We’re inside listening to the scanner, but it looks like a lovely, sunny day outside in Seattle’s East Precinct. Here’s our thrilling report on how some will take advantage of it:

We spotted this family on Lake Washington Boulevard yesterday, hauling their fall harvest of pumpkins with their pony-drawn carriage.

The mother told us they were on their way home after selling most of their pumpkins in Leschi.

Our friends at The Seattle Times have a moving update on the Clemmons family and how they’re still in limbo as the city decides whether they will cover the damages inflicted on the Clemmons’ Leschi home during the police hunt for their nephew Maurice Clemmons last November:

The windows are boarded up. The walls stripped down to studs, and the floors to exposed, scarred wood, at the city’s orders and expense. Everything that represented family and music, travels and tradition has been hauled off to a storage unit because of the tear-gas residue that settled on it that November night.

“I never imagined that this is what I was getting myself into,” Chrisceda Clemmons said as we stood inside her Leschi home recently. “And not just myself, but my family.”

… 

And yet, 10 months later, the family is still living in a rental home, waiting for their claim to be settled so they can rebuild not just their house, but their very lives.

“We’re nervous; we don’t know what’s going to happen,” Chrisceda Clemmons said. “The city could still choose not to do anything and then we would be homeless.

“We did the right thing by protecting the community, and we just want to be back,” she said. The Seattle City Council reviewed the family’s claim two weeks ago during a closed, executive session. The council is scheduled to meet again on the issue within the next month.

Happy October from the streets of Seattle’s East Precinct:

The Hamlin Robinson school is now all moved in and teaching kids in their new location in the old TT Minor building at 18th & Union. If you’re curious to learn more about the private school and its programs in language acquisition, this weekend is your big chance.

Hamlin Robinson is holding an open house on Sunday afternoon from 1:30pm to 3:30pm. You can stop by and meet the faculty and staff, as well as the parents and students who are a new part of the Central District community.

A couple of weeks ago CDNews Twitter friend LizWas let us know about a new mural that showed up in front of a home on 21st Avenue. 

We finally happened past there yesterday and got a photo:

I think we have one of the most creative groups of residents in the city.

It’s 12th Avenue week here at CDNews, and this time it’s really good news. Today the city parks department released the draft list of projects that would be funded through the Opportunity Fund that was provided in the Parks & Green Space Levy.

The big winner is the James Court Woonerf that the neighborhood has proposed for installation next to the forthcoming James Court Park on 12th Avenue. It has made the draft list with a $500,000 budget allocation, which should be enough to turn the sleepy side street into a landscaped, pedestrian-scale plaza. 

In addition to extending the perceived size of the new park that will be next to it, the project is intended to provide a connection an transition to Seattle U’s new student housing and ground-floor retail that is now taking shape on the block just to the north.

Another project on the north border of the Central District is also slated for funding. The 19th & Madison Neighborhood Park is allocated $473,000. Stay tuned as we find out more about that project and bring it to you in a separate story.

The proposed Jimi Hendrix Park next to NWAAM on the south end of the neighborhood was also hoping for funding, but as of now it is only on the alternate list of projects. We’ve got a note out to find out more about that process and figure out what the odds are that it could move up in the list.

A public hearing on the draft list of projects is scheduled for October 25th at  7pm, nearby at the Miller Community Center on 19th Avenue. Final recommendations will be made by the Parks Oversight Committee on December 6th, with final approval granted by the city council.

A full list of projects citywide is attached at left.

CDNews is glad that September is leaving on a weather high-note. Here’s the scoop from Seattle’s sunny East Precinct:

The city’s new First Hill Streetcar is scheduled to start construction next year, and one big decision still remains in the project. As we reported in the summer, the city is evaluating two potential locations to place the maintenance and storage facility for the streetcar vehicles, including one spot here in the Central District at 12th and Yesler.

This week the Department of Transportation gave city council members an update on streetcar planning, including new details on how the maintenance facility could be sited on the Seattle Housing Authority property adjacent to Yesler Terrace..

According to preliminary renderings, the maintenance barn would face 12th Avenue and sit in the middle of the block between Yesler and Fir, with a half-block of track connecting it to the main path of the streetcar where it travels up and down Yesler. 

The photo below shows the general massing of the facility in an aqua color. It is surrounded by a conceptual development from the housing authority, adding low-income apartments that would ease the planned transition of Yesler Terrace to a more dense mid-rise development. Apartments are shown in red and orange, parking is shown in gray, and retail space is shown in yellow.

The partnership with SHA would be designed to benefit both the housing agency and the city. SDOT’s Ethan Melone said “We each benefit because we take on some of the site development costs, and they provide some of the land.” The roof of the maintenance facility would also provide open space for SHA’s residents, giving them green space and a courtyard that would be 25 feet up above street level.

With SHA’s plans in flux, the city’s design would allow for a phased approach that would build the maintenance facility first, and then allow the housing authority to fill in the space around it sometime in the future. The photo below shows how the streetcar barn would fit in with existing development on the site:

Melone told the city council that one key consideration is whether a maintenance facility fits in with community plans for 12th Avenue. They’re looking at whether its impact can be lessened by including ground-floor retail along the 12th Avenue side, and will be talking with community groups to collect their feedback on the plans.

We stopped by 12th & Yesler today to get some action shots of the fire fighter training at the empty retail block that will soon be demolished by the Seattle Housing Authority.

Crews had filled the second floor of the building with artificial smoke, practicing rescue responses in situations similar to actual fires.

The smoke was clearly visible coming out of broken windows in the building, drawing stares from pedestrians and motorists who passed by. But fire crews and a training sign were clearly visible, so it doesn’t look like it generated any calls to 911.

SHA will be tearing down that block sometime in October. As we reported yesterday, there are no concrete plans for further development on that block.