Photo by Yuek Hahn in the Beacon Hill Blog photo pool on Flickr.The Seattle Times reports that the Pacific Hospital Preservation and Development Authority governing council voted this morning to continue discussions with both entities interested in a long term lease of the landmark PacMed building.
On Monday, the state rejected the 30-year lease the PDA recently proposed, stating that more time was needed to perform due diligence. This morning, the governing council met to discuss the alternate deal on the table by Miami-based homebuilding company Lennar, which would take out a 75-year lease and convert the building to market-rate apartments.
The council voted today to continue discussions with Lennar, and also to meet with the state to determine whether the issues between the two sides can be resolved.
In the state’s plan, Seattle Central Community College would use 85,000 square feet for health-training programs, including a new Bachelor of Nursing degree. Non-profit groups focusing on community health and social services would form an “innovation center” that would take up the remaining floors of the building.
If you want to let the Pacific Hospital Preservation and Development Authority know your thoughts on the current situation, contact Rosemary Aragon, the Executive Director of the PDA at r.aragon@phpda.org or by mail to 1200 12th Ave. S, Quarters 2, Seattle, WA 98144.
Photo by Wendi Dunlap.The Seattle Times reports tonight that the state Department of Commerce has rejected the proposed lease agreement that would have put Seattle Central Community College health-training programs and other non-profit agencies in the 1932 Art Deco landmark PacMed building, which most recently housed the Amazon corporate headquarters.
The public authority that owns the building, the Pacific Hospital Preservation and Development Authority, proposed a 30-year lease that would require the state to provide $250,000 in exchange for 60 more days to conduct due diligence evaluation of the building’s condition. The state would prefer 90 days to conduct its due diligence.
The PDA’s governing council has said that if the state did not agree to this lease by Monday evening, they would turn to “other lease alternatives.” The other lease offer on the table is from Lennar, a Miami-based homebuilder that offers a 75-year lease with $25 million in improvements to create 165 market-rate one- and two- bedroom apartments, a gym, and a dining lounge.
The Seattle Central Community College plan, funded with $20 million approved by the Legislature, would use 85,000 square feet for health-training programs, including a new Bachelor of Nursing degree. Non-profit groups focusing on community health would take up the remaining floors of the building.
Added 11:21 p.m.: If you want to let the Pacific Hospital Preservation and Development Authority know your thoughts on the current situation, contact Rosemary Aragon, the Executive Director of the PDA at r.aragon@phpda.org or by mail to 1200 12th Ave. S, Quarters 2, Seattle, WA 98144. She will forward your letters to the members of the Board.
A still from Tess Martin’s They Look Right Through You.Beacon Hill’s own Tess Martin, a multi-faceted animator who’s been featured at the Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF), presents an evening of animated shorts on Saturday, August 3, at 4 p.m. at Capitol Hill’s Northwest Film Forum.
The show, curated by Martin and titled Strange Creatures: Contemporary Independent Animation From Seattle, features ten short subjects from seven local animators, all members of the Seattle Experimental Animation Team, and all focused — for the purposes of this show — on animal and/or nature themes.
The best-known artist in the show is probably Seattle native Bruce Bickford. Mr. Bickford made several clay animations for Frank Zappa and is featured in his own documentary, Monster Road, named for an actual road in his old neighborhood. A longtime master in clay, Bickford’s been working more recently in pencil animation. The show features an excerpt from a pencil-drawn work-in-progress, Dream Of A Beatnik Poet.
Ms. Martin included two of her own works: The Whale Story, animated on a 16-foot wall at Seattle’s Cal Anderson Park, and They Look Right Through You, a mediation on the difficulties of understanding house pets, shot using marker-on-glass animation.
Webster Crowell presents a coming-attraction teaser for his Rocketmen project, an old-style segmented movie serial about government sentinels left behind by a changing world, waiting for their chance to shine anew. Drew Christie’s Song Of The Spindle features a heated debate between a man and a whale on the subject of who’s really the smartest species on Earth.
Christie also contributes Hi! I’m A Nutria, shot for the New York Times, about a rodent who’s arrived and wants to go native. Britta Johnson’s Crashing Waves explores the psychological travails of two shipwreck survivors washed up on a desert island. Are they controlling nature, or are they losing their exhausted minds?
Clyde Petersen’s Harsh Tokes And Bong Jokes takes us back to the agony, the ecstasy, and the parts perhaps better forgotten, of young people growing up queer in 1990s Seattle. Stefan Gruber looks at slightly younger people in his Edible Rocks short, the story of the animator playing a prank on his baby brother.
Another Britta Johnson work, King Kong Kitchie Kitchie Ki-Me-Oh, concludes the program, using watercolors to depict the courtship of a frog and a mouse. The soundtrack song is by Laura Veirs, featuring the banjo of Bela Fleck.
Each guest will receive a zine program designed by Seattle cartoonist Marc Palm, featuring portraits of the filmmakers by comic artist Kelly Froh.
The screening takes place on Saturday, August 3, at 4:00 p.m. at the Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave. Tickets are $10 for the general public, $6 for Film Forum members, and $7 for seniors, children under 12 and students with valid photo ID. Tickets may be purchased online at the Film Forum website.
