Remembering Binyam Wolde, ‘the spirit of Dirty Dog’

(Image: Dirty Dog)

The spirit of Dirty Dog has passed.

Binyam Wolde, the entrepreneur behind the Dirty Dog food cart business that has included the wiener stand at 11th and Pine that has grown into a core element of the Capitol Hill street scene, died earlier this month. Wolde was 44.

As his business continues, a fundraiser has been set up to help support his family. “Biny was a devoted and loving husband to his wife. He was a fun, patient , and loving father to his two young children- he absolutely adored them. He was the eldest of six siblings who looked to him as mentor and friend,” it reads. “He was generous with all who knew him and our community is devastated that we’ve lost him.” Continue reading

Flowers Just 4 U closing shop after 40 years of business in the CD

(Image: CHS)

When you are ready to retire from the flower business, you are ready to retire — even if you are only a few weeks from Valentine’s Day.

Flowers Just 4 U will mark its final day of business Friday after 40 years in the Central District.

Owner Mary Wesley told the South Seattle Emerald earlier this month she has been holding out hope a buyer will come along to keep a flower business going at 23rd and Cherry. Wesley said she also was invited to reopen her business on the corner after the planned affordable Acer House development demolishes the old building and finishes construction. Continue reading

‘Downscale the Proposed One Seattle Rezoning Plans for Madrona’ — How Hollingsworth’s office is handling neighborhood pushback on Seattle growth plan update

There are petitions in Madrona and letters from angry realtors.

“We are welcoming any and all feedback,” Anthony Derrick, chief of staff to District 3 representative Joy Hollingsworth tells CHS about the ongoing process the council member is leading to forge an update to the city’s comprehensive plan and new zoning across its neighborhoods. “With the law, the city is going to see some massive density changes.”

Wednesday afternoon, the Seattle City Council committee Hollingsworth leads formed to take on the nearly impossible task of reaching compromise on Seattle’s comprehensive plan update will meet.

A report on displacement, a core issue for Hollingsworth who grew up watching her Central District neighborhood struggle with gentrification, is on the agenda. But the important statistics and challenges raised in the presentation on the city’s Anti-Displacement Action Plan (PDF) might get lost.

The second half of Wednesday’s meeting will focus on public engagement around the comprehensive plan update — including the city’s meetings on the update it has been hosting since 2022.

Protests and pushback from a growing chorus of property, business, and homeowners from across the city and District 3 are becoming louder as a key February 5th public forum on the comprehensive plan update proposal approaches.

In Madrona, groups are forming to oppose upzoning in the neighborhood as Seattle leaders say more areas of the city must rise to meet state required changes hoped to address growing housing and affordability challenges.

The Madrona neighborhood, they argue, should be treated differently than the rest of the city when it comes to efforts to increase density. Continue reading

City of Seattle announces $7M in youth mental health spending

From the city’s 2024 report (PDF) on youth mental health

Seattle has announced $7 million in new partnerships as it expands mental health services for teens and young adults.

The spending was included in Mayor Bruce Harrell’s priorities as his office responded with a $14.5 million plan focused on intervention, mental health, and “school-based safety specialists” following last year’s deadly shooting at Garfield High School.

The spending announced this week includes a new partnership with Talkspace, an online therapy platform, increased staffing at school-based health centers, and “other holistic approaches,” plus seven local mental health and wellness organization serving youth ages 13 to 24 “through a suite of virtual and in-person care options,” the city said,

The funding through the Department of Education and Early Learning will expand access to in-person and telehealth mental health services to support Seattle’s middle and high school students, as well as youth up to age 24, in 2025 and 2026.

The new services are being readied to launch early this year. Continue reading

No Capitol Hill-U District light rail service this weekend to repair damage at University of Washington Station and get trains back up to speed

(Image: Sound Transit)

This one is a little different. Sound Transit says to prepare for another weekend of disrupted light rail service around Capitol Hill Station — but this time, preparations for the planned late 2025 full opening of the system’s 2 Line are not to blame.

Service between the University District and Capitol Hill will be suspended Saturday and Sunday as work takes place to repair equipment damaged in September that has had trains running slowly through the area:

As regular riders through University of Washington already know, Link trains have been traveling slowly through the station and interlocking since September, when a train with a broken pantograph damaged the Overhead Contact System (OCS). Crews were able to make emergency repairs, and to prevent further disruptions trains have been speed restricted entering and exiting the station until full repairs could be performed.

Sound Transit says the service interruption is necessary because repairs of the high-voltage electrical components involved cannot be performed “without a complete shutdown of the impacted area.” Continue reading

With dancing, events, and a new name, group steps forward with new plan for Capitol Hill’s Century Ballroom

(Image: Century Ballroom)

Wilder, Kuperman, and Cockrill — You can watch the announcement here

There is new hope for a new dance at Capitol Hill’s Century Ballroom.

