The way property owners, architects and QFC tell it, the proposal to replace the Metropolitan Market with a two-story grocery and retail complex will be a valuable, pedestrian-friendly addition to Upper Queen Anne.But none of several hundred neighborhood residents and business people who attended two recent public meetings about the project believe the claims. In fact-judging from some hissing, booing and steamed comments at a Land Use Review Committee meeting Monday night this week-some Queen Anne residents are downright angry about the proposal.The proposal also failed to impress a capacity crowd at Ponti's last week during a Greater Queen Anne Chamber of Commerce luncheon. But property owner Christina Cox and a team of people from the project gave it their best shot in a presentation that included a Power Point slideshow of rudimentary architectural renderings."It's important to note the project is still evolving," Cox said of the lack of design detail. Also conspicuously absent from both the Chamber lunch and the committee meeting was any talk of how deliveries would be made to the grocery store.
Phil Lane Jr., the new chief executive officer of the United Indians of All Tribes Foundation (UIATF), has big plans for the organization.An internationally renown and award-winning activist and educator for indigenous peoples, Lane said he is looking forward to the local, regional, statewide, national and international growth of the UIATF.Appointed to the position in December after serving as interim CEO since last summer, he replaces former United Indians CEO Michelle Sanidad, who has taken the position of chief financial officer with the organization.In a way, it's a return to his roots for Lane, a compact 61-year-old who gives the impression of perpetual motion even when sitting down.Lane was part of the original group that founded the United Indians in the early 1970s under the direction of the late Bernie Whitebear, a man Lane describes as a friend and a mentor.
Nobody agrees about much of anything where graffiti is concerned.Whatever your personal feelings, whether you think graffiti is an artform, a public nuisance or a criminal offense, graffiti-in its many spellings and with its ubiquitous ugliness (or beauty)-is something we will be living with for quite a while yet in urban America, and increasingly in rural America, too.Some Seattle neighborhoods are harder hit than others. But the problem (or opportunity for expression) is keeping two Seattle firms busy removing what some folks, predominantly the owners of the buildings affected, see as visual litter, and others, particularly those self-described "writers," see as yet another form of public art, underground division.Grafitti Busters, located out near University Village, is keeping three employees working every day, and sometimes into the night.
Mayor Greg Nickels patted himself on the back last week at the Greater Queen Anne Chamber of Commerce luncheon, where he gave a "state of the city" talk."It's been a fascinating journey this past four years," he said. Noting that he was elected to his first term as mayor in 2001, Nickels said his focus from day one has been on safety and security. "We've had to make sure our city is safe from attacks like Sept. 11."But the mayor also said a major earthquake is more likely to happen than a terrorist attack in Seattle, and that thought segued into a brief discussion of city plans to replace or upgrade its aging fire stations. Two-thirds of them could fall down in a quake, Nickels said. "When you think about it, that's a real problem."
The Port of Seattle announced Feb. 14 it will begin preliminary work on a new container facility at Terminal 30, a move that would relocate cruise ship docking facilities to Magnolia's Terminal 91 at an preliminary estimated cost of $90 to $120 million.The port also authorized a new lease with SSAT to operate the facility once finished."This has been discussed internally for a few months now," said David Schaefer, spokesperson for the Port of Seattle. "It's our first big step."The next step, Schaefer added, will include revamping Terminal 30, previously used in 2002 as a container facility. When ocean carriers moved to other locations in the harbor, it reopened as a cruise docking area in May 2004.With the reopening of Terminal 30, located between East Marginal Way and East Duwamish Waterway, cruise ships would move over to Magnolia's Terminal 91, located near Interbay.
The United Indians of All Tribes Foundation (UIATF) has quietly dropped plans to construct a three-building People's Lodge project on its nearly 20 acres of leased land in Discovery Park.Raising the tens of millions of dollars for construction costs aside, the feeling was that the UIATF couldn't afford to maintain the existing Daybreak Star Indian Cultural Center, let alone a new complex, said Phil Lane Jr., the new chief executive officer for the American-Indian organization."The concept of a People's Lodge is no longer a $48 million building," he said. Instead, the UIATF board of directors agreed the People's Lodge is the land itself, "that this land, all of Discovery Park, needs to be preserved for the educational upliftment and heritage of future generations," Lane said.
BILL FRICK"No. I think that if we weren't bombing and killing so many innocent Muslim people, we could probably weather this free-speech storm and maybe even use it as a way to help convince the Muslim world into accepting our idea of free speech."SAM OWEN"No. If you have to worry about insulting everyone around you, no one is ever going to say anything. That is what is wrong with this country. We are too politically correct, and everything is sterile."IAN KAWABATA"I think that it is one of those situations where diplomacy is good, but I also think that the freedom to satirize and the freedom of speech are important. When people are offended by things like satire or humor, they may be missing the point and importance of the social commentary that is associated with the parody."