Mr. K (Kent Stevenson) performed at the June 2013 Beacon Rocks! event. Photo by Wendi Dunlap.Today the free Beacon Rocks! festival returns to Roberto Maestas Festival Street from 1-5 p.m. with the theme: “Move It! Transportation Exploration!”
Along with four hours of local music, other activities will include making and decorating your own hula hoop, and building a paper boat to sail in the wading pools.
Here’s the entertainment schedule:
1:00 p.m. Random Axe – featuring Jack LeNoir and Betty Jean Williamson
Heading north on 12th Avenue South this weekend? You’ll need to detour.
First Hill Streetcar project construction will close the northbound lane of 12th Avenue South to through traffic from South King Street to South Jackson Street, starting on Saturday, July 27 at 7 a.m. and continuing until Monday, July 29 at 5 a.m. A detour will be set up here on Beacon Hill, with the diversion starting at 15th Avenue South at South College Street, where traffic will be diverted east, then north on Rainier Avenue South, then west on South Jackson Street to 12th Avenue South.
The intersection of South Jackson Street and 12th Avenue South will remain open to eastbound, westbound, and southbound traffic. Also, 12th Avenue between South King Street and South Jackson Street will remain open to northbound local access traffic, and pedestrian access and access to businesses will be maintained.
Photo by Gavin. St. Ours via Creative Commons/Flickr.Upping Technology for Underserved Neighborhoods (UPTUN) needs your help by signing a letter requesting changes that would make it easier for new broadband investments to come to Beacon Hill (and other neighborhoods), improving the speed and reliability of broadband service available to Beacon Hill neighbors.
Here is an appeal from UPTUN’s Robert Kangas, asking neighbors to sign a letter to the Seattle Department of Transportation. To sign the letter, post here with your name (real name, please) and your affiliation — for example, “John Doe (Beacon Hill resident)” or “Jane Doe (Owner, Doe’s Beacon Hill Widgets).”
Hey all, UPTUN’s going to be sending a letter to SDOT to try to force some change to the Director’s Rule that’s effectively blocking new broadband equipment from rolling out in Beacon Hill and the other underserved areas of Seattle. Most of us are stuck with the choice of a cable provider or nothing for high-speed internet. Well, we’re all tired of it. It’s time to take action.
We’re looking to get as many cosigners as possible before we stick copies of this in the mail on Saturday. Will you add your name to the list of supporters of this letter? The more supporters we get, the better the chances of a good, timely outcome. The time to act is now.
Will you put your name down? Will you get your fellow neighbors / nearby business owners to do so, as well? If you’re going to do so, please give me your name and what organization / business or part of the city you belong to. For example: Robert Kangas (UPTUN member) or Robert Kangas
(Beacon Hill resident).
Denise Louie Education Center at 3327 Beacon Ave. S. is one of three Seattle preschools who will share $470,000 in funding from the 2011 Families and Education Levy as part of the City of Seattle’s Step Ahead preschool program. (The school also has branches in the International District and Rainier Beach.)
The funding will increase slots at Denise Louie for 20 children to attend part-time, for a total grant of $126,240. Denise Louie was one of nine preschools applying for the funds, which were intended to serve low- and moderate-income families of three- and four-year-old children who live in the attendance areas of Seattle elementary schools that are eligible for Families and Education Levy funding.
Slots are available at Denise Louie and the other Step Ahead preschools for the coming school year. To be eligible, children must be three or four years old by August 31, 2013, must live in Seattle city limits, and their family must meet the income guidelines based on family size. See the web page for more information.
Interested in learning how to make solar energy at your home more affordable? A workshop will run from 6-7:30 p.m. tonight at the Beacon Hill Library (2821 Beacon Ave S.) to provide information about the Solarize Seattle program, which features a group-buy program to provide a streamlined process for residents and small businesses to purchase solar systems for a discounted price.
Workshop attendees will learn how solar works in oft-cloudy Seattle, how it is installed, what tax and production incentives are available to bring the price down, and how low-interest financing can spread out the cost. On June 30, Governor Inslee signed an extension through 2016 of the sales tax exemption on solar systems smaller than 10kW (which a typical residential system would be). The Solarize campaign intends to install over 200 kilowatts of solar energy in central and southeast Seattle by the end of 2013.
Registration for Solarize Seattle: Central/Southeast is open to neighbors who live in the geographic area bordered by the Montlake cut to the north, I-5 to the west, Lake Washington to the east, and the City of Seattle boundary to the south. See the website for more information.
Neighborhood kids are invited to take part in the Orca Reading Club at the Beacon Hill and Columbia City libraries. All kids are welcome; it’s not limited to Orca students. Books will be provided, and students will work toward prices including books and entries into a raffle for lunch with Mayor McGinn.
Beacon Hill musicians, poets, and more — you’re wanted for the Beacon Hill Boombox, a collection of recordings by Beacon Hill artists. The recordings will play in several neighborhood businesses in August and September.
Here’s the announcement:
Are you a recording artist who lives or works on Beacon Hill?
GET IN THE BOOMBOX!
We are creating the Beacon Hill Boombox, an audio catalogue of artists who call Beacon Hill home. In August and September, the boombox will be located in several different neighborhood establishments, featuring the diverse sounds and expressions of Beacon Hill for all to listen to and experience on cassette tapes. We want to hear you!
Submit your recorded work –- music, poetry, anything recorded! –- in order to be part of this project. Your recordings will also be featured online on a digital archive.
