Chanting “Scrap the MAP,” Garfield High students and faculty gathered on the steps of the school to rally in defiance of district-mandated MAP testing.

In the month since the faculty unanimously voted to boycott administration of the test, the protest has spread to schools around the district and attracted national attention and support.

Seattle School District Superintendent Jose Banda backed off his original threat of suspending faculty who refused to give the test, but school administrators started giving the test Tuesday without the support of the faculty. Continue reading →

After many months of delays, Wonder Coffee & Sports Bar is now open at 19th and Jackson.

They opened their doors for the first time Sunday, just in time for the Super Bowl. They are seeing how things go and are making adjustments to their menu and store hours.

As of right now, they are aiming to open around 2 p.m. and go until late.

The menu features typical American sports bar food (hamburgers, fries, onion rings, etc), but it also has some Ethiopian items (like zilzil tibs).

And of course, it has coffee, cold beer and a full bar.

The bar also has a stage, a screen with a projector pointed at it and a private room with the front end of a car coming out of it.

Swing by for food or drinks and say hi! Continue reading →

Seattle Schools superintendent Jose Banda has won his battle to get Garfield High School in line and administer the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) tests. CHS reported on a faculty-led effort to boycott the standardized tests that critics claim are a poor measure of academic progress and are biased against students of color and the poor. The district plans to use the test results as part of the teacher evaluation process for the first time this year.

(Image: Seattle Schools)

The testing will begin Tuesday at Garfield though many students are expected to be excused following a surge in parents opting their children out of the process following the push-back from Garfield teachers and support from other schools in the district and across the country.

Expect to see students hit the streets on Wednesday as a series of Scrap the MAP! protests are planned across the country.

What: Educators, Students, Parents and supporters of Public Education nation-wide will take action in support of Garfield High School teachers and all teachers in Seattle Public Schools refusing to administer the MAP test.

Teachers at Garfield High School and other Seattle Public Schools have gained national attention and support for their stand against the Measure of Academic Progress, for its invalidity, waste of time and resources and its scandalous arrival to Seattle. We call on supporters of public education nationwide to participate in actions in their locale to show their support for our effort to Scrap the MAP. Supporters will hold meetings, rallies, take photos, and wear red to show support on February 6th.

As the nation-wide day of protest grows, we will send updates to the media with all the cities and organizations who are participating.

When: Wednesday, February 6th, 2013

Where: All over the nation! In Seattle actions will take place at participating schools, including Garfield, Orca, Chief Sealth, and Center School.

Some of the prominent organizations and individuals that have expressed their support for the Seattle MAP test boycott: National Education Association (NEA) President Dennis Van Roekel, American Federation of Teachers (AFT), San Diego Education Association, UTLA Board of Directors, Parents Across America, Des Moines, Iowa Education Association, Diane Ravitch, Garfield High School PTSA, Garfield HS Associated Student Body, Dr. Wayne Au, Dexter Tang, President of Seattle Student Senate, Matt Damon & his mother Dr. Nancy Carlsson-Paige, Seattle Education Association (SEA), The SEA Substitute Association, and Social Equality Educators (SEE).

Garfield serves as the public high school for most Capitol Hill teenagers. All Seattle ninth graders are required to take the MAP reading test. Unlike state-mandated tests, the MAP has no bearing on whether a student can graduate. The district contends the tests are useful for measuring achievement and improvement. This year, the district also plans to begin utilizing the results in teacher evaluations:

Teachers who get high scores on both student growth and classroom observations may qualify for promotions and higher pay. Teachers with low growth scores will get extra classroom observation by their principal and more training opportunities. If they don’t improve, they could end up on probation according to the teacher contract.

Christopher Monfort, the man suspected of shooting and killing SPD Officer Timothy Brenton at 29th and Yesler Halloween 2009, will plead not guilty by reason of insanity.

Monfort is facing murder and attempted murder charges after he allegedly pulled up next to Brenton’s stopped car and fired. Officer Britt Sweeney was also wounded in the incident.

