In Seattle, the usual suspects again (plus two)

Forbes logoThis morning, Forbes released its annual list of the world’s billionaires. It essentially includes the entire Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans, which appears in the fall, plus another 1,026 swells from around the world. Since publication of the last Forbes 400 list in September, the Seattle-area contingent has grown by two, from eight to ten.

The newbies:

Anne Gittinger. $1.2 billion, ranked No. 1,175. She and her brother, Bruce Nordstrom, are the biggest shareholders in department store operator Nordstrom. Bruce, 79, finally made it onto the Forbes 400 list last year (he’s on this one, too, with an unchanged net worth that matches his sister’s and also the same rank). But Forbes researchers back then apparently missed the fine print in the company proxy statement indicating that Anne, 77, had pretty much the same stash. So it fell to New To Seattle to first point this out to the world last September. The sibs are both graduates of the University of Washington.

Gabe Newell. $1.1 billion, ranked No. 1,268. He is majority owner of Valve Corp., a Bellevue video game developer and distributor. Newell, 50, joins that grand tradition of Seattle billionaires who left school short of graduation. He bailed from Harvard. Continue reading

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Big Seattle charity cuts its bogusly high efficiency claim–a bit

This morning, Seattle-based United Way of King County, the nation’s largest United Way unit by donations, updated a display on its Web site. Aside from color, see if you can spot the change:

YesterdayUWKC screenshot 2 130227Today

UWKC screenshot 2 130228Yes, UWKC slightly lowered its financial efficiency claim, from “more than 98 cents” of each donated dollar to “more than 97 cents.” In my judgment–as a journalist I’ve been writing about charities for a long time–both numbers are bogusly high. Using the standard formula in the nonprofit sector–or even the method prescribed by the parent organization of all United Ways–UWKC’s true real charitable commitment ratio, as this measure of financial efficiency is called, is just 91 cents on the dollar, or 91%.

Now in the world of charity 91% is a perfectly acceptable financial efficiency, but apparently not acceptable enough for UWKC. As I see it, the agency is playing games with its numbers–essentially leaving out inconvenient truths–hoping to impress ignorant donors. Its leadership made up a calculation so invalid in its methodology that its own auditors declined to sign off on it. In effect UWKC is asserting it has just one-fourth the average overhead of the country’s other 1,200-plus United Ways–which all pretty much operate in the same manner, raising money through workplace deductions.

I wrote about this last fall after UWKC posted online its annual financial statement for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2012. The unaudited part of the statement–the portion that the auditors disclaimed all responsibility for–calculated a charitable commitment ratio of 97.9 cents on the dollar, or 97.8%. That by definition is less than 98 cents. Yet until this morning, UWKC was still claiming “more than 98 cents,” the number from the previous fiscal year, when the actual calculation was 98.1 cents, or 98.1%. I have been advised the delay in updating to the lower number on the Web was due solely to the time it takes to prepare the PR-ish annual report. Continue reading

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Really? Iffy charity says gift will benefit Seattle hospital

Childrens Cancer logoSee updates at end of story.

As regular readers of this blog know, living here in Seattle I receive a fair number of telephone cold calls in the name of charities that will end up getting just a few pennies on the dollar of any resulting cash donation. That’s because the bulk of the money goes to the telemarketing fundraiser.

This, of course, is not good, but it’s more or less legal so long as the caller doesn’t make false statements. However, today I received a cold call from a Pennsylvania-based charity that I would say went a little over the line. I was explicitly told my contribution would benefit a specific Seattle hospital. I don’t really believe it, for reasons to be explained below. On top of that, it doesn’t look to me like more than 15 cents of every cash dollar donated in the recent past went to what I would call a proper charitable purpose. Continue reading

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Club soda officially declared tax-free in Seattle–7 days late

Grocery receipt 2I am now the recipient of an official government declaration that club soda is exempt from the Washington State sales tax. The edict from the state Department of Revenue (DOR) came well after the time frame set forth on the agency’s own website for responding to such questions. It arrived more than a week after the supermarket that sold me the six bottles confessed error in assessing me an additional 68 cents. But at least the decision showed up.

To recap: I bought the two-liter bottles of club soda at my neighborhood Albertsons. Looking later at the receipt, I discovered that I had been hit with the sales tax (in Seattle, 9.5%, the highest among major U.S. cities). Perceiving this levy as a mistake–most edible groceries are exempt, here and in all the other places I lived before becoming New To Seattle–I did some local research.  Then by email I queried both Albertsons and DOR.

