter Tim Clifford will be participating and covering the event at the same time. If any of our readers would like to donate please visit http://www.classy.org/tcwestseattle.

Any readers who donate to this page are asked to send their name along as well so we can thank them in print after the climb. If you wish to donate anonymously that is perfectly fine as well.

By Peggy Sturdivant

This week I learned that even if you’ve never heard a coyote kill a cat before, you know it when you hear it. Although I like to think of myself as eager to learn every day, there will always be things that I wish I’d never heard and never witnessed.

I’d love to forget the cat kill and ugly tone from some attendees at the city-run meeting on transitional encampments at the Sons of Norway Lodge on August 12th, but it’s not a choice. I think my husband’s night lesson is that if you are already having trouble sleeping then reading an on-line blog by someone in Dayton, Ohio writing about “Nimbyism” in Ballard is not a good idea. You will not go back to sleep, your mind will race and if the cat begs to go out, you may say, “Fine, go look for the coyote.” (Okay, that was me, not him).

At around 12:36 a.m. Wednesday morning the Seattle Police Department took to social media to ask for the public's help in locating toddler Kevin Szal who was taken while his mother was in the hospital. About two hours later, around 2:36 a.m. the SPD Blotter page was updated with the short note "missing toddler has been found in Burien".

Szal, 20-months-old, had been missing since Aug.23 while his mother was receiving treatment at Harbor View Mediacal Center. She was told that her child could not be in the treatment room with her without additional adult supervision. The mother asked an acquaintance known as Michael Mau to take the child so she could pick him up later.

That was the last time she had seen her child or heard from Mau.

On Aug.25 the mother raised concerns about what had happened to her son with a hospital social worker. The SPD became involved once this social worker relayed the mother's story to them.

information from King County Sheriff

Dan Shaw, who worked as a KCSO deputy in White Center for the last 27 years, completed his final service to the community by feeding the homeless.

The Sheriff’s Office hired Shaw in 1988 after he left the US Air Force. Shaw happily worked the vast majority of his career serving the citizens of White Center. On August 23rd, his last day as a deputy, Shaw bought eight buckets of chicken and all of the sides to feed the homeless in the community where he loved to work.

In a letter to some of his coworkers upon his retirement, Shaw stated, “Thanks for the many wonderful memories….. especially to all of my cop friends……and to the wonderful dispatchers and call receivers that have their hands and (foot), literally on the heartbeat of patrol…...thank you from the bottom of my heart. I wish I could just ramble on about the people that have helped me throughout my career. It is a team and a family that I will miss. If you have any kind thoughts about me in any way, shape, or form, it is because of your partnership with me. “

By Tim Clifford

With two pre-season games in the can and the hotly anticipated regular season set to kick off on September 13 it was only a matter of time before the horror stories of the “12th Man” being taken by ticket scammers began rolling in. This past weekend the King County Sheriff’s Office issued a warning to fans about online ticket scams and related the story of a recent arrest made in Seattle.

Earlier this month Tacoma resident Justin Stevens, 19, listed his tablet on the website Offerup.com in exchange for tickets to a Seahawks game. He was contacted by a 32-year-old man, the suspect, who told him he had tickets he would be willing to trade. They arranged to meet in Seattle.

After Stevens traded the man his tablet for the tickets the suspect then threw out the offer that for an additional $35 he would throw in an extra ticket. Excitedly Stevens accepted the offer and drove back home with the tickets. Once at home he realized that something didn’t feel right. The deal seemed much too good to be true.

It’s clean-up time for the Ballard Bridge. The Graffiti Rangers plan to remove graffiti from the underside of the bridge on Saturday, Aug. 29 from 7:30 a.m. until no later than 3:30 p.m. Sidewalks will remain open, but the right-hand lanes, both southbound and northbound, will be closed to accommodate the equipment.

To reach this area, SDOT crews will provide their U-BIT (under bridge inspection unit) which is positioned on the deck of the bridge and has an arm that can bend around and under the bridge. There is a bucket at the end of the arm to carry a person to work or inspect the underside of the bridge.