You know you're from Lake City when....

The Olympic Hills Polo Club as seen in 1935.

People in Lake City are a bit tough on their neighborhood. Sure we have some serious problems in our community and we seem to be the contemporary Northeast playground for the vices of Seattle.

Also, many here have a perception that folks down in Queen Anne, Madison Valley and Ballard see us as a sketchy neighborhood lined with asphalt car sales lots, strip clubs and weed shops. (Obviously some of that is true.)

But there is so much more to Lake City than many of those tired sterotypes.

The Facebook Group "You Know You're From Lake City" helps longtime residents wax nostalgic and share stories about our community. The group is also an effective way for newer residents to learn about some of the history of the neighborhood.

True to Lake City form, there is some occasional odd content posted there, but amid posts from people upset at how the neighborhood has changed and people posting about Lake City crime, there are some real gems, such as this historic photo above of the Olympic Hills Polo Club.

Member of the group post photos, anecdotes and commentary about the LC.

You can view or ask to join the Facebook Group by clicking here.

Lake City community calendar to connect, inform LC residents

Today (Feb. 6th) the Lake City Library hosts 'Valentines Crafts' at 1:30. Tomorrow (Feb 7th) a 'Senior Dance Around' will be held at the Community Center at high noon.

These are among the events produced by neighborhood organizations here in our community. But as we all know, getting word out about events can be a challenge in our community.

In our continued effort to keep Lake City residents connected and informed, today we debut the new Lake City Community Calendar.

This Google-based calendar features the feeds from the Lake City Library, the Lake City Community Center's new web calendar, Familes for Lake City's calendar, Lake City Neighborhood Alliance's calendar, and Douglas Park Cooperative's calendar.

While there may be a bit of overlap on some events, especially meetings, we will be working to improve the information featured here. This calendar is available on the right column of the Douglas Park Cooperative website or here in this blog post

If you know of other Lake City community-based organizations that use Google for their calendar, let us know and we may also feature their posts on this new community calendar.

Posts in brown are from the Lake City Community Center, posts in light blue are from the Lake City Library, posts in dark blue are from Families for Lake City, posts in green are from Douglas Park Cooperative.




You can paste the code below to embed the calendar shown above (month format) on your own website:

Seattle Public Schools Levies Offer Significant Improvements to Greater Lake City Neighborhood Schools

Note: The following post was guest-written by a member of our community.

If passed, the Olympic Hills Elementary building will be replaced and expanded

Seattle voters recently received ballots in the mail for the renewal of two property-tax levies. The levies, which are the only measures on the ballot, will help bridge state funding gaps and support facility improvements for Seattle Public Schools

These levies, if passed, would have a significant impact on the Lake City neighborhood because they would fund two new, expanded replacement school buildings on the sites of Olympic Hills Elementary and Pinehurst Elementary.

They would also provide for earthquake safety improvements for Jane Addams, Rogers Elementary, and Sacajawea Elementary buildings.

Click map for larger

Proposition 1: a $551.9 million Operations Levy, will provide funding for approximately 27 percent of Seattle Public School’s operating budget over the next three years. The school levy will help fund teachers’ salaries, textbooks, transportation, a sixth period for high school, security and special-education programs, among other day-to-day costs not fully funded by the State.

Proposition 2: the $694.9 million Capital Levy (BEX IV), will provide necessary funding to maintain, improve and expand school buildings. In 2007, voters approved the BEX III capital levy that improved district buildings, infrastructure and classroom technology. Every project in BEX III came in on time and within the budget. The renewal of the BEX Capital Levy will replace or renovate school buildings, many of which are more than 50 years old. Additionally, the levy will provide funding for new schools and school expansions in response to increased enrollment in recent years. Within the past year, enrollment has increased by about 1,400 students and an additional 7,000 students are anticipated over the next decade.

The BEX IV Capital Levy will also continue to provide earthquake retrofits for 37 schools that do not meet updated safety standards.