Two months after announcing they would not renew their lease and were ready to end the three decade run of the popular dance venue inside Capitol Hill’s Odd Fellows Hall, Century’s Hallie Kuperman and Alison Cockrill have announced a group has stepped forward with a plan to continue the space’s long history of social dance while stabilizing the business.

“When we reached out to the universe and said, if there’s a way to save this space as a dancing space, let it come forward, and this person came forward,” Kuperman said in this week’s announcement.

The group led by Seattle event producer Eliza Wilder says it is negotiating a new lease for the building’s Grand Ballroom and West Hall and plans to fill the venue with dances and classes while growing the event space rental component of the business.

“I’ve been dancing at Century Ballroom for 15 years. It was the first place I went dancing when I moved here as a fresh-eyed 18-year-old,” Wilder said.

In the announcement, Wilder said she had been searching for a home for an event business — but never thought she would take on something at Century’s scale. Continue reading

City Council chooses Solomon to fill open International District and South Seattle seat

(Image: Seattle City Council)

Mark Solomon has ten months to change Seattle. Monday, the Seattle City Council voted to appoint the longtime Seattle Police Department community crime prevention coordinator to finish the term of Tammy Morales representing the International District and South Seattle’s District 2 at City Hall.

Solomon has pledged to focus on the job at hand and says he will not run in the November election to re-fill the seat.

Solomon has said his priorities will be representing D2 neighborhoods in the city’s comprehensive plan update and address street disorder in Little Saigon. Continue reading

Recycle and reuse? New thrift shop lined up as Lifelong to say goodbye to Broadway store — UPDATE

(image: CHS)

Lifelong, the Seattle nonprofit dedicated to helping those living with HIV, is shutting down its thrift division. A change on Broadway is coming but the old Lifelong Thrift Shop looks like it is being set for some vintage recycling with a new thrift entity lined up for the space.

The nonprofit said it is closing its thrift division in a Monday announcement. “We hope to carry on in the same space with a new name, unaffiliated with Lifelong and will be sharing details online and in our windows as they are finalized,” the announcement reads. UPDATE: Lifelong said it pulled down the announcement to update some information included in the post and will be making a new announcement soon.

Details on the timing of the change have not yet been announced. The Broadway store was Lifelong’s only retail location.

Business license filings show a new entity lined up for the 312 Broadway E address. The new thrift shop project includes current Lifelong Thrift director Tamara Asakawa, according to the filing.

UPDATE: Lifelong CEO Erica Sessle tells CHS the decision to move on from the store comes as the ten-year lease for the space was coming up and Lifelong’s leadership is making concerted efforts to focus the nonprofit on its core services as it prepares to weather a more uncertain future under the new administration. Shuttering the underperforming store will help Lifelong as it expands its kitchen and meal services with a new space in the Georgetown Yards that will double the size of its operations.

“We’re hoping we’re going to be able to feed more people,” Sessle said.

Lifelong Thrift opened in the space in early 2015. Prior to that, the store was part of the Red Light Vintage family. The new Lifelong Thrift combined the spaces left empty by the departure of the much-loved Red Light and its sibling boutique. At 12,500 square feet and two levels, it was almost three times the size of the thrift’s former E Union location.

Capitol Hill vintage, meanwhile, remains an important part of the neighborhood’s retail mix. Though the Capitol Hill Value Village was long ago torn down to make way for an 11th Ave office space development, vintage shops large and small continue to do the area including the Late Night Vintage Market that landed on E Pike in 2022. The Capitol Hill Goodwill remains active on Belmont Ave despite mixed-use plans that now span back five years.

We’ll know more about the new shop’s plans for Broadway soon but Lifelong is hoping for a smooth transition for customers and employees.

Learn more at lifelong.org.

 

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911 | Good samaritan helps knocked-out Capitol Hill robbery victim get home

See something others should know about? Email CHS or call/txt/Signal (206) 399-5959. You can view recent CHS 911 coverage here. Hear sirens and wondering what’s going on? Check out reports from @jseattle or join and check in with neighbors in the CHS Facebook Group.

