Entrepreneur Matt Jones has traveled the world, started a program to help the homeless and become an abstract painter of international acclaim. Now he has a new endeavor, at his own Gasworks Gallery in Fremont, called "paint dancing.""I dance and paint all the time because it's fun," Jones said. " I can't wait to paint dance with everyone else."Jones came up with the idea while painting and dancing with his friend Karen Fletcher, a qigong instructor. Fletcher, a Wallingford resident, dances at least twice a week."I'm able to enter a state where my heart completely opens and the mind stops," she said.In addition to her participation in the upcoming paint dancing events, she plans to integrate painting and qigong with Edmonds artist Miriam Drake starting in February."Dancing is my greatest expression of joy," Fletcher said. "I'm really drawn to painting, as well and vibrant colors."
The City of Seattle's charter states that "there shall be maintained adequate police protection in each district of the city."Do you feel we have enough police officers to keep our neighborhoods safe?Last September, Mayor Greg Nickels delivered his proposed budget to the City Council. Despite a strong local economy and budget-revenue forecast with millions of dollars in new revenue, the package did not include funding for one new sworn position in the Seattle Police Department (SPD).We must be safe, right? An increasing number of crimesThe growing numbers of crime victims in Seattle neighborhoods tell another story. Last year in Seattle, there were 47,600 serious crimes reported to police, including 25 murders, 139 rapes, 558 armed robberies, 2,344 aggravated assaults, 9,558 auto thefts, 6,756 burglaries and 155 arsons. Yet sadly, only 15 percent of these crimes resulted in arrests, according to the police department's own 2005 statistics. This means that thousands of serious crimes went unchecked and without consequences for the criminals, who remain free to go on perpetrating more crimes. For property crimes in particular, including burglaries and auto thefts, arrests are falling below 10 percent. Recently, Chief Gil Kerlikowske reported that, "In comparison with the 25 largest U.S. jurisdictions (including four of the West Coast cities), the property-crime rate (burglary, auto theft and theft of property) in Seattle ranks second only to Memphis, Tenn."
As I write, the Seattle School District is defending its policy of race-based school assignments to the U.S. Supreme Court. This is a hot-button issue that has gotten Seattle mentioned throughout the mainstream media.The school district's official defense for its race-based assignments is that it "enhances students' education by introducing them to people with multiple backgrounds and points of view." That may be what the bureaucrats at the school district tell themselves, but for many of the people who actually felt the brunt of their policies, opinions are quite different.Added challengesIn a recent column by nationally syndicated columnist George Will entitled "Justice or Racism?" he cited two parents, Jill Kurfirst and Winnie Bachwitz, who both felt that they were discriminated against. Both parents had children who were assigned to distant schools that required them to get up at 5 a.m. and return at 8 p.m. at the earliest. They only avoided this by taking their children out of the school district altogether.Jake Foxcurran, a student at University of Washington and vice president of the UW College Republicans, voiced concerns over the policy.
As part of an ongoing effort to clean up the University District, Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) has teamed with community members to look into bringing a new public recycling program to the area.If the city can afford an education effort to accompany the program, about 25 recycling containers will be placed throughout the University District as early as June. Without the education component, though, business owners and U-District residents fear the plan will fail. "The community is sort of saying 'hold off' until we have everything answered," said Teresa Hugel, executive director of the Greater University Chamber of Commerce. "They're working right now to find out if there's any money in the budget for an education campaign."If the containers are placed in the U-District, they will be anchored to the fluted, green garbage cans already bolted to the sidewalks. The recycling cans look similar to the garbage ones, only they're smaller and light blue.
At 9:25 on a December morning in 1992, a member of the Nobel Committee called Dr. Edwin Krebs at his Seattle home to tell him he was a co-winner of the Nobel Prize in medicine.Unfortunately, it was 3:25 a.m. local time, and he had no intention of answering the phone.The phone kept ringing all morning. Dr. Krebs took his first call at 7 a.m. It was an Associated Press reporter who wanted to interview him about his Nobel Prize. It was no joke. Krebs and his fellow researcher, Dr. Edmond Fisher, had won the Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine for their research at the University of Washington that revealed reversible phosphology in proteins. Krebs had no idea they were even being considered for a Nobel Prize. Besides, the research had been done in the 1950s.