Albertsons got back to me in four business days, admitted the mistake and refunded the grand overcharge plus another $5 for my efforts. But even though I used DOR’s “Quick Question” portal, which states, “You can generally expect a response within two business days,” it took the state more than four times as long–nine business days–to reply. Continue reading

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A song in ‘The Music Man’ suggests ‘Seattle Stubborn’

Noah Racey as Harold Hill with townsfolk in "The Music Man" (credit Mark Kitaoka, courtesy 5th Avenue Theatre)

Harold Hill (played by Noah Racey) with townsfolk in “The Music Man” (credit Mark Kitaoka, courtesy 5th Avenue Theatre)

As I sat in last night’s opening-performance audience of “The Music Man” at Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre, one of the many tunes hit home. Early in the show, “Professor” Harold Hill arrives in River City, Iowa–like I did a century later as New To Seattle–and finds it hard to become friends with the locals. They are more than happy to tell him why in Meredith Willson’s famous song, “Iowa Stubborn.” With a slight change that immediately popped into my head and which you will notice quickly, here are some of the lyrics:

Oh, there’s nothing halfway
About the Seattle way to treat you,
When we treat you,
Which we may not do at all.
There’s a Seattle kind of special
Chip-on-the-shoulder attitude
We’ve never been without,
That we recall.
We can be cold
As our falling thermometers in December
If you ask about our weather in July.
And we’re so by God stubborn
We could stand touchin’ noses
For a week at a time
And never see eye-to-eye.
But what the heck, you’re welcome.
Join us at the picnic.
You can eat your fill
Of all the food you bring yourself.
You really ought to give Seattle a try.
Provided you are contrary. ….

Now I submit this is a pretty good description of the much-debated local phenomenon known as the Seattle Freeze. Continue reading

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Another curious charity around Seattle

Eagles Nest logoIn the course of my continuing New To Seattle exploration of the shores along Puget Sound, I have come across yet another local charity whose operations raise a few questions.

The name is Eagle’s Nest Foundation. It’s headquartered in the Seattle suburb of Mukilteo, where folks catch the ferry to Whidbey Island, the state’s largest. The charity is run by Dayoung and Jeanne Kimn, described as veteran aid workers.

The charity says on its Web site that it “receives medical supplies as donations” to send to others nations “most in need.” Then there’s this grand claim:  “Since it’s [sic] inception in 2003, Eagle’s Nest Foundation has shipped over $80 million in medical supplies to more than 25 countries around the globe.”

Sound terrific, doesn’t it? But there’s a little problem with this statement. The six years of Eagle’s Nest public tax returns that I can find (2006 to 2011) show that the charity spent a total of $453,000 on charitable purposes, none of that identified as donated goods given away. That’s a whole lot less than $80 million. And I should point out that statements on Web sites are not made under oath, while those on tax returns are.

While Eagle’s Nest is federally registered with the Internal Revenue Service as tax-exempt public charity–meaning it can offer tax deductions to donors–it is not registered with charity regulators in Washington State. Moreover, Eagle’s Nest seems to have ties with a Canadian relief agency, Universal Aide Society, that lost its tax-exempt status after an audit showed, among other things, gross overvaluation of donated goods. Continue reading

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My 68-cent sales tax refund in Seattle

Grocery receipt 2Earlier this week, I posted a short article to the effect that I thought my neighborhood Albertsons supermarket in Seattle improperly had charged me the state sales tax on six two-liter bottles of unsalted club soda. The tax wasn’t exactly a tremendous sum–68 cents to be exact. But I thought there was a principle involved–you know, that stuff we learned growing up about following the law.

So after researching the big issues involved, I sent emails inquiring about this tax treatment both to Albertsons and the Washington State Department of Revenue, which oversees the sales tax. I provided citations to specific provisions of Washington State law and a “special notice” issued by the DOR entitled “Taxability of Soft Drinks.”

Then I sat back and waited. Today, there were developments. Continue reading

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Sales tax confusion in Seattle

Grocery receipt 2Take a close look to the right at the slightly annotated and redacted receipt for groceries I recently purchased in Seattle. The six two-liter plastic bottles of club soda I bought were hit with the hefty 9.5% sales tax. The four two-liter plastic bottles of seltzer water were not. Both products consisted of unsweetened, unflavored, unsalted water to which carbonation had been artificially added.

For the life of me, I can’t figure out a rational explanation for the differing treatments, other than, perhaps, an error. It looks to me like both products are exempt under current Washington State law. I reached this conclusion after carefully perusing material on the state Department of Revenue website as well as the Washington Administrative Code. The two sources seem to exempt from the sales tax carbonated bottled water that doesn’t contain sweeteners like, say, Coca-Cola.

The tax that might have been wrongfully assessed in this instance amounted to only 68 cents. But in the course of a year I drink a lot of fizzy water. So I might pursue this further. Continue reading

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Far from Seattle,Texas boosters have a hero-spelling problem

William Barret Travis

William Barret Travis

This post has been updated since its original publication through March 6 to cite more misspellings.

