July 2011

Press release:

Release some stress with free lunchtime Concerts in Town Square Park Tuesdays from noon to 2 p.m.

The concerts, presented by the Discover Burien Association, run July 12 through Aug. 9. Featured performers are:

July 12 - Dave Cooley (piano/vocal)
July 19 - Michael Gullo (jazz standards)
July 26 - Andy Burnett (singer/songwriter)
Aug. 2 - Todd Koeppen (rock/folk blues)
Aug. 9 - Eric Two Scoops (jazz/blues)

Discover Burien is a nonprofit organization that works on the economic development, promotion and marketing of Burien. Burien Town Square Park is located at Southwest 152nd Street and Fifth Place Southwest in downtown Burien.

For more information, call (206) 433-2882 or go online to www.discoverburien.com.

The High Point Farm Stand officially opens Wednesday, July 13, offering fresh organic produce picked right from the High Point P-Patch Market Garden. Located at 32nd Ave. SW and SW Juneau St, the farm stand will be open every Wednesday through September from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Fresh right now is spinach, carrots, leafy greens, new onions, peas, turnips and radishes, to name a few.

Seattle P-Patch Market Gardens is a partnership developed with the community by the P-Patch Community Gardening Program in collaboration with the Seattle Housing Authority and P-Patch Trust to support low-income gardeners.

Its mission is to establish safe, healthy communities and economic opportunity through Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) and farm stand enterprises.

To learn more about the Seattle P-Patch Market Gardens, visit:
www.seattle.gov/neighborhoods/ppatch/marketgardens/

By Christy Wolyniak, Intern

Saving money brings with it a new sound for a handful of Ballard residents who decided to capture rain instead of let it run all over them and leave them in puddles.

Seattle Public Utilities’ RainWise program pays residents to build their own rain gardens or install cisterns, which divert the amount of overflow that otherwise goes directly into sewers and Puget Sound. SPU will compensate 90 percent or higher based upon the square foot per roof water captured, making the cost of saving money appealing to many homeowners.

Ballard resident, James Bristow has been working closely with Bob Spencer, who is in charge of the Ballard RainWise project. Bristow has helped many of his neighbors with the installation of their cisterns as he is the only certified RainWise Installer in his neighborhood.

“I like the sound of free water. [The cisterns] gurgle when it rains,” said Ballard resident, Mark Davison. Though Davison’s neighbors initially did not like these ominous things near their house, they are now sharing the cistern to water their garden.

Once or twice a year I lose my mind. Well, I lose my mind daily, but I’m referring to a heightened energetic, variably irrational state that lasts for a week or so. I believe the term is called mania and it involves insomnia and scattered thinking, but tons and tons of energy.
I used to enjoy this state and it was with reluctance that I asked a therapist years ago whether or not she thought I was manic-depressive. If she said yes, I was afraid she would medicate my high away. If she said no, I wouldn’t have the reassurance of a label to understand my neurosis. She said no, leaving me to continue to self diagnose and treat myself in perhaps non-useful ways. “The four rounds of acupuncture sort of helped or was it merely the melatonin I started taking as well?” “Going to visit Jill and talking incessantly for forty eight hours seemed to help, maybe I just need to do that every year.” And the most recent reassurance, “Well, at least I’ll never be a meth addict, I like sleeping too much.”

The convenience store chain, 7-11 gave away free small Slurpees (in a special 7.11 oz size) to celebrate the company's 84th birthday. They planned on giving away more than 5 million between, yes, 7:00 am to 11:00 pm

Stores were crowded and West Seattle saw a lot of traffic as people stood in line to get their free frozen treat. A drive by the location at 16th s.w. and s.w. Holden revealed plenty of people in line.

Mark Moffatt and his daughter Vanessa stopped at the location on the corner of 35th and Barton to get what was her second Slurpee of the day. She's a competitive swimmer (she had just been to Colman Pool) and said the team loves them after a hard practice. Moffat said he's been enjoying Slurpees for years.

The name “Slurpee” was coined in 1967 by a 7-Eleven agency director. Today, there are 8,600 7-Eleven stores in North America and 41,500 around the world.

Normally they cost $1.19 plus tax for the small size.

There are 26 flavors on the market, all of which are carbonated and about half of which are based on popular sodas, such as Fanta and Pepsi.