January is a clean slate - the time to start doing the things you have wanted to do, that you know you should do, but have just not been able to.For some, the "thing" may be more homemade dinners that bring your family together in the evening. It means doing less of "It's 4 o'clock; what are we going to have for dinner?" Or, "where can I swing by on the way home and pick something up that we can eat for dinner?" Not that we all don't do this - some do it more often than others and some less guiltily than others.What I am suggesting is a little more meal planning for the week. I am not suggesting you sit down and plan an entire week. No, that can be too daunting for some, including myself. My suggestion is to take it three dinners at a time.
Seattle public relations veteran and long-time Magnolia resident Dan McConnell led the list of award recipients at the Holidays in Tinseltown annual Public Relations Society of America gala held in December.McConnell, a senior management consultant and officer at DDB Worldwide Communications, was given the Society's highest honor, the Jay Rockey Lifetime Achievement Award.With the distinction, McConnell becomes only the fourth professional to receive the award in the group's history.The evening gave McConnell a chance to celebrate his accomplishments and outstanding leadership in communications with almost 200 of his colleagues, clients, close friends and his wife, Jane.McConnell's award was presented by DDB public relations account director Dan Miller, who McConnell mentored when Miller came to the agency as an intern more than 10 years ago.
Last year was an eventful one for Magnolia and Queen Anne. The happenings included everything from grocery wars to several deaths at Fishermen's Terminal to the dropping of plans for a People's Lodge in Discovery Park. Here's a look at some of what happened:JANUARYSpeaking in Seattle at one of 163 "out of Iraq" meetings nationwide, U.S. Rep. and Queen Anne resident Jim McDermott was highly critical of Pres. George Bush and his neocon advisors for the Iraq war. McDermott blasted the Whitehouse for the spin it has put on the war and for its secret wiretaps of the American people.Numerous conservatives in Magnolia complained about the paper's coverage of the story.A new park in Magnolia was named the Ella Bailey Park. The park replaced a playground behind the long-closed Magnolia Elementary School on 28th Avenue West. A teacher for 30 years, Bailey originally sold the playground property to the Seattle School District.Fisherman John McDonald raised the alarm over safety issues at Fishermen's Terminal following the discovery in the nearby waters of fellow fisherman Kip Gilmartin's body. He'd been missing for three weeks, and McDonald, along with a couple dozen other fishermen at the terminal, charged that the Port of Seattle was to blame because the docks are slippery in the rain and cold weather.A planned neo-Nazi demonstration at the foot of the Space Needle drew around 100 protesters but no white supremacists.FEBRUARYThe Magnolia Chamber of Commerce named the Porcelain Gallery's Bert Lundh as business person of the year. The store first opened in 1973 and has developed a customer base that now spans the world. Lundh was the obvious choice for the award, said chamber president Glenn Harrington.Seahawks fans were badly disappointed at Super Bowl Sunday gatherings at the Boxcar Alehouse in Magnolia and Floyd's Place in Lower Queen Anne. It was the first time the Seahawks had made it to the Super Bowl, and while hopes were high for a home-team win, the Pittsburgh Steelers pulled off a controversial victory.
Welcome to the 11th year of selecting my annual list of the year's most overhyped and underreported stories. As usual, there's plenty to unravel: stories that should never have been stories, stories whose reporting largely missed the point and stories barely told at all. My national list of such stories is at www.workingforchange.com.Meanwhile, here are 2006's most underreported and overhyped stories from our own little corner of the universe.
It is that time of year again, when those of us undaunted by annual failure swear to improve ourselves via resolution.I find a great similarity between my feelings this time of year and every Thursday morning about 7:50 a.m., 10 minutes before I tee off for my weekly golf game at Jefferson up in Beacon Hill.Every single early Thursday morning I am convinced, immediately before tee time, that this will be my day.Records will fall-personal records, that is.Each and every week, usually around the sixth or seventh hole, concentration flags and balls start scurrying into the rough on both sides of the fairways, where my ball is supposed to go and has been landing for the first five holes.New Year's Day is Resolution Day, though, and despite whatever failure may be lurking, I cannot resist publicly stating my aims once again.
