Author Archives: jseattle

About jseattle

Justin is publisher of CHS. You can reach him at [email protected] or call/txt (206) 399-5959. Follow @jseattle on Twitter or be best pals on Facebook.

Seattle has a Capitol Hill renter in the mayor’s office — Does it need a mayoral mansion like New York City?

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(Image: City of Seattle)

The Bullitt House is available

This week, Mayor Zohran Mamdani moved into Gracie Mansion, the city’s 1799-built Manhattan mayoral residence overlooking Hells Gate.

In Seattle, as Mayor — and Capitol Hill renter — Katie Wilson sets about her goals of creating more housing for more types of people in the city, shouldn’t she also get her own place.

“While the mayor is certainly interested in publicly-owned, permanently affordable, mixed-income housing, I don’t think she’s looking to acquire public property for her own residence,” a Wilson spokesperson tells CHS. Continue reading →

Born into the pandemic, Chophouse Row wine bar Light Sleeper is closing

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Light Sleeper was born with a mask on into the teeth of the pandemic and made the best of things with takeout and bottles to go

Honey, wake up, Chophouse Row’s “vins sans intrants” and “roast chicken, fries & pizza pies” hangout Light Sleeper is closing.

“Opening a spot as an independent operator is very personal. Lots of dreaming and sacrifice. Lots of fear and joy. The costs to do this in Seattle are insane… some can pull it off, others can’t,” sommelier owner Ezra Wick said in the announcement that wine-focused restaurant is set to close in February after six years inside 11th Ave’s Chophouse Row.

“I started my career in restaurants on Pike/Pine, cooking breakfast at the Puss Puss Café over 30 years ago. I’ve been pouring wine on this block for 16 years, Osteria La Spiga, Bar Ferdinand, Sitka and Spruce – I met and fell in love with my wife on this block. Shit, I was born seven blocks away. It’s personal.” Continue reading →

Seattle City Light says ‘vandalism’ to blame for Friday’s Capitol Hill power outage

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There is a new menace threatening the Capitol Hill power grid around Broadway and John — people.

Seattle City Light tells CHS that Friday’s underground electrical vault fire that caused a power outage to around 450 customers including area businesses and residential buildings was caused by “vandalism resulting in damage to primary and secondary underground cables.”

It took Seattle City Light several hours to make repairs and restore service.

The public utility is asking for your help keeping an eye on things. Continue reading →

Seattle Fire crews mistakenly sent to Capitol Hill’s 13th Ave in response to two-alarm apartment building fire on Beacon Hill

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(Image: Seattle Fire)

A two-alarm apartment fire in Beacon Hill is the latest reminder to be as clear as possible with your street directionals and cross streets when calling 911 in Seattle.

Seattle Fire says its response to a major fire on Beacon Hill Sunday morning was delayed when crews were dispatched to Capitol Hill after a 911 call “reporting a fire in an apartment building in the 1700 block of 13th Ave.”

SFD says the first crews reported no fire in the area as they arrived near 13th and E Olive St. Sunday at 12:01 PM, three minutes after the initial call.

The fire department says a second 911 call came in at 12:03 PM reporting the fire was on Beacon Hill in the 17000 block of 13th Ave South — more than two miles away. Continue reading →

Global cycling brand Rapha is closing its Capitol Hill ‘clubhouse’

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London-based global cycling sportswear brand Rapha is closing its Seattle “clubhouse,” a mixed retail and cafe concept it introduced nearly ten years ago on this E Pine block of Capitol Hill after its redevelopment

The company said the Seattle shutdown will be joined by clubhouse closures in Boulder, Chicago, Miami, and Manchester, United Kingdom  “before the end of March 2026.”

The closures come as Rapha is suffering global revenue loss of a reported $23 million annually. It will continue to operate 20 or so clubhouses in cities including New York, Los Angeles, and Portland as well as opening new sites including Shanghai.

The company says the closures will begin as early as this month. Continue reading →

These Central Seattle school kids are getting a soft addition to their blacktop playground

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(Image: Seattle Public Schools)

Part of life for many Pacific Northwest kids — especially in densely populated areas around Capitol Hill — are affordable and long-lasting hard-top paved elementary school playgrounds. Seattle Public Schools has budgeted to change that for one corner of a neighborhood school’s campus.

Plans are afoot for a $416,000 project to install synthetic turf on a large rectangle of the Leschi Elementary School campus, according to city permits. The new turf area will be installed where the school’s futsal court is currently marked. Continue reading →

Power out around Broadway and John after another reported underground electrical fire

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Friday night’s outage map from Seattle City Light

An underground fire and more issues with the grid around Capitol Hill Station knocked out power to at least 450 customers around Broadway and John Friday night.

“Crews are responding to an energy response underway for a vault fire in the 100 block of Harvard Ave. E. Please avoid the area,” Seattle Fire reported about its “energy response” as the incident unfolded around 6:30 PM.

Remember to treat flashing intersections as four-way stops. Continue reading →

Cafe Lolo will make seasonal start this spring on Capitol Hill

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(Image: Cafe Lolo)

Three cooks are ready to share the kitchen in a new start in Capitol Hill’s historical Loveless Building that will align with the seasons of the Pacific Northwest’s farmers and foragers.

“Having three, each person has their thing that’s theirs, and we feel support from each other” Leah Engel tells CHS about Cafe Lolo, a “seasonally dictated” day and night cafe taking shape in the longtime E Roy home of Cook Weaver which closed as 2025 drew to an end to make way for the new project.

Much as Cook Weaver’s Zac Reynolds balanced family and a food and drink career for a near-decade of service at Cook Weaver, restaurant veterans Engel and Alex Halmi found love and a life together growing Cafe Lolo at Seattle farmers markets and pop-ups.

As they honed the concept for a fixed-place version of Lolo with a residency last year at Roosevelt’s Three Sacks Full, Engel’s co-worker at the NE 64th locally-sourced restaurant Brett Bankson joined the team. Continue reading →

CHS Year in Review 2025 | The year in pictures

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OK, ok, ok… you have probably had enough of 2025. Indulge us one last look back.

Here is the year that was in pictures on CHS. Take a look through the memories and faces from the year. Thanks to the photographers (especially, you, Alex Garland) and the neighbors who captured these images for us to see what was happening and who the people are who made news on Capitol Hill. Each photo links to the story behind the image. Now, back to 2026…

Continue reading →

Rapist who recorded assaults in Capitol Hill apartment sentenced to 46 years

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More than eight years after the assaults, an activist and entrepreneur who used Seattle University as his home base for establishing himself as a media pundit and expert on Native American issues has been sentenced to 46 years in jail for the rapes of unconscious women he videotaped inside his Boylston Ave Capitol Hill apartment.

His victims say Redwolf Pope drugged them and assaulted them without their knowledge.

Videos of the attacks revealed the crimes.

In September, a jury convicted Pope of five counts of rape and four counts of voyeurism for the assaults beginning in 2016.

The long path to justice in the case included time for Pope to finish a sentence in New Mexico. In July 2018, Pope was arrested and charged with sexually assaulting a Seattle woman in a Santa Fe, New Mexico hotel room. Continue reading →