Further, BEX IV will build additional lunchrooms, new science labs and improved outdoor athletic facilities. All schools are slated to receive technology upgrades that include wireless internet access and improve accounting systems

Both propositions are renewals of existing levies. If approved, these levies would cost the owner of a $400,000 home $13 a month over what the homeowner pays on the expiring levies

Below is more specific information about projects the levies will fund across the district:

School Levies and their impact on Lake City

Our friends at Families for Lake City have put together a post that explains the significant improvements Proposition 1 and Proposition 2 will have on Seattle Public Schools in Lake City and Northeast Seattle.

The Building Excellence (BEX) Capital Levy (Prop 2) and the Operations Levy (Prop 1) will bring much-needed improvements to our neighborhood schools. Families for Lake City and Douglas Park Cooperative both ask you to vote YES for Proposition 1 and YES for Proposition 2 to help improve and invest in our community schools.

If approved, these two levies will be a continuation of expiring levies. If approved, these levies would cost the owner of a $400,000 home $13 a month over what the homeowner pays on the expiring levies. A simple summary of the two levies is available here.

Below Families for Lake City explains how these levies will impact individual schools in Lake City.

What do these levies mean for Lake City area schools?

The Capital Levy (Prop 2) will help fund new construction and safety improvements at multiple Lake City area schools. The Seattle School District is facing severe capacity shortages, particularly in our NE corner of Seattle, just based on current enrollment. With projected enrollment included, the capacity issues worsen.  Without Prop 2 passing, we’ll see Lake City schools overcrowded and thriving programs dislocated or disbanded altogether.
The Operations Levy (Prop 1) provides crucial support for everything from textbooks and transportation to student activities and support for bilingual and special education students.
With schools bursting at the seams, whether or not the levies pass, the following Lake City area schools will be impacted:

Olympic Hills Elementary
If the Capital Improvement Levy passes, Olympic Hills Elementary will receive a rebuilt and expanded school.  The Olympic Hills program would temporarily re-locate during construction – either to the currently closed Cedar Park site, or to another location. If the capital levy does not pass, Olympic Hills will not be rebuilt. Instead, neighbors would likely see a slew of portables added to house more students, putting additional strain on the school’s small infrastructure.

Cedar Park
The Cedar Park site formerly housed a neighborhood elementary school, but has been leased to an artist cooperative for the last 30 years. Regardless of whether the levy passes or not, the school district plans to re-open this site. At a recent community meeting, Pegi McEvoy, Assistant Superintendent of Operations, presented two scenarios: 1) if the levy passes, Cedar Park will be used as an interim site for Olympic Hills, then reopened as a permanent school, 2) if the levy fails, the district will need to reopen the school as soon as it can be made ready; a time crunch that will limit the district’s flexibility with how to redevelop the site.

Jane Addams
To relieve overcrowding at Eckstein Middle School, the district will begin a comprehensive middle school at the Jane Addams site in fall of 2014, called Jane Addams Middle School (JAMS).  Currently, the Jane Addams site houses the Jane Addams K-8 option program (JAK8). It’s expected that these two programs may be co-housed at the site for one or more years.
If the Capital Levy passes, the JAK8 program will be permanently relocated to a new facility at the existing Pinehurst site by 2017. If it doesn’t pass, it’s unclear what will happen to the JAK8 program.
With JAMS will come a new middle school feeder pattern, with Olympic Hills, John Rogers and Sacajawea feeding into JAMS instead of Eckstein. This has raised equity concerns, as these elementary schools have much higher concentrations of low-income students than the elementary schools which will remain in the Eckstein feeder pattern. In a meeting last week, the School Board voted 4-3 to wait until 2014 to open JAMS in order to allow adequate planning time to address these concerns and bring this new school online.

Pinehurst 
If the levy passes, the existing Pinehurst site will have a new facility built on it to house JAK8. District plans for the existing Pinehurst K-8 program aren’t specified, but the possibility of relocating it to the Cedar Park site was mentioned at the Cedar Park community meeting with Pegi McEvoy.
If the levy doesn’t pass, the Pinehurst program may experience even more radical changes. It’s unclear what the district would do to relieve capacity issues, but almost certainly the Pinehurst site would get more students than it currently does.

John Rogers, Sacajawea & Jane Addams
If the levy passes, these three schools will receive important seismic upgrades to improve earthquake safety.