During last month's monumental windstorm and power outage, we heard-and saw-too little of the top three leaders of our government, and what little we heard came rather late. The top three leaders are Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, King County Executive Ron Sims and Gov. Christine Gregoire.One could argue how much statutory authority these folks have, but we elected them to be our leaders. Leadership involves more than getting the Legislature, or the city or county council, to run the leaders' agenda. (And our leaders certainly didn't let the storm and power outage derail them from talking up those agendas.)Leadership means helping the citizens of Seattle, King County and the state of Washington cope with insurmountable problems. It means coordinating the efforts of public safety agencies and public utilities. It means taking an active role in making sure that helpless and elderly people don't shiver in the dark without heat or food.
All the clichés have been written about the start of a New Year. Try as we might, the change is not easily ignored. So let's celebrate the obvious and indulge in our fantasies, known at this time of the year as resolutions.Be it therefore resolved that first we write a list of our top 10 resolutions. Then set up that list to automatically flash across our inboxes on the first day of each month. That certainly could become an interesting and quick reality check as the "new year" progresses.I suspect that by March or April, I would be sorely tempted to hit the delete button.
Like so many offspring of parents who retired on the East Coast, I need to fly from Sea-Tac to MIA (Miami International Airport) if I want to see Dad. Florida is where men like my father move to live out their lives in condominiums by the sea or subdivisions by golf courses that make up most, if not all, of their backyards and social lives.I like to wander the side streets of Dad's neighborhood where, today, I reach this working-class corner a mile north of the fashionable scene of South Beach. This is where real life zigzags away from the Art Deco beachfront, glitzy and make believe as cubic zirconia.I can't remember what the music transition is called when the bad thing is about to happen in a movie. Still, it's the turn I hear as I walk up to the Starlite Bodega, where people rush in to buy beer, cream to protect them from the sun they seek, inflatable rings to keep their kids afloat. Because here, a girl stands with torn and ragged clothing, her foot with a missing toe like a gap between teeth, her terrified eyes like moons in the midnight of her skin. I glance nervously at the man standing next to me. Through him I learn that these days when refugees wash up on the shores of Florida, it rarely makes the news. But they still come by the hull-full, and it's not unusual to walk the seafront at dawn and see a makeshift raft or crumbling rowboat beached on the sand.
Welcome to the 11th year of selecting my annual list of the year's most overhyped and underreported stories. As usual, there's plenty to unravel: stories that should never have been stories, stories whose reporting largely missed the point and stories barely told at all. My national list of such stories is at www.workingforchange.com.Meanwhile, here are 2006's most underreported and overhyped stories from our own little corner of the universe.
When Billy Wilder died early in 2002, halfway through his 96th year, we lost the last great director of Hollywood's golden age. He hadn't made a movie since 1981, but that scarcely mattered. Most of the films he'd directed, and at least half a dozen more he'd co-written for other filmmakers, had long since become permanent classics - movies to which audiences turn again and again as unfailingly entertaining pictures and, even more, as touchstones that remind us what good movies are supposed to deliver.This is all the more remarkable given that, for much of Wilder's career, and depending on the fickleness of popular taste at any moment, he often found himself a figure of controversy. Even when he was riding high, with one hit after another and frequent mention for awards, his scabrous wit and insistent pushing of the envelope of taste and decorum got him into trouble at least as much as it brought him admiration. He could seem ahead of his time because his films were outspoken about aspects of life and society other filmmakers hadn't dared even to think about. But that, too, could work against him; with the passage of a few years, what once seemed original and daring might have become passé. We build film series around directors, but he was a writer first - not just in terms of career chronology but in the essence of his creative focus. Legend has it that Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond, his last writing partner, insisted on giving their screenplay of "The Apartment" (1960) one final polish - several days after the film had won the Academy Awards for best picture, direction and original screenplay. But his work has also gifted us with dozens of "moments," distillations of mood, image, action, music and performance that finally no one can write.