Okay, I admit it. This is a rant. And on this topic not for the first time. But it continues to bug me that boosters of the Great State of Texas–where I lived for seven years long before becoming New To Seattle–still can’t spell correctly the name of one of their most celebrated heroes.

The figure in question is William Barret Travis. He was the 26-year-old commander of the Alamo, the San Antonio mission that in 1836 fell to the Mexican Army, which killed everyone inside, including Travis.  But the written message that Travis managed to send out–“I shall never surrender or retreat … Victory or death!”–inspired fellow Texans, who, chanting “Remember the Alamo,” defeated the Mexicans just six weeks later.

Here’s why I even care about this. My name happens to be William Barrett, spelled with 2 T’s. Travis spelled his middle name with one T.  For various reasons detailed below, I don’t consider him all that much of a role model. But I still get asked if I am kin or if I was named for him (No and no).

The impending return to the Alamo of his “victory or death” letter nearly two centuries after he wrote it is occasioning a great deal of publicity.

And misspellings. Especially around the Lone Star State.

On February 8 the hometown San Antonio Business Journal reported on “the famous “Victory or Death” letter penned by Alamo hero William Barrett Travis in 1836.” The website of hometown TV station WOIA, the NBC affiliate, did no better on February 21: “Lt. Colonel William Barrett Travis’ famous letter returns to the Alamo this week …”

The official website of San Antonio tourism couldn’t get it right. “One hundred and seventy-seven years ago, Alamo commander William Barrett Travis wrote an urgent letter requesting aid during the Alamo’s siege,” proclaimed a  aJanuary 24 posting on VisitSanAntonio.com. And the Alamo’s own gift shop? The “William Barrett Travis Ring Necklace” can be yours for just $39.99. (UPDATE: After this post went up, the Alamo’s gift shop fixed the spelling.) Continue reading

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In Seattle, a sunbreak is to be treasured–for a bit

Cloudy Seattle (via Wikipedia)

Cloudy Seattle (via Wikipedia)

Decades ago, as a journalist getting shot at in the Middle East, I had occasion to visit Abu Dhabi. That’s one of the seven states comprising the United Arab Emirates along the Persian Gulf. Abu Dhabi is (and was) an oil-rich, crescent-shaped lump of unforgiving desert. Lots of desert. Outside the capital city of Abu Dhabi, where an irrigation project tried to spruce up landscaping along city streets, there was little green growing in the wild. So little green, in fact, that I was told more than once that nomadic bedouin tribes went crazy when they came across a weed growing in the desert. It was green and growing!

Now that I am New To Seattle, I perceive much the same mindset among Seattelites when, during the long period from Halloween to Memorial Day, they encounter bursts of sun that often last for just a few minutes. Locally, these are called sunbreaks, and they really seem to excite people the same way a relatively rare day materializes during the winter in which nearby mountains can be seen in all directions.

In Seattle, sunbreaks receive prominence in weather forecasts all out of proportion to their physical significance. In most of the rest of the country, weather forecasts emphasizing sunbreaks would be ridiculed as not being very useful in planning one’s day. But not so in Seattle, where broadcast meteorologists seem to get as excited up over the possibility of sunbreaks as the CNBC crowd does over a tiny rise in the stock market that says nothing about the longer trend. Continue reading

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When it comes to air quality, Seattle avoids the S word

Current Puget Sound Air Quality Agency burning bans

Current Puget Sound Clean Air Agency burning bans

For some days, chilly Seattle and environs have been in the grip of what the local news media keep calling fog. But I’m still wheezing after having refereed youth soccer for several hours this afternoon on Beacon Hill in Seattle. Before becoming New To Seattle, I lived for years around Los Angeles, and prior to that, Albuquerque and Houston, all cities with persistent air quality problems. I know smog when I breathe it, and believe me, this is smog.

But that wouldn’t mesh with the narrative of Seattle as a pristine place in perfect harmony with nature. So the news accounts generally just reference fog, which seems so refreshing. “Foggy weather to last into weekend,” said a typical recent post on the website of KING-TV. Here’s a headline on the website of another TV station, KOMO: “Time lapse video shows Space Needle towering above fog.” To me, the video looks suspiciously close to what I see from a plane landing at LAX or Burbank on a particularly gruesome day.

The Puget Sound Clean Air Agency–there’s a reason why this exists–has laid down a woodburning fireplace usage ban until further notice along with a notso-hotso air quality prediction for the next few days. The National Weather Service today issued an air stagnation advisory.

To be fair, I think this is an unusual event in Seattle, whose air quality I normally find quite acceptable. This is so unlike Los Angeles. Its air inversion pollution problems, largely caused by the San Gabriel Mountains, are so persistent that Spanish explorer Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo way back in 1542 named the offshore waters Bay of Smoke because of the overhanging haze from the fires of onshore Indians.