In addition to benefiting Lake City area schools with new construction and seismic upgrades, these levies will also fund sorely needed projects in other areas of Seattle, such as replacement of the severely dilapidated Arbor Heights building.  If approved, these levies would equate to a $13/month increase for the owner of a $400,000 home. The following chart provides a comparison of how Seattle’s education levy tax rate stacks up against other cities:

*Levy rate chart available via www.seattleschools.org
**Note:  With any school construction, the school district will work with the City of Seattle to address neighborhood impacts following SEPA and best practice protocols for community involvement.

Neighbor Appreciation Day, February 9th

Saturday, February 9, 2013, marks Seattle's 19th annual Neighbor Appreciation Day.

This is a day when we can reach out, create new bonds, and express thanks to those who live or work around us.

The celebration began in 1995 when Phinney Ridge activist Judith Wood suggested that the City designate "a special day to celebrate the goodness in those around us and to reach out and strengthen our bonds to each other."

Seattle Mayor Norm Rice then proclaimed the Saturday before Valentine's Day as Neighbor Appreciation Day. The observance has grown every year since.

So what can you do on Neighbor Appreciation Day?

Here are some suggestions:

• Plan an activity for your neighborhood such as a block party, potluck, or work party. This website provides ideas, tools, resources, and templates to help community members organize an activity. Once scheduled, the event can be posted to the events calendar. 
• Attend one of the many community activities listed on the events calendar. Many Seattle Fire stations along with Seattle parks and neighborhoods are hosting celebrations and work parties.
• Send Neighbor Appreciation Day e-cards to your neighbors. The selection features artwork from past winners of the Neighbor Appreciation Day Student Art Contest.
• Share a story or two about your favorite neighbors. Community members can post stories about great neighbors or their neighborhood.
• Share the photos of your activity with us on flickr.

Information from www.seattle.gov/neighborhoods/neighborday/

Tim Burgess supports a Comprehensive approach to Lake City

Back in the mid to late 90's, hundreds of Lake City residents and business owners worked many hours with the city to develop the Lake City Comprehensive Plan. The overarching theme of the plan was to “create an atmosphere of safety”. There was concern at that time that increasing density would bring urban problems to the area. The Plan was to mitigate them by providing physical improvements to our public areas and supporting positive commercial and recreational uses of our neighborhood.

Many of the requests were for sidewalks, open spaces, a new community center, ways of improving people’s perception of Lake City so they will get out of their cars and walk / shop, crime prevention through design, etc. All these are needed just as badly now as they were 15 years ago.

Our public spaces are where we form connections with our neighbors and we need to feel safe using them. The current conditions are an impediment to us forming a sense of community and identity.

At the Full Council meeting on Monday, a resolution was passed to review and further implement our neighborhood plans. Later that day, Councilmember Tim Burgess wrote a letter to city staff regarding Fire Station 39 and our neighborhood Comprehensive Plan.

The letter emphasized a comprehensive approach that honors our neighborhood plan as well as our feedback that we have given at the two Public Involvement Plan meetings ( here and here ) regarding the concentration of extremely low income housing and the lack of other much needed assets and services - like sidewalks, civic space, and recreational programming.

In addition, the letter directed the city to:

- Create a status report on our Comprehensive Plan ( full plan here / adoption matrix here ) to review what has and has not been completed as well as updating the city contacts for each action item. 

- Create a report on current efforts to increase safety, economic development, and housing opportunities for a variety of income levels ( mixed income model ). 

- Provide a timeline for an update to our Neighborhood Plan.

- Look at the Pierre Visioning efforts when updating the Plan. 


An update of this policy document will help us rethink and / or re - emphasize our needs in a way that the city can act in a coordinated effort with us to realize them. We have a significant opportunity here to participate in the development and governance of our neighborhood and we should seize it. Many things being discussed now have the potential to bring millions of dollars in capital investments to our neighborhood: the Pierre's stated intent to redevelop their property, the BEX IV ( if it passes ) will be providing millions of dollars for new schools and remodels of nearly every school in our area, and  the possibility that we would get a high priority for a new community center on the next Green Space Levy are all near realities that will significantly and positively impact our community.