A strange but true family saga reminiscent of the film "It's A Wonderful Life" has inspired Phinney Ridge resident Kevin Moriarty's Irish-American play "A Rose for Danny."The three-act play is based on a 1957 incident that happened during Moriarty's childhood in Seattle, in which his grandfather, 74-year-old Jack McCoy, arrived at their doorstep. The family had believed McCoy to be dead, as a partly decomposed body was found floating in a Yakima irrigation ditch was mistakenly identified as McCoy. His relatives had grieved for him at a funeral a month before his appearance.The grandfather's arrival, which led newspapers to coin the term "the real McCoy," gave the McCoys and their in-laws an opportunity to make one final effort to come together as a family and forgive each other. The play recently was honored as one of the top four entries in the Christians in Theatre Arts' national playwriting contest.
I had the pleasure of spending the vast majority of my 20s in a mostly codependent marriage. So much so, that when she left and I was cast adrift on the single's scene at age 28, I had a lot to learn. The thing about dating is that it ties into just about every other arena of your life. Forget about your budget, your schedule and your friends' input. We're talking about self-image here. Being the socio-romantic creatures we are - hammered from all sides with media hype about love, romance, sex and partnership - it's a little difficult to say, "Sure, I'm single by choice. I like hanging out by myself, and masturbation is just as fulfilling as sex" and actually believe yourself.Then, too, I have found that I generally learn something on just about every date - whether it is about myself or the world in general.
The Seattle Wi-Fi Project - a pilot program that provides free, limited-range wireless Internet access - has experienced limited success since its debut in May 2005, especially in the University District.Though the Internet service for all three sectors of the Wi-Fi Project (it also services Columbia City and select city parks) is from the strong connection at the University of Washington, some project leaders say that unexpected hardware and software problems have hampered use of the service. "We've been working on it for six to eight months, but it's been a challenge of hardware and software from the city," said Teresa Lord Hugel, director of the Greater University Chamber of Commerce. The chamber was a key player in finding funding for the Seattle Wi-Fi Project in the U-District.
The weather was freezing, but the rhetoric was hot at a protest of city parks policies last Saturday, Feb. 25, at the south entrance to the Woodland Park Zoo. Around 150 people showed up, and they had a number of bones to pick with the parks department's projects that included the zoo parking garage, concerts in Gas Works Park, plans to cut down 17 trees in Occidental Square Park, installing artificial turf at Loyal Heights Playfield and the location of a new skateboard park in Woodland Park.The demonstrators came from all over the city, and a common theme for them was that Seattle Parks and Recreation pays little attention to citizen concerns - no matter what project is involved.
There are ghost people at the Frye Art Museum these days. They hover around the photographs by Candida Höfer. We can't see them, but clearly they were there a minute ago or they're about to reappear.This is one of the compelling features of "Architecture of Absence," the exhibition of 50 of Höfer's large-scale photographs of public rooms. She has invited us to enter some exquisitely rendered public spaces, and left us to enjoy them all by ourselves. As the Frye puts it, these are "spaces marked with the richness of human activity, yet devoid of human presence.
Mayor Greg Nickels last week shot down concerns from five city council members that substantially expanding Fire Station 20 in its present location could be a mistake.The council members - Tom Rasmussen, Richard Conlin, David Della, Jean Godden and Jan Drago - weren't convinced that a convincing case has been made for demolishing three Queen Anne homes to make room for an expanded firehouse. They suggested in a May 15 letter to the fire chief and Fleets and Facilities that an alternative location could serve better, or barring that, that the new station could be reduced in size so that all three homes wouldn't have to be demolished.Nickels didn't buy the argument. The Fire Facilities and Emergency Response Levy defines what an appropriate size for a new fire station is, and one with a reduced footprint doesn't fit that definition, according to a May 25 letter from the mayor to the five council members.
Still pondering the beauty, and from American eyes and culture, the fascinating quixotic nature of Japan - its people and culture. How can they exist in such closely packed throngs, whether it is to visit Nara, or to visit a major temple garden? I did notice that eye contact is almost nonexistent. Also, I learned from a friend who has spent more than 34 years visiting Japan that they have a word - garansuru - which translated for us means "to put up with." To watch their behavior as they negotiate through the crowds is an impressive study in body language and manners.
I'm writing this from Iraq. I've been in country now for almost nine months. Nine months! No "outs," as other journos call the not-too-frequent vacations. Just three weeks sitting in a hotel in Baghdad watching TV and playing video games. Not quite the out I needed, but it sufficed.Now I'm sitting here in the Green Zone waiting for a flight home. For good. I'll never return to Iraq after this trip. It's strange to write that. I've been here for so long - 22 of the past 28 months - that I've almost gone native. I speak some Arabic now. Have adopted the gestures the locals use. And despite serious cases of food poisoning and losing 15 pounds, I've learned to eat the local food with gusto.Sitting here has given me a lot of time to think about the past few months. It goes without saying I've seen a lot here. It's a war zone, and seeing death, destruction and mayhem is a fact of life. I've also twice seen the very tenet of democracy. I witnessed the last two elections that eventually set Iraq free of outright occupation by our country, although some might say that occupation is more behind the curtains now.There is no one experience that defines Iraq. This place is so wild and chaotic that ... it's hard to pin it down to just one time or place.