Weekly Walk report - Thursday, April 26th

We started our walk out last night at Virgil Flaim Park. We found 18 empties ( including a Heineken Keg ) along the laurel hedge on the north. Earlier that day, a DPC member witnessed a drug sale in the park in the NE corner. He went over afterward and found about a dozen empty "dime bags" with white powder residue in them. He also had collected up 52 empties earlier that day in the park ( that is in addition to the 18 we found later that day. )

 We continued our usual route after that and found an additional 121 empties. The first photo includes (18) empties from the park + (121) from the route. The second includes (52) from the park earlier in the day + (56) collected from last Thursday.  That brings yesterday's total to 191 empties and the total since we started to 799 empties.

We are working on scheduling a meeting with representatives from Seattle Police, Seattle Parks and Rec, and Seattle Department of Neighborhoods to discuss the problems in Virgil Flaim and Albert Davis Parks. This meeting will be sometime in the next few weeks and we will post the time, date, and place as soon as we know.

Empties from Virgil Flaim Park

Found in NE corner of park

Found in NE corner of park

Kaffeeklatsch regular, supplier of toys passes away

Update: Joseph's Shoreline neighbors and the staff at Kaffeeklatsch are planning a memorial for Joseph on Sunday, April 29th, at Kaffeeklatsch, 12513 Lake City Way NE. The memorial will be at 3 p.m. All are welcome.

Joseph Patrykus, photographed in his seat at Kaffeeklatsch recently.

The King County Medical Examiner has confirmed what was written on a few Facebook pages over the last few days. Kaffeeklatch regular Joseph Patrykus, 69, died of natural causes on April 21st. He was found sitting on a chair, in the sun, on the porch of his Shoreline home.

Joseph, a former member of the U.S. Navy and a Boeing worker that was on the crew that built the first 747, was a regular at the coffee shop. When he wasn't sitting at his table, sipping drip coffee from his 40 year-old personalized mug he kept at the local business, he could be found across the street at Value Village, sifting for treasures.

Some of the toys brought to Kaffeklatsch by Joseph

"He provided about 2/3 of the toys here," said Kaffeeklatsch co-owner Annette Heide-Jessen.

Joseph, who mostly kept to himself while sitting at his regular seat, would light up when talking to parents and their children. "He was quiet but thoughful," said Heide-Jessen.

Some children that regularly saw Joseph at the coffee shop were convinced he might be Santa Clause, a perception reinforced by all the toys he would bring from Value Village.

Friends of Joseph recently set up a Facebook fan page for him. There he would share quotes while spending time at Kaffeeklatsch.

He knew his health was poor but was trying his best to enjoy the life he had.

His niece Jodi Patrykus, who said she was named after him, wrote recently that she was "happy to see him in the virtual world having a good time. He is very special to me!"


In one recent post on his Facebook page Joseph said, "leaving, soon possibly even the planet!"

One of Joesph's favorite books kept at Kaffeeklatsch

Notes from DPC April 9th meeting

Below is a PDF  with notes from the April 9th meeting with Sally Bagshaw regarding Parks & Recreation in Lake City.

A few things to note:

- The major recent Parks expenditures in our area are:

1)  ~$800k for the purchase of the Varsity Building on 33rd, which will be torn down to make a park / open space. The land area is 10,000 sf. This was funded through the Parks and Greenspace Levy.
2) $500k is earmarked for improvements to the Cedar Park Playfield using funds from the Parks and Greenspace Levy. 

- It was emphasized that if we want a community center or any other major acquisition / development that we need to be able to clearly say what we want and say it with a unified community voice. This applies to sidewalks and greenways as well.

- To get programmed events up here at our current center, the best way to match the programming to what the community wants is to set up a Lake City Community Center Advisory Council with ARC and work with them. They can also act as a fiscal sponsor and accept donations for projects that we are working on getting matching funds for.

- The "Greenways" concept is very interesting and CM Sally Bagshaw  is very supportive of this. There are online tool kits for communities to use in developing a Greenway and funding is available from many sources.