All posts by Wendi Dunlap

Editor of the Beacon Hill Blog.
Beacon Bits

Beacon Bits: Grant money, free acupuncture, and a flying cart

2 Comments
One of our Beacon Hill neighbors hanging out on a tree. Photo by Freeman Mester in the Beacon Hill Blog photo pool on Flickr.
We missed this, so we have to thank the Rainier Valley Post for bringing it to our attention. Last year, Jason lamented that the 2009 Neighborhood Business District grant money passed our neighborhood by. Things have changed. The new Beacon Merchants Association recently received a 2010 Neighborhood Business District grant from the city’s Office of Economic Development (OED), to be used for membership outreach and board training.

* * *

Beacon Pub is starting a Trivia Night every Wednesday at 7:00 pm. It’s free to play, and the current first place prize is a $20 coupon for pub drinks and food. Up to four players are allowed per team. The weekly event is organized and hosted by members of the community.

* * *

A member of the BAN list posted a runaway tale to that mailing list the other day:

“A shopping cart was sent flying down Grand Street in the middle of the night (last night) with a giant television in it. It crashed on 12th, making an awful mess. Fortunately, no one was hurt, and all property seems unscathed.” Police and the Illegal Dumping Department were contacted.

* * *

There’s a lot happening on Beacon Hill these days. Don’t forget to check our Events page to keep track of everything going on, including events like the following:

CommuniChi Community Acupuncture has two Free Acupuncture Days for new patients on Friday, August 13, and Saturday, August 14. You can reserve a spot using their online scheduler. The clinic is located at 2524 16th Avenue South, #301, inside the El Centro building.

* * *

The League of Women Voters is holding a Primary Election Forum at Seattle First Baptist Church (Harvard and Seneca), on Thursday, August 5, from 7:30 – 9:00 pm to hear statewide candidates for two State Supreme Court seats and local King County Council District 8 candidates. (Part of Beacon Hill is in District 8.) King County Council District 8 voters will choose among four candidates in the August 17 primary election. For more information contact the League office at 206-329-4848, visit the website, or email info@seattlelwv.org.

* * *

The Second Annual Rizal Park Fest will take place on Sunday August 15 from 12 noon to 8:00 pm at, you guessed it, Dr. Jose Rizal Park, across from Pac Med/Amazon. There will be nine live bands along with food vendors, artists, and activities for the whole family. See the website for more, and please note that volunteers are needed!

Crime

Parked perv problem on North Beacon

4 Comments

Neighbor Lina wrote to warn us about an unsavory individual on North Beacon Hill. She saw a white van SUV pull over in front of her and park near Daejeon Park. The windows on both sides of the van SUV were rolled down, and inside was a white, baseball-cap-wearing, masturbating male. When Lina returned with a camera to get a picture of the van’s SUV’s license plate for the police, it was gone. She reports that the license plate started with a B and ended with an H.

(5:00 pm: Article updated to correct description of the vehicle. — Ed.)

Local Events

Tonight is Seattle Night Out

Seattle Night Out is tonight! Night Out is an evening event in which communities hold block parties where neighbors can connect with each other and organize their neighborhoods against crime. We haven’t heard about very many neighborhood parties this year, but we do know of a couple:

  • The Jun Hong Kung Fu and Sports Association is hosting an event from 7:00 until 9:00. There will be a Lion Dance performance, a Kung Fu demonstration, and coconut ice cream. Please bring a dessert to share. All are welcome! The Jun Hong Kung Fu and Sports Association is located at 4878 Beacon Avenue South.
  • Krizten Breidenich is hosting a North Beacon block party from 6:00 to 10:00 pm in the 2000 block of 12th Avenue South, between Hill and Plum streets. Plates, utensils, napkins and non-alcoholic beverages will be provided. Please bring donations to cover the costs, as well as “stuff to grill, a dish to pass or your beverage of choice.”

    • Is anyone else hosting a Night Out event tonight? If so, please post in the comments.

Local Events

More music and dance at Sunday’s Beacon Rocks!

The Screaming Starts performed at the last Beacon Rocks! Photo by Wendi.
The third Beacon Rocks! event is this Sunday, August 8, from 1:00 – 5:00 pm at the Lander Festival Street, on South Lander between 16th Avenue South and 17th Avenue South (though we fear the Blue Angels may drown it out at times). Here’s the lineup of this weekend’s show:

Naugahyde: a two piece rock set – percussion, Theren Hayes and guitar/vocals, Jeff Wendland.

Deception Pass: a local youth rock band including Ian, Finn, Anders and Raphi who created the group in 2007 when the members were in fifth grade at Kimball Elementary.

Zumba: West African dance and exercise demonstrations by Carol.

Excuse You: original adult contemporary rock.

Blue55: blues, R&B, and “vintage rock and roll with a garage band feel and attitude.”

Kevin Gibbons: calls himself a “hack songwriter,” but the Beacon Rocks! people say “he’s actually a ‘really good songwriter.'”

The Middle Age Crisis Band: “a hard pumping, fun and punkish/J-pop style band that plays all original music (sometimes in Japanese).”

Lost and Found

Is this your cat?

