The petition has been filed to create a district-based city leadership election system, and now signatures are needed to get the movement to a vote.

Currently, all nine Council members are elected citywide, or at-large. The proposed 7-2 “mixed system” would create seven districts in Seattle, each with about 87,000 voters, and two at large, citywide representatives.

If Seattle Districts Now is able to gather the 40,000 signatures needed to qualify for a city charter amendment on the November ballot and voters approve the plan, the seven district representatives would be elected in 2015:

Two years after that, we’d elect our two at large or city-wide representatives and so it’d would go in alternating election cycles.  One cycle, we’d elect our district representatives, then in the next our city-wide representatives.

It would ensure city councilmembers are closer to the people they represent and that voters better know their city councilmembers.  And the seven district representatives would provide for geographic distribution of Councilmembers, while giving individual neighborhoods a distinct voice and real access on major issues, while the two at-large representatives ensure that the citywide perspective is maintained. The best of both worlds. Continue reading →

Chief Leschi. Image from MOHAI

The Leschi neighborhood is named after the Nisqually Chief executed unjustly by the Washington Territory on this day in 1858, according to HistoryLink.

Years before the founding of Seattle, Chief Leschi is said to have made camp in the neighborhood that now bears his name.

More from HistoryLink:

On February 19, 1858, Nisqually Chief Leschi (1808-1858) is hanged on a gallows at Fort Steilacoom, for the “murder” of the American soldier Colonel A. Benton Moses. Chief Leschi’s attorneys argued firstly that Leschi had not actually been the one to kill Colonel Moses, and secondly that Colonel Moses was killed during warfare (in which there were casualties on both sides), requiring that his accused killer should not be tried in a civilian court. On March 4, 2004, the Washington State Senate formally recognized “the injustice which occurred in 1858 with the trial and execution of Chief Leschi” and honored Chief Leschi as “a courageous leader” and “a great and noble man” (Washington State Senate Resolution 8727).

Read more…

Design for planned but stalled building on southwest corner

23rd and Union is the big story on the front page of The Seattle Times today.

Close readers of CDNews won’t be too surprised by much of the news, but it’s presence on the front page suggests that momentum for changes really is growing.

But the story also points out the sober reality that the corner’s cultural narrative is up for grabs, and there is a potential for the corner to be essentially annexed by the insatiable demand for housing and commercial space on Capitol Hill.

“What we are looking at are rents that are achievable for a lot of folks that have been priced out of Capitol Hill,” Joe Ferguson of Lake Union Partners told the Times. Lake Union Partners is behind plans for the long-stalled six-story building on the vacant southwest corner. As we reported last month, Ian Eisenberg bought that property recently with hopes of getting the project moving.

The Central District’s location makes it easy to walk, bike or take transit to the region’s largest employment center: downtown. Groceries, shopping, eating and playing are all within close reach from any CD home. With demand in Seattle for housing with such urban amenities growing far faster than the supply (and with no signs of slowing down), the CD is destined to continue its growth as a desirable place to live. These desirable traits are all good things. But as more people move to the neighborhood, what place story will they hear when they get here? Is the Central District an exciting, vibrant and unique place to be, or is it just gentrifying new growth on the edge of Capitol Hill? Continue reading →

Though it would have been the cheapest alternative, Seattle City Light has dropped an unpopular alternative route that would have required 100-foot towers across Capitol Hill and the Central District for its planned 115-kilovolt transmission line connecting the coming Denny Substation with the city’s grid.

CHS first reported on the issue in October as City Light began the public process to scope the project. City Light planners said the route — up Denny to 14th Ave and then south through the CD to the Massachusetts substation — was an unlikely choice but included the route as one of three proposed options for the line. Neighbors in the area took to flyering existing utility poles and sharing information via email lists and, of course, by word of mouth. By January, the public feedback on the route was still coming in — and still decidedly against the proposed alternative.

While a major infrastructure project will still take place just off the Hill along Denny, it appears residents and businesses in the area won’t need to be concerned with giant towers being part of the project. As part of the just-released State Environmental Policy Act impact statement (PDF) on the project, City Light has revealed that planners have reduced the route alternatives to two underground paths through downtown:

Transmission
During the scoping process, City Light presented three preliminary transmission alternatives representing a range ofcost, construction methods, and possible impacts. City Light stated a preference for building transmission west of I‐5 iffeasible. At this time, City Light does not intend to proceed with the primarily overhead route east of I‐5 and that optionwill not be evaluated as an alternative within the Draft EIS. The decision to delete this route as an alternative for thisproject was based on the viability of more direct alternatives that have limited short‐term construction impacts. Thetwo transmission line alternatives that will be evaluated within the Draft EIS are:

• Transmission Line Alternative 1 (TL1) ‐ underground through downtown Seattle (generally along the eastern edge of the Downtown Seattle Business Core)
• Transmission Line Alternative 2 (TL2) ‐ through the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel (tunnel)

Last year, an electric car gave Garfield High School students hope for the future when parents auctioned a Nissan Leaf to fund a career and college counselor.

After raising $40,000 and successfully investing in Garfield’s High School & Beyond Center, the PTSA is hosting the unique auction again this year, giving participants the chance to win a 2013 Tesla Sedan electric car.

“Electric cars represent the future, and we’re working to secure the future for our kids,” says PTSA President Phil Sherburne.

Garfield High School PTSA says they’ll “RAISE THE WOOF!” for the second year by auctioning an electric car to make up for budget cuts that left Garfield students without a career and college counselor three years ago.

2012’s auction netted $40,000 after the PTSA sold 750 tickets. This year, they’re doubling the number of tickets in hopes of raising $80,000 after expenses.

“The center is all about getting kids to think earlier about what to do beyond high school,” Sherburne says. “Whether it’s college or tech school, what we don’t want is for them graduate and have no plan.”

The High School and Beyond center aims to creatively use community resources and paid staff to meet the wide-ranging needs of Garfield’s students and reduce the academic achievement gap.

Any remaining funds will go toward funding the Read Right program and grants for teacher supplies.

While students can’t be directly involved in the raffle sales because of gambling laws, they’ve helped spread the word to parents, graduates and others in the community. Sherburne says there are still plenty of tickets available.

To purchase a ticket, contact Phil Sherburne or visit the auction’s website for more information.

The winner will be announced at Garfield’s “Raise the Woof” all-school auction on March 1, at Showbox SoDo.

• Auction tickets are $60 and include a dinner by renowned chefs, and musical performances featuring Garfield students and staff.
• Second, third and fourth-place winners will also receive a cash prize.
• The winner of the Tesla may also chose to take $50,00 in lieu of the car.
• RSVP by February 18, 2013.