Aaron Dixon, co-founder and captain of the Seattle Black Panther Party, graduated from Garfield in ’68 and into a full-time job as a militant revolutionary. I picked up a copy of My People Are Rising at a packed reading by Dixon at Black Coffee Co-op on Capitol Hill last month.

Why You Need this on your Shelf

The book is a beautiful object. The cover art is striking, the matte finish pleasing to hold. Perhaps the most charming production element is the collection of portraits of family members, friends and heroes that seem to bring the late 60s to life. Dixon’s writing here is formal—almost like it was written by a grammarian high school English teacher. And yet, the tenor of the 70s comes on occasionally like a radio transmission intercepted from the past:

“All power to the people, Comrade,” he said. “Did Tommy and the brothers break down for you what the party is about?” Bobby asked. “There is a lot of s*** for you to learn, brother. We got a lot of work to do. We gotta keep these pigs from killing Brother Huey. I want you to go up to the jail and visit him before you leave. You dig?”

“Right on, Bobby,” I answered. Continue reading →

Seattle voters approved more than $1.25 billion in new school levies in early results from Tuesday’s special election.

The approval continues “a decadelong record of ballot box success” for school levies in the city, the Seattle Times reported.

Included in projects that will be funded by the new levies is a $14.5m line item to modernize and re-purpose the Meany school campus in the Miller Park neighborhood of Capitol Hill. Here’s information on how to get involved in the planning for that project.

The levy will also help rehab the Horace Mann building at 24th and Cherry to make way for the return of Nova in 2014. The World School, currently housed in the Meany building with Nova, will also get a new home in 2016, likely the TT Minor campus at 18th and Union.

Hamlin Robinson, currently operating in the TT Minor building, is on a search for a new permanent campus by the start of the 2015-16 school year.

The levy will also fund an addition to the McGilvra Elementary’s lunch room (insert childhood obesity joke here), roof repairs for Franklin High School, and seismic upgrades at Franklin, Leschi Elementary and Washington Middle School.

Full voting results will be available via the King County Elections site. Continue reading →

Kevin Prince at Good2Go Groceries and Deli reached out to us via Facebook to let us know more details about the business, which opened at 18th and Yesler in recent months.

The store is two doors down from Home of Good BBQ, and has hot food and groceries. Hours are Monday – Thursday: 9 a.m. – midnight, Friday and Saturday: 9 a.m. – 2 a.m., and Sunday: 9 a.m – 10 p.m.

From Good2Go:

My name is Kevin Prince. I have opened a grocery store and deli here on the corner of 18th and Yesler.

We are now offering an alternative to the usual food here in central Seattle.
Offering, mini burgers, new orleans golden fried chicken, vegi burgers and more.
Our burgers are hand made angus beef and definitely delicious!

Also, we have a nice and affordable grocery area. Many local beers, over 22 different.
I look forward to meeting you and serving you with a smile!

Please like our page on Facebook: Good2Go Grocery and Deli!

Concept image from the Early Design Guidance document (see full document below)

Yesler and Broadway construction. Photo by Gordon Werner, used with permission

Change is coming quickly to Yelser Terrace.

The intersection of Yesler and Broadway will be closed for weeks for a redesign that will make way for the First Hill Streetcar and newly designed sidewalks and bike lanes. And while major demolition of the existing housing units has not yet begun, Vulcan has been chosen to lead the private redevelopment efforts, and one private development project is already underway on a vacant lot at 12th and Yesler formerly owned by Seattle Housing Authority.

As we reported previously, Canadian firm Gracorp Capital Advisors bought the lot from SHA for $2.88 million in the the fall. Now, local architecture firm Spectrum Design Solutions (members of which worked on 12th and Cherry’s The Douglas) will present its initial design concepts for a six-story, 119-unit building on the corner.

With commercial space on the ground floor and a mix of studio, one-bed and two-bed units, project designers say they are hoping to create a building for people of different income levels. From the Early Design Guidance document: Continue reading →

A man tells police his assailants were armed with a shotgun that they beat him with in an early Sunday robbery near 22nd Ave and E Olive St. The preliminary SPD report on the incident is below.

According to the report, the man was walking home around 2:30 AM when he was suddenly struck in the back of the head and knocked to the ground. The shotgun-armed muggers made off with the man’s cell phone and wallet. SPD’s search for the suspects was not successful.

Here’s the full report on Sunday’s robbery from SPD:

A man was struck in the head and robbed.  This morning at approximately 2:30 a.m., the victim had his headphones in listening to music. He was walking back to his house in the 2200 block of E. Olive St when he was suddenly struck in the back of his head by a blunt object causing him to be knocked to the ground.

When he turned around, the two suspects were standing over him. One of the suspects was pointing a shotgun at the victim’s face. The suspect then struck the  victim in the face with the shotgun several times. The suspects forcibly took the victim’s cell phone and wallet and fled the scene. The victim called 911 from his house. The victim sustained lacerations requiring stitches to the back of his head and under his left eye

Containment was quickly set up and a K-9 track was attempted without success.

Anyone with information about the suspects’ whereabouts is asked to call 911. Anonymous tips are welcome.

The Hill is alive with the sound of beer steins and bocce balls chasing the pallino. Our sister site Capitol Hill Seattle first broke the news about a beer hall and those most-exciting bowling courts coming to 12th Ave last July. This week, the team behind Poquitos will open Von Trapp’s, now described as a “Bavarian-inspired bier hall” with with five indoor bocce courts, two mezzanines, three bars, and a fireside “bier den.”

The space is enormous.

“We wanted to create something for everybody — including families,” Deming Maclise, one of the partners behind the venture tells CHS. Maclise told CHS his wife hails from Austria — so she can vouch for boules being a legit Bavarian pastime. In the meantime, Maclise and friends have built a beer hall seemingly big enough to hold every family on Capitol Hill.

An equally epic press release on the new addition to 12th Ave is below. “Beer will obviously be central to Von Trapp’s,” it notes. You can check out the roster of taps, below. Doug Wargo, formerly at Quinn’s, will manage Von Trapp’s beery bar. Cocktails, beer-based, are also available though a Bavarian cocktail hall just doesn’t have the same ring. Continue reading →

The city’s ongoing work on the First Hill Streetcar will require a nearly three-week closure of the intersection at Yesler and Broadway in Yesler Terrace.

Expect to take a different route starting Saturday whether you are driving or taking the 27 and 60 Metro buses. Even after the roads reopen to vehicles, the buses will remain on a detour into April.

Sidewalks will remain open, and presumably people on bikes will be able to use those to get through the area as well (we have asked and will update if we learn differently).

More details from SDOT:

Beginning this weekend the intersection of Broadway and E Yesler Way in the Yesler Terrace neighborhood will be closed to through traffic for approximately three weeks to facilitate construction of the First Hill Streetcar. The closure will begin on Saturday morning, February 9, at 7:00 a.m. and continue until Thursday, February 28. Continue reading →