From the Seattle Times:

Christopher Monfort’s lawyers have notified King County Superior Court that he will plead not guilty by reason of insanity. Monfort, 42, is facing the death penalty if he’s convicted of the ambush slaying of  Brenton. Continue reading →

Swedish Medical Center and the Sabey Corporation unveiled on Thursday night an attention-getting vision for future growth at their Central District campus in which the population of the campus would increase three-fold.  The campus, between 15th and 18th Avenues and E. Cherry and E. Jefferson Streets – originally Providence Hospital – is currently occupied by Swedish Medical Center, Northwest Kidney Center, and several tenants of the Sabey Corporation.  Swedish and Sabey are embarking on the process of developing a “Major Institution Master Plan”, required by the Seattle Land Use Code for medical centers and universities, which are given the right to develop in residential zones with buildings of a size that are not allowed to other developers.  In return for that right, the City Land Use Code gives a Citizens Advisory Committee, and ultimately the City Council, the obligation of fashioning a plan that balances institutional growth and the surrounding neighborhood’s vitality and livability.

At present the institution has about 1500 parking spaces.  Swedish and Sabey are asking for a plan with 3000 additional spaces, for a total of 4500 structured parking spaces. Current Swedish and Sabey buildings measure about 1.2 million square feet. In the future there could be up to 3 million square feet.

Two alternative conceptual schemes to accommodate this growth were described.  One, called the “dispersal” alternative, would expand the institution’s campus boundaries on three sides — to the north, east and south.  The current height limit for institutional development on 18th Avenue, bordering a single-family neighborhood to the east, would increase from 37 feet to 90 feet.  Expansion areas north of Cherry would have height limits of 50 or 65 feet, south of Jefferson, up to 50 feet.  The greatest height limit would be 200 feet between 15th and 16th Avenues.  Currently, the greatest height limit for the campus is 105 feet, (although the tower of the former Providence Hospital, now called James Tower, exceeds that height.)

Another alternative conceptual scheme, called the “concentrated” alternative, calls for a smaller boundary expansion, limited to one parcel at the northwest corner of 16th and E. Cherry.  Proposed height limits include a 200 foot limit along the west edge of the campus and a 90 foot limit along the east edge.  18th Avenue and 16th Avenue would be vacated under this proposal.

Over coming months, the Citizens Advisory Committee will meet to react to these proposals, with the goal of producing a Major Institution Master Plan to guide growth over the next several decades.  Numerous public meetings will be held, the next on February 21, at 6:00 P.M. in the James Tower on the Swedish/Sabey Campus, 557 18th Avenue.

When navigating murky waters, it’s good to have a map. One such chart of Seattle produced by the Department of Planning and Development as part of the process to figure just how, exactly, the state will regulate commercial cannabis in Seattle following I-502’s approval is making its way around inboxes and social networks. It shows just how restricted the Seattle’s “Cannabis Zoning Restrictions” could be. The interested and the entrepreneurial of First Hill, Capitol Hill and the Central District will also notice the area’s single zone of commercial marijuana opportunity — 23rd and Union.

“I was kinda hoping for Little Amsterdam,” real estate investor and business owner Ian Eisenberg tells CHS — only partly joking — about potential names for the business district that could take shape around the Central District’s 23rd and Union.

Eisenberg, who has emerged as a major landholder at the intersection and has plans for more development, said he hasn’t seriously started working on building a cannabis economy at the corner but he’s definitely been sharing the map around the neighborhood.

The city’s planning process around cannabis zoning started last year to deal with the growing effort around medical marijuana and hasn’t yet expanded to deal with the implications of a new commercial market for the drug.

“The City currently regulates medical cannabis the way we regulate any other business,” a DPD spokesperson tells us about the legislation currently being worked on. “We are proposing some clarifications to our current rules though to account for both medical and recreational cannabis operations.” Continue reading →

Image courtesy of the Burke Museum

Sometimes, you don’t know what you’ve got stored in your attic. In 2006, a trunk donated to the Dearborn Goodwill included a beaded vest that was likely created by the Blackfoot tribe in the early 1900s.

Goodwill took a half decade trying to figure out what to do with the vest, valued at around $5,000, before donating it to the Burke Museum recently.

Goodwill released this press release about the vest:

Seattle Goodwill recently donated a beaded Native American vest to the Burke Museum to be part of their permanent collection.

“Seattle Goodwill realized the historical value of this vest and thought it would be most beneficial to the community to donate it to the Burke,” said Catherine McConnell, Vice President of Development & Communications for Seattle Goodwill.  “We are able to support our free job training and education programs with the generous donations from the community which we value very much, but when we see an item of such cultural significance it should be shared with an organization that can preserve it for the community.” Continue reading →