Honoring a writer, newspaper editor and leader in Seattle’s black community, the planned public green space for the lot at 19th and Madison will be named Cayton Corner Park.

Susie Revels Cayton, daughter to the first U.S. Senator of African descent, arrived in Seattle in 1896:

Susie Revels Cayton soon became a leader in Seattle’s black community. She was named associate editor of The Seattle Republican and, later, contributing editor of Cayton’s Weekly. She was an active member of cultural and social organizations designed to improve the conditions of African Americans, including the “Sunday Forum,” a group of black Seattleites that met on a regular basis. Along with three other black women, Susie Cayton founded the Dorcus Charity Club in response to an urgent plea to help a set of abandoned twins. The club continued its charitable work for years.

Following a naming process this summer, the community group working to help plan the new park announced the decision earlier this week. If you’d like to get involved, their next meeting is October 8th, 6:30 PM at the Hearing, Speech & Deafness Center adjacent to the park space.

Residents celebrated at the space now known as Cayton Corner on Seattle’s Night Out in August (Image: CHS)

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Learn more about 23rd Ave improvements from the Seattle Bike Blog

The target of this November’s battle of progressives pitting liberal neighbor vs. liberal neighbor, the Seattle Mayor’s office Monday unveiled the executive’s proposal for how the city should spend its money in 2014 complete with line items for bike and transit investments for 23rd Ave and the First Hill streetcar. You can view the proposed budget documents here.

The Seattle Times has details of the proposal that continues a path of recovery — including $65 million in “unanticipated revenue — from recent years following cuts in the wake of the economic slowdown to end the previous decade.

• 2010: City and county leaders roll out their plans to cut back for 2011
• 2011: The ‘Great Recession’ continues — Where Seattle budget cuts will hit the Hill
• 2012: Capitol Hill line items part of modest trimming as Seattle sees recovery

Under the budget proposal, the city would add 176 employees next year after laying off almost 550 between 2010 and 2012, the Seattle Times reports.

The Times also says Mayor Mike McGinn has added money for a new bikeway along 23rd Ave and a new pedestrian crossing for the Montlake light rail station. The mayor’s proposal includes $3.2 million to improve Seattle public transit including planning to connect the South Lake Union and First Hill streetcars.

The mayor has been rolling out some of the more important budget proposals in recent weeks:

• More cops in Seattle
• Traffic safety improvements
• Center City Initiative

The process for public feedback and City Council-sponsored modifications to the budget plan now begins.

2014 Seattle City Budget
Budget Documents, Agendas and Information

Do you have questions about the budget agendas or can’t find something? Search our City Council Budget Documents database or contact us at [email protected] or 206-684-8344.

 

How does the budget process work?

The City Council conducts its official budget deliberations from late September to mid-November, but drafting the budget is a year-long process. If you have any questions about the process, please contact the office of Council Budget Chair Tim Burgess at [email protected] or 206-684-8806.

Be involved

There are several ways for you to share your budget priorities. Help us create Seattle’s future by email, over the phone or at one of our two public hearings:

• October 3, 5:30 p.m.(5 p.m. sign up), Council Chambers, Seattle City Hall, Download the Public Hearing Agenda
• October 24, 6:00 p.m. (5:30 p.m. sign up), Location TBD

Be informed

• Search the archive of budget documents

• Watch this eight-minute audio slideshow from 2010 about City budget trends over the last 20 years

   

  If you value this coverage and want to support the continued independence of Central District News, please subscribe today for as little as $5/month — DRIVE ENDS SEPTEMBER 30.

“3 car roll over at MLK and S. Jackson in front of @SeattleFire Station 6” Image via @timdurkan

Seattle Fire rescued two people trapped in a car and transported three patients to the hospital following a rollover crash at MLK and Jackson Wednesday afternoon.

Details are still coming in on the collision first reported just after 2 PM.

Seattle Fire reports that it transported a 93-year-old male driver in stable condition and a male and female in their 30s both in stable condition following the crash.

Traffic in the area was diverted during the response.

Animal control was called to care for an uninjured dog from one of the vehicles.

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Police fanned out around the area between 23rd and James and the AM/PM at 23rd and Cherry after a man was shot in the leg just after midnight Tuesday morning.

Details are still preliminary at this point as we confirm what happened with SPD and Seattle Fire.

According to police radio dispatches, the man was shot near 23rd and James and managed to run to the AM/PM at 23rd and Cherry to escape his attackers. The assailants were described as three black males wearing dark clothing and bandanas over their faces.

Officers searched the area around 23rd and James for suspects and shell casings for evidence. A K9 unit responded to the scene but there were no immediate arrests related to the search.

UPDATE: We have the official word from SPD and SFD on the incident:

Around 12:30 this morning we responded to 23/Cherry for a report of a shooting.  Located two people, one victim and a witness.  Victim had a gunshot wound to his upper thigh.  SFD responded and treated, the victim was transported to HMC for treatment.  Not considered life-threatening injury.

Both victim and witness told officers that they were approached by three suspects in what they thought was a robbery attempt.  During this encounter, the victim was shot, and the suspects all fled.  Described a three black males wearing dark clothing.  Officers searched but did not locate suspects.  Detectives will handle the follow up investigation.

