Beyond Oppenheimer, nuclear Issues highlighted in International Uranium Film Festival’s stop on Capitol Hill

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By Holland Burris/UW News Lab

Oppenheimer has been a cinema sensation with seven Academy Awards for its depiction of the physicist who helped develop the world’s first nuclear weapons. There are more — and more important — stories to tell. The first-ever film festival about nuclear power will stop in Seattle on April 12-14 at Capitol Hill’s Northwest Film Forum thanks to Jad Baaklini, a native of Beirut now residing in Seattle as director of communication at Epiphany Parish.

Baaklini became fascinated with the Hanford site in eastern Washington, learning about it after immigrating to the United States.

“I think people should just be aware of what’s around them,” Baaklini said. “Seattle can be in a little bubble especially if people are newcomers like me. I only moved here in 2018, and you know, you can live here your whole life not knowing the rest of Washington.”

After hearing about the International Uranium Film Festival, a Brazilian-based festival looking to stop in multiple locations in the U.S., he reached out to IUFF, pitched hosting to Northwest Film Forum, and connected the festival to its main sponsor, Physicians for Social Responsibility.

IUFF will show eight movies at the 12th Ave independent theater that will discuss nuclear issues from around the world, and include some panel discussions after a few of the films. Continue reading →

There still isn’t a crosswalk at Harvard and E Olive Way

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A photo Matt Baume sent to city officials showing yet another crash at Harvard and Olive

Even with a new representative on the city council more dedicated to public safety, transparency, and access, “One Seattle” slogans from City Hall, and leaders paying lip service to the importance of pedestrian and bike rider safety as they shape the city’s next billion dollar transportation levy, it still takes a hell of a lot of work and a few squeaky wheels for the Seattle Department of Transportation to add a needed crosswalk at a dangerous intersection on Capitol Hill.

Matt Baume, a neighborhood writer, has been documenting the crashes at E Olive Way and Harvard Ave E for about ten years, all the while trying to get safety improvements put in place. With new leadership in the district, Baume wrote to D3 Councilmember Joy Hollingsworth in January to share his concerns after yet another crash, this time involving three cars and several passengers including a family with a small child. Continue reading →

Seattle Public Library, facing another workforce crunch, slices hours including temporarily cutting Sundays at Capitol Hill branch

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(Image: Seattle Public Library)

Continuing staffing issues has the Seattle Public Library system pulling back on service and hours at branches across the city over the coming weeks:

Several factors have impacted the Library’s staffing capacity, including changes to the Library’s minimum staffing levels and increased leave usage. Our impacted staffing capacity has led to unplanned closures, as the Library must redirect staff from one location to another if a branch doesn’t have the right number, or right mix, of staff to open and operate a building safely and with full library services. The Library is working to bring on additional staffing support.

The SPL system is implementing “scheduled closures” at several branches including the Capitol Hill library through June 4th. The Capitol Hill branch is implementing noon openings on Thursdays and will now be closed on Sundays through June 4th.

SPL says the staffing situation will be reevaluated in May when details of “the Library’s schedule beyond June 4” will be announced. Continue reading →

Community weighs in on design preferences for Central District’s Firehouse Mini Park renovation

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Seattle Parks and Recreation offered creative input opportunities for younger community members during the engagement meeting for the Firehouse Mini Park renovation project on Saturday, April 6. (Image: Ashley Yu/UW Journalism News Lab)

(Image: Ashley Yu/UW Journalism News Lab)

By Ashley Yu/UW News Lab

Members of the Central District community gathered at Byrd Barr Place last weekend, to give their input for the proposed renovation to the historical Firehouse Mini Park at 712 18th Ave.

Hosted by Seattle Parks and Recreation, community members were invited to meet the design team and provide input for the design plans of the $781,000 project. Since the current play equipment was installed in 1988 and is now due for replacement, the goals of the meeting were to gather insights on enhancing the park’s current use and identify the community’s preferences for themes and specific equipment.

Some of the features requested included maintaining the current firehouse theme and creating accessibility for children of all ages.

“The play equipment is not meeting the current safety and accessibility standard,” said capital projects coordinator Jessica Michalak. “The main goal is to make it safe and accessible for the community and to draw more folks in based [on] what the current needs are.” Continue reading →

Le Morte D’Meliora? Struggling restaurant that replaced the Canterbury hit by unpaid rent, taxes

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The Capitol Hill “new American” restaurant that replaced ye olde Canterbury Ale House is struggling with the oldest of business challenges: taxes and rent.