7 Comments

Neighbor Lynn has been adopted by a cute kitty who may be lost:

“For the past six months or so, this russian blue cat with green eyes has been sneaking into my house and ‘sharing’ my cats’ food. I live near the corner of Beacon and Columbian. I assumed it was just because he liked what I was serving better than his own home, but now I’m begining to wonder if he’s homeless… I suspect someone is missing this guy, since he’s been full-on living here for a while now. He’s super talkative, with an amazing vocabulary, lots of rolling R’s. Very affectionate, a bit skittish. No collar. This cat has a very unique tail, I’ve never seen anything like it. If someone has any info on this cat, please email me at lynnard666-at-comcast.net. thanks!”

(Another photo is after the jump.) Continue reading Is this your cat? →

Photos

Red sunset

The red sun last night was caused by smoke in the atmosphere from forest fires. Photo by Jason.
Alley art near McClellan. Photo by melissajonas in the Beacon Hill Blog photo pool.
Doll in the sunset light, in the window of the about-to-close Three Brothers Cleaners/Gift Shop a couple of weeks ago. Photo by Wendi.
Crime

Alemu attackers sentenced

3 Comments

Two of the men who attacked Dawit Alemu last June at 13th and Holgate near Beacon Hill International School were sentenced yesterday for their roles on the attack. Jaynus Speed and Kenneth Fisher pleaded guilty to second-degree assault and first-degree attempted robbery. Speed was sentenced to three years and Fisher to two years and eight months in prison. Last September a third attacker, Justin Phillips, was sentenced to ten years in prison after he pleaded guilty to first-degree assault and first-degree attempted robbery. A fourth attacker who, like Speed, Fisher, and Phillips, was photographed by a nearby witness has not been found.

KING5.com has a report including comments from Alemu, who has made a remarkable recovery from the severe injuries he received in the attack, which occurred one day before his community college graduation.

Recreation

Jefferson Park opening delayed by a month

2 Comments
It will all be worthwhile when the fences come down. Photo of Jefferson Park last year by Joel Lee in the Beacon Hill Blog photo pool on Flickr.
Andy Sheffer from Seattle Parks and Recreation sent out a letter yesterday with some disappointing news:

Dear Jefferson Park Community,

We are all excited about the opening of Jefferson Park and the construction crews are on the home stretch. We were hopeful that we would be able to open the park early because the general contractor was ahead of schedule. Unfortunately, we need to change the proposed park opening date from Saturday, September 18, 2010 to October 23, 2010 (or thereabouts) for the following reasons:

  • Despite commitments, the landscape installation is not progressing at the rate needed for completion by September.
  • If we hurry the contractor to complete the final work I know that a lot of important “finessing” will be omitted. Our commitment is to ensuring that the final product is as optimal as possible.
  • Several areas on site contain unsuitable soils for paving. These areas have to be over-excavated and filled with suitable material. We waited until now in the hope that the areas would dry out but that has proven not to be the case.

I was made optimistic by the progress of general contractor at the onset of the project. Unfortunately, the detailed finish work has been painstakingly slow. The contractor was given a specific number of days to finish the project and it’s their prerogative to utilize as many contract days as necessary to finish.

While I understand that this is disappointing news, I hope that you will understand a delay of one month will pay great dividends in terms of delivering a park project that is as nearly perfect as we are able to achieve. And, the news is not all bad. We anticipate that the play area will open by the end of August. (Emphasis ours — BHB.) I look forward to celebrating the grand opening of this wonderful park with you in October.

Please feel free to contact me anytime to further discuss the project.

Respectfully,

Andy Sheffer

If you have questions, you can reach Andy Sheffer at andy.sheffer@seattle.gov.

Getting Around

Construction, Seafair to cause traffic delays

Look up next week and you might see these guys flying right over your head. Photo by Wendi.
It’s construction season, which means there are a lot of projects that will cause delays and reroutes to travelers on Beacon Hill and in nearby areas. There are so many projects that rather than list them all, we’ll send you to the lists on the Seattle Department of Transportation website: Sodo projects, South Seattle projects.

You might particularly want to note a few special events. The Seafair Torchlight Run will cause the northbound lanes of the Alaskan Way Viaduct to be closed tonight from 5:45pm to 7:45pm, and the Torchlight Parade will close Fourth Avenue all the way from Broad Street near Seattle Center, south to Qwest Field. Next week, the Blue Angels will return to buzz Beacon Hill on August 5-8, in the process closing I-90 to traffic from 9:45am to noon and 1:15 to 2:30pm on August 5, and from 12:45 to 2:40pm on August 6-8.

Among other construction projects in the area, this week a crew worked on the new pedestrian-activated flashing light crosswalk that is being installed next to the library at Beacon and Forest. Photo by Jason.
Education

Jefferson CC hosting LEGO camps for kids

2 Comments
Photo by Alan Chia.
Jefferson Community Center is hosting LEGO day camps from August 30 through September 3. There are two camps offered, a Pre-Engineering camp from 9:00am – noon for ages 5-6, and an Engineering Fundamentals camp from 1:00 – 4:00pm for ages 7-12.

In the Pre-Engineering camp, kids will build cities, bridges, and motorized cars and planes, with the help of a Play-Well Engineering instructor. In the Engineering FUNdamentals camp, students take on real-life engineering challenges that explore concepts in physics, architecture, mechanical and structural engineering with over 100,000 pieces of LEGO material. It is a “hands-on and minds-on course suitable for LEGO novices to ‘maniacs.'”

The activity fee for the camp is $125. For registration information, please contact the Community Center at 206-684-7481.