(Image: CDNews via reader contributed video)

Fire units responded to a fully engulfed structure on the Madrona Elementary School campus early Sunday morning.

We are awaiting updates from Seattle Fire regarding the extent of the damage and any word on the cause. UPDATE: A SFD spokesperson tells us the fire was determined to have been intentionally set and the investigation has been handed over to police. Damage was limited to $2,500 — $1,000 to the structure, $1,000 to the school building and another $500 to the contents of the shed.

The department marshal was dispatched to the scene for investigation of the blaze early in the response just after 12:30 AM Sunday.

The building was described as a “fully involved toolshed” by SFD radio dispatches and was brought under control about 10 minutes later. Inspections of adjacent facilities revealed smoke but no apparent fire damage.

The fire comes in the wake of a string of suspicious fires in the area. Madrona Elementary at 33rd and Union stands just 10 blocks from the arson fire that damaged the Med Mix restaurant last week. Authorities are offering a $10,000 reward for any information pertaining to the case. Anyone with information is instructed to call 1-800-55-ARSON.

Seattle Fire quickly extinguished a blaze in a building under construction on E Pine Sunday morning after flames were reported coming from the backside of the duplex project.

Investigators worked to determine the cause of the small fire first reported just before 6 AM. No damage estimates were yet available. UPDATE: SFD says the investigation has been handed over the police after investigation showed the fire, which did $5,000 in damage to the new construction, was intentionally set. It joins a small string of suspicious fires currently under investigation in the area.

City records show that the construction project entails raising the heigh of the duplex, transitioning a garage to a living space and creating surface parking at the address.

From Work-It-Out-Seattle:

Don’t miss the ** Central District Community Street Fair!! **
WHEN: Saturday, August 10, 2013, 11am to 5pm
WHERE: 24th Ave., between E. Yesler & E. Alder
WHY: Because this is the LARGEST one-day celebration of education, children and resources! Families and children from all over Seattle come out for fun and FREE event. We hope you can join us as we continue our tradition of a fabulous fair!

(Image: mesobseattle.com)

Fans of tiny E Jefferson Ethiopian restaurant Mesob hopefully won’t have to travel far to visit as the restaurants makes way for a new rowhouse development.

The 14th and Jefferson parcel was purchased by developers Chris Gurdjian, Erik Cullen and Quinn Borseno in late 2012 for $630,000 — a tidy 37% more than the previous owner paid in 2005.

According to city records, a three-unit rowhouse project is planned for the parcel once it is subdivided.

We’ve been told Mesob is planning a move to near 12th and Main. A permit for the demolition of the 14th/Jeff building are currently listed as “reviews completed” — but not yet “approved.”

The community surrounding the new park project at 19th and Madison gathered Tuesday night as part of Seattle’s annual Night Out block party celebrations. Hot dogs, corn on the cob and all-you-can-eat gummy worms were on the menu. To learn more about the park project, check out facebook.com/19thAndMadison.

(Image: CDN)

A hot bed of social and political activism is reportedly shuttering on 23rd Ave. Here’s an update on the Wildcat from the Anarchist News:

As members of the Wildcat collective, we are both relieved and bummed to announce that everyone’s favorite too-tiny social center will be closing its doors by August 15.

Since opening in February 2012 near the politically-charged intersection of 23rd and Union in the Central District of Seattle, the Wildcat has hosted dozens of speaking events, dinners, and films. It also housed L@s Quixotes, a radical lending library with a great collection of anti-authoritarian books and consistent open-hours. We opened the space during the crucial ebb-time between the eviction of the Decolonize/Occupy Seattle camp at Seattle Central Community College and May Day 2012. Without the Occupy camp or the Autonomia social center, the city’s growing and loosely-formed anti-state/anti-capitalist network desperately needed a meeting place to continue to encounter each-other and discover new affinities. For a time, the Wildcat was exactly that. True to our mission, our three-room cubbyhole was “a springboard for comrades to meet and launch their collective struggles toward freedom.”

Throughout the spring of 2012, the Wildcat was a clearinghouse for posters promoting what would be an unforgettable May Day. The space bustled on summer weekends as folks circulated in from the Food for Everyone BBQs that took place down the street in front of the mostly-empty Horace Mann building, a site of historic contest in the Central District. Along with the Umojafest PEACE Centeracross the street, the Wildcat helped to spread anti-police and anti-gentrification sentiment in the neighborhood. Upstanding citizens complained about all the graffiti, posters, and demonstrations.

Unfortunately, developers are currently planning to destroy the southeastern block of 23rd and Union in order to build a giant apartment building similar to the ones on Capitol Hill. This development may ultimately destroy Umoja and the black- and brown-owned businesses currently located next to it. While we have no love for capitalist enterprise in general, we recognize that this development is yet another step in a process that is rapidly transforming Seattle into an over-priced, sterile, white-washed dead zone. In this context, it is really sad to see the Wildcat go. The yuppies would have really, really hated us.

More here.

According to city records, a permit to transition the building to restaurant use was renewed earlier this year. In 2010, CDN reported that a project called Burger Central was planned for the location.