Open publication - Free publishing - More comp plan

DPC block party singer featured on David Letterman last night

Recently we wrote about Ray Dalton, the Seattle singer that joined members of Douglas Park Cooperative for our annual block party and helped lead our kids parade with his powerful voice.

Along with local hip-hop artists Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, Dalton's memorable voice has shot to the top of the charts with the track "Can't Hold Us."

Well, last night Dalton, Macklemore and Lewis were the featured artist on the David Letterman Show in the Ed Sullivan Theater. Their performance was flawless. You can see the video below. Watch until the end to see how Letterman mixes up the artists and creates a mildly awkward moment.

North Helpline thanks community, needs continued support

Recently our own Lake City North Helpline went through a crisis.

In December KING/5 reported that 2012 was the worst year yet for the food bank. They serve more than 1,700 people a week and giving from corporations and foundations was down. Donations at the time were also dwindling.

North Helpline Executive Director John Klevins looked at the numbers and realized something drastic had to happen for the organization to continue to operate. So he stopped drawing a salary in October and some staff took pay cuts so the emergency services and food bank could continue helping people in tough situations.

"This food bank is about love. This food bank is about transforming lives," Klevins told KING/5.

This week the organization sent out an update letter saying that because of an "inspirational" level of community support during the crisis, they have returned to their full array of food bank and emergency services.

But the letter also stresses the need for continued donations. 

"Of course, now that we have moved beyond our financial constraints of 2012, our focus must be placed on creating a new and more robust financial future," said the message to donors and the community.

The message also reminds who North Helpline's clients are. They are your neighbors, friends, family members and those you see in your community.  They could be any one of us.

"It just takes one lost job, a few missed mortgage or rental payments and a bad illness and we could all be in our long lines."

You can learn more about North Helpline on their website by clicking here.

You can donate here.

The KING/5 report is embedded below.

Lake City Library Calendar on DPC website

A screen shot of the Lake City Library calendar on their website

The Lake City branch of the Seattle Public Library regularly hosts educational programs and events. Some of these are events that would benefit many in our community. The challenge sometimes can be to get the word out.

This is something we have heard from neighbors and event organizers many times. It can be difficult to know all that is going on in our own community.

People in our neighborhood are working to solve that problem.

The Lake City Library has a wonderful online calendar and we have embeded the RSS feed from their calendar on the right column of the Douglas Park Cooperative website.

To find out more about a particular event just click on the item in the RSS feed and the details will pop up. We hope to have a similar feature from the Lake City Community Center in the future. The exchange of information is an important part of what will better our community.

Update: We have also imported info from their calendar into our Google calendar featured on the right of our website. But we are unsure if it will automatically update so that is a test of the data.

Neighborhood support needed Monday evening for skate spot

Click this image to view larger and to see ideas for the skate park

Correction: An earlier version of this post had an incorrect number date. The meeting is in fact Monday the 28th.

Members of our community will give a presentation to the Seattle Parks Department Levy Oversight Committee Monday evening, January 28th, to make a case for a skate spot at Virgil Flaim Park in our neighborhood.

A funding application was reviewed and scored and this presentation may be one of the last opportunities to make a case for funding for the neighborhood skate spot as it seems the funding may not be approved.

Here is how you can help:

Come to the Levy Oversight Committee meeting tonight, Monday, January 29th.

Visibly show your support for Lake City and a proposed skate spot.

Bring a skateboard, wear a LCW sticker from Elliott Bay, help make our community visible to the decision makers and let them know that a skate spot would bring much-needed life to a park that is often a hangout for chronic public inebriates.

The meeting details from organizers are below:

6:00 - 6:45: Open House: display table for committee members
7:00 - 9:00: Sometime in here, we have a slot for a 3 minute presentation.

Where: Northgate Community Center, 10510 5th Ave NE

Stand with us at our display table during the open house to demonstrate neighborhood support and/or stick around for the presentation and stand with us (with your LCW sticker) during the presentation.

To learn more about efforts to build a skate spot at Virgil Flaim park go here:  www.skatelakecity.org