Tukwila Village Associates, LLC, (also known as the Senior Housing Assistance Group/SHAG,) has been approved by the Tukwila City Council as the new developer for the Tukwila Village project, which was previously put on hold after the initial developer, Tarragon, LLC, backed out after the economic downturn.
The idea behind Tukwila Village is to have a mixed-use facility that includes retail and residential areas, public spaces and a new King County Library.

Mayor Jim Haggerton has been authorized to begin negotiations with Tukwila Village Associates, LLC.
Negotiation have already started with the King County Library System to bring a new library to the development.

Derek Speck, Tukwila's economic development administrator, outlined the next steps for the project:
Summer/Fall 2011: SHAG performs due diligence.

Summer/Fall 2011: Draft deal points presented to City Council.

Dec. 2011: Development agreements brought to council for consideration.

2012: Public involvement in design of site, plaza, indoor commons.

2012: SHAG completes design.

2013-14: Construction.

The King County Council's transportation committee will hold a public hearing at Burien City Hall, 400 S.W. 152nd St., on July 21 at 6 p.m. on proposed transit service cuts.

The hearing will be held in City Council chambers on the first floor.

"King County has a choice of cutting 17 percent of our transit service-taking the system back to 1996 service levels-or preserving current service levels by enacting a $20 congestion reduction charge on vehicles in King County," said committee chairman Larry Phillips. "These meetings are an opportunity for the public to learn about the proposed service cuts and weigh in on the future of Metro transit."

Due to the dramatic recession-driven drop in sales tax revenues, Metro Transit is facing a $60 million annual deficit between revenues and the cost of providing current levels of transit service, officials noted.

That shortfall would require Metro to shrink service by 600,000 hours of annual bus service over the next two years, or 17 percent of the entire system, which is the equivalent of cutting all weekend transit service or all weekday rush hour bus service for commuters, according to county staffers.

The Simplified Summer Food Program for Children is sponsored this summer by Highline Public Schools and the Des Moines Area Food Bank.

This program will provide free meals to children from 1 through 18 years of age for most weekdays at select local sites. All meals are available regardless of race, color, national origin, sex, age, or disability. Attending children need not be a Highline Public School student to benefit from this program. Please note that food may not be taken off the premises.

In the north part of the Highline area, Arbor Heights Elementary (135 S.W. 116th St.), Evergreen High School (830 S.W. 116 St.), Hilltop Elementary (12250 24th Ave. S.), The King County Park at White Center (1321 SW 102nd St.), Mt. View Elementary (10811 12th Ave. S.W.), New Start High (614 S.W. 120th St.), The Somali Community Services Center (15027 Military Rd. S., Upper Terrace #3), Southern Heights Elementary (11249 14th Ave. S.), The Southwest Boys and Girls Club (9800 8th Ave. S.), andWoodridge Park (12400 28th Ave. S.) will be serving meals and a snack.

Made of crushed rubber from old tires, the Evergreen High track just installed is "faster" than the cinder surface it replaced, according to track coach Tyrone Curry.

Evergreen's track is made of recycled rubber from a truck tire re-capping process. Atlas Tracks, Inc. out of Portand, Oregon did the work. No metal is involved. The bits of rubber are bagged and sent to the site where a trio of workers can take up to two weeks to put down the product in up to seven layers with a special gel coat sprayed between each layer. The odd shaped bits are raked and smoothed by hand. Gravity settles the track into a shiny, porous running surface. The underlayment is two inches or more of asphalt over the old cinder track. Atlas spokesperson Gary Logsdon said the track should provide 10-12 years of service before a re-coat is needed. Atlas is also installing a new running surface at Highline Stadium using a different product that can stand up to the greater use the stadium will get from district schools.

Eric "Protein" Moseley, the first homeless person to have his films screened on both coasts of the United States, has a challenge for Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn. He has challenged the mayor to spend 24 hours on the streets of Seattle to better understand homelessness in the Seattle region and the issues homeless persons face.

The title is, fittingly, "A 24 Hour Challenge to Mayor Mike McGinn."

Before beginning his documentary, Moseley lived for a few months at Grace Lutheran Church in Des Moines and Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in SeaTac.

His stays at these two churches "opened my eyes," he claims, relating how he found people who genuinely care about the homeless.

He described other situations where the homeless are "shuffled around." They receive their food, and are expected to move on. However, Moseley was pleased to find that during his stay at the two churches, people sat down with him after he got his food and engaged him in conversation. They were interested in talking with him, not just giving him meals.

His stay at Grace Lutheran also got him talking to Pastor John O'Neil about his plans to film his documentary.