  • Good samaritan helps robbery victim get home: Seattle Police say a good samaritan who witnessed a driver getting knocked out by a punch and robbed in an altercation over a fender bender near Broadway Hill Park early last Monday morning, picked up the unconscious victim, drove him home, and got him into his apartment where he later came to and got himself to the hospital. According to the SPD report on the robbery investigation, police were able to piece together what happened in the 1 AM fight thanks to a note the good samaritan left in the knocked-out victim’s pocket. Interviewing the victim at Harborview where he was being treated for an injured neck, police learned only that the victim remembered getting into a small collision near Federal and Republican. “I don’t see any damage, I’m going home,” the victim remembered saying. That was the last thing he would recall. He woke up in his apartment with his phone and wallet stolen and found the note. The victim “said he found a piece of paper in his pocket with the name of a witness, XXXXX. XXXX, his phone number, and a message saying, ‘the guy who drove you home after you got knocked out,'” the SPD report reads. Police say the suspect who stole the phone also called the victim’s mother to try to get her to wire money for the return of the victim’s property. Police contacted the good samaritan and were able to learn what had gone down. The man said he was sitting in Broadway Hill Park when he noticed around ten vehicles were stopped in the middle of the E Republican. He described the altercation and said the suspect punched the victim in the face and sent him crashing to the ground where he was knocked unconscious. The man told police he was able to wake the victim “up enough to find out where he lived and get the victim back inside the car he was driving and drove him home, “parked his vehicle and was able to carry XXXX into the building and left him in his apartment with the note.” SPD is investigating.
  • First Hill gunfire: Seattle Police investigated gunfire that left a bullet hole in the parking garage fence at First Hill’s Sorrento Hotel early Wednesday. Police were called to the area around 2:30 AM to the reported shooting. “The reporting party stated that they heard approximately multiple shots followed by a vehicle speeding off westbound, but it was not observed,” the SPD report reads. There were no reported injuries.
  • Central District gunfire: SPD also investigated a shooting last Wednesday evening near 21st and Cherry:
    At 1819 hours, multiple calls of shots being fired and a person fleeing. Officers arrived in the area and spoke to several witnesses. They pointed out a nearby apartment building and said that one of the persons involved had run inside of the apartments. No victims were located. No damage to any cars or buildings could be located. A check of the apartment building did not reveal any victims, the occupants were either uncooperative or said they did not see anything and only heard gunshots. GVRU was notified.
  • A still from video showing the January 16th incident

    Capitol Hill Station security tackle teen suspect: A Sound Transit spokesperson tells CHS that a January 16th incident at Capitol Hill Station involving use of force by its security officers was necessary to remove “a possible sharp weapon” from a suspect who had been involved in an ongoing altercation at the Broadway and John transit facility. Video of the incident captured by an observer shows one of two responding Sound Transit security staff tackle the teen female along E John and cause her to drop the object in the midst of a dispute involving multiple male and female subjects and a small child. The officers gain control of the weapon, release the teen, and she can be seen leaving the scene with another female subject and the small child. Sound Transit says the incident began around 1:30 PM with an altercation involving the suspect and several others that slowed as Seattle Police were called and Seattle Fire was on the scene to treat one person for an injury. Sound Transit says the fighting began again as police left, necessitating the use of force. There were no immediate arrests.

 

HELP KEEP CHS PAYWALL-FREE
Subscribe to CHS to help us hire writers and photographers to cover the neighborhood. CHS is a pay what you can community news site with no required sign-in or paywall. To stay that way, we need you.

Become a subscriber to help us cover the neighborhood for as little as $5 a month. 

 

Why the Broadway Center for Youth is coming to the center of Capitol Hill

Weinstein A+U’s rendering of the now under construction Broadway Center for Youth at Broadway and Pine

By Matt Dowell

A planned two years of construction has begun on the Broadway Center for Youth, an affordable housing and workforce development hub at Broadway and Pine. Why develop the project here near the core of the neighborhood’s entertainment district on one of the most expensive blocks in the city and in an area experiencing some of the deepest pains of the city’s ongoing challenges around addiction and mental health?

Officials at YouthCare, the nonprofit behind the center, say they want to create this resource for the young adults they serve at Broadway and Pine for the same reasons anybody might want to live here — community, culture, transit, and jobs.

YouthCare has worked for 50 years to help address youth homelessness in the Seattle area. Their Constellation Center, a part of the Broadway Center for Youth, will connect to Community Roots Housing’s new eight story building with 84 affordable homes on the busy Capitol Hill corner. Imagined as a hub for young people aged 18 to 24 who need job training, case management, housing, and mental health services, the center will expand programs already offered by YouthCare.

YouthCare CEO Degale Cooper highlighted the advantages of the well-connected location. It is close to two local colleges, employers with jobs, and public transportation. And it’s near the healthcare organizations that provide care to those under YouthCare’s wing.

Plus, it’s close to those who need help.

“More young people who use YouthCare services are moving out of the downtown corridor as more condos and businesses go up. They are moving to Cap Hill,” said Cooper. Continue reading