Meliora, which has been “temporarily closed” since February while the ownership said it was undertaking a restart of the concept, is behind on three months’ rent and owes more than $30,000, according to a notice posted last week by the building’s landlord.

Meanwhile, a King County Superior Court filing shows the business owed the state more than $40,000 in unpaid taxes. Continue reading →

Kerry Hall hits the market as Cornish College of the Arts says goodbye to Capitol Hill

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(Image: Cornish College of the Arts)

The Cornish College of the Arts is ready to sever its final connection after more than a century of dance and music education on Capitol Hill.

Kerry Hall, the three-story studio and performance hall at E Roy and Broadway where Nellie Cornish called home at the time of the school’s 1914 founding and part of the school for more than 100 years, is now for sale.

“This is an exciting moment for Cornish College of the Arts,” Emily Parkhurst, chair of the board of trustees, said in a statement. “The decision to sell Kerry Hall completes the Board’s plan to unify the campus in South Lake Union, first outlined in 2007.”

CHS reported here in 2021 on preparations for the property sale as Cornish sought to solidify its growing presence in South Lake Union.

The announcement did not include a price tag for the property. Cornish says proceeds from the sale will be “reinvested into Cornish’s existing facilities and operations, allowing the college to continue to grow.” The school says its enrollment is expected to exceed 530 students in the 2024/2025 school year. Continue reading →

UW football player accused of two rapes including assault in Capitol Hill apartment

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A University of Washington football player has been arrested for raping two women in incidents late last year including an October assault of a Seattle Central College student in her Capitol Hill apartment.

Tybo Tylin Rogers, 18, faces charges of second and third degree rape. Continue reading →

Pike/Pine has a permanent pop-up bar: It’s time to check-in at The Mystic Motel

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(Image: The Woods)

Capitol Hill’s Christmas Dive Bar isn’t going year round but pop-up bar experiences are, indeed, the new way of doing business at 11th Ave’s The Woods.

The club’s owners say they are jumping into pop-ups full time with the opening of The Mystic Motel, a new Wes Anderson-worthy temporary theme for the space riffing on the grown-up spring breaks of Palm Springs and adventures in the desert.

“This latest pop-up is another export of something we love – the deserts surrounding Palm Springs, which we try to visit as often as we can,” Joey Burgess said in the announcement of the new project that debuted over the weekend. “We riffed on photos we’d taken over the years of crazy things we’ve seen as we’ve explored down there, and we really wanted to bring something that was just absurd and completely unexpected to the Hill.” Continue reading →

In a 15-minute city, why not have a Mt. Bagel on every block?

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Not every culinary success story begins at age 7, but for Roan Hartzog, his story does. Hartzog has been “bread adjacent” for most of his life.

Mt. Bagel, surprisingly located amid the homes of Madison Valley on 26th Ave E, is the current iteration of Hartzog’s baking.

In 2019, Roan took a trip to the “bagel homeland” of New York City. Wanting to start his own project, but unsure of what that was, he let his travel be his inspiration. After returning home, he worked his bread bakery job and on his off time, experimented with bagels.

It took a year of playing with dough to get the recipe right, but after an instagram account became his storefront, and family and friends got their share, more than just friends got to sample his rounded carbs.

“Soon it became friends of friends, then people I didn’t know started DMing me for bagels and I was like. oh, this is becoming something a little bigger than expected.” Working out of a friend’s commercial bakery, he eventually quit his bread job and focused on his bagel empire. When his friend moved to Edmonds in 2023, Hartzog took over the space. Continue reading →

Office of Inspector General report: SPD’s ‘use of force’ dropped — but not for Black or Latino Seattleites

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The Seattle City Council’s public safety committee Tuesday will hear details of a 2023 report on the Seattle Police Department’s use of force that shows police have been reporting fewer total incidents while “the use of force increased with Black people, Hispanic / Latino people, and other racial minorities,” according to a council brief on the session.

The Seattle Office of Inspector General report (PDF) covers a three-year period — 2021, 2022, and 2023 — and documents a shift that recorded some of the overall “lowest use of force since 2015” for the department even as incidents reported involving Black and Hispanic/Latino people jumped.

The report also shows that Black people in Seattle are disproportionately more likely to have a cop point a gun at them. “Black subjects are still most likely to be subject to pointing of a firearm, despite not being subjects of force as frequently as white or unknown race persons,” Tuesday’s presentation reads. Continue reading →