But the current P.R. spin in Seattle clearly has its roots around the City of Angels. In the 1880s, during one of the area’s earliest booms (followed, of course, by one of its earliest bubbles and busts), real estate developers slyly advertised inland lots as being free of “fog-laden sea breezes.”

But meantime, I guess I’m just going to have to put up with the smog   fog-laden sea breezes   fog for awhile. Fortunately, I’m not scheduled to referee soccer again for at least a few days.

Follow William P. Barrett’s work on Twitter by clicking here.

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Strange charity stuff far from Seattle–or not

Operation Compassion logoLong before becoming New To Seattle, I wrote about charities. And since becoming New To Seattle I still write about charities. Those of you who regularly visit this page know that from time to time I describe charities seeking money in Seattle that don’t pass what I would call the sniff test. Many of my subjects are extremely dubious. That’s usually because they spend little of what they raise in good works. In the memorable case of Vietnam Veterans of Washington State, absolutely nothing. In another, Cancer Fund of America, 0.4% (40 cents of every $100), which is pretty close to absolutely nothing. In yet a third, Washington AmVets, a better but still lousy 22%.

The list goes on: Kids Wish Network and United States Armed Forces Association, both 25%. Then there is the squirrly fundraising in the name of the King County Police Union, which doesn’t even exist. The KCPU is a name fronting for a really questionable for-profit enterprise of Public Safety Employees Union 519, which represents precious few police officers.

At the other extreme are charities that admirably devote almost everything they gather to good works, spending little on themselves or the salaries of their leaders. But they, too, can get in a little over their heads, especially when it comes to getting the paperwork right.

One such case is Operation Compassion, a Tennessee faith-based group (founded by the pentecostal Church of God) that over the past decade has become one of the country’s largest charities. Operation Compassion deals in gift-in-kind, or GIK, meaning it takes donations of noncash goods and routes them to needy parties or disaster zones both domestically and abroad.

Now, you are probably asking, what the heck does a Tennessee church charity have to do with famously unchurched Seattle? Well, read on. Continue reading

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Seattle influence in, of all places, Antarctica

Antarctia (via Wikipedia)

Antarctica (via Wikipedia)

It’s an article of faith among many devotees of Seattle history that what really first put the city on the map was Alaska after massive gold discoveries thereabouts in the 1890s. Long before the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair–or Starbucks–the city became the staging point and gateway for thousands of would-be prospectors who arrived from the east and south by train and headed north by boat. Even though most returned empty-handed, Seattle businessmen made fortunes feeding, outfitting and housing them coming and going. The aftermath included creation of local enterprises now nationally known as UPS and Nordstrom. Alaska’s importance locally is why there’s a statue in Seattle’s Volunteer Park of William H. Seward, the U.S. Secretary of State who negotiated Alaska’s 1867 purchase from Russia for 2 cents an acre.

Which is why I, New To Seattle, find it so surprising to see a significant Seattle imprint at the southern end of the earth, in Antarctica. More than a dozen geographic features on that frigid, desolate continent are named for people or institutions in Seattle. Indeed, one 50-mile-long cliff, the Washington Escarpment, is actually named for the entire University of Washington, some of whose alumni explored it in the mid-1960s. Continue reading

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It turns out Murder Inc. isn’t expanding in Seattle

handgunOn the May day after Ian Stawicki went crazy at Cafe Racer, killing five persons and then himself, I cautioned against concluding Seattle’s murder rate was skyrocketing and therefore making public policy on that basis. Stawicki’s carnage brought the year-to-date killing toll to 21, one more than the 20 killed in all of 2011.

But to me, an ex-police reporter still New To Seattle, the period of time–less than five months–was so short and a mass killer relatively so unusual that, statistically, little of validity could be deduced. This was especially so since Seattle’s violent crime rate, compared to other large cities, was pretty low to start with.

Of course, that didn’t stop the local clamor for action. “Growing gun violence commands concrete solutions,” thundered a headline over a Seattle Times editorial that, however, offered no concrete solutions. Mayor Mike McGinn and other politicians scambled.

Well, what do you know? Today’s Times has a story saying that with three days to go in the year, the total number of murders is 26–exactly the average of the past 10 years. And since Seattle’s population has gone up 8% over that period, that means the murder rate actually has gone down by a significant margin. Continue reading

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Seattle lawyers maybe not so liberal as local population

KCBA logoAfter decades of evaluating would-be judges in a very secret closed-door process, the very establishment King County Bar Association is on the verge of formally stopping brothers-in-law and sworn enemies from sitting on the screening panel. The surprising thing to me is that this wasn’t done a long time ago.

That’s my take-away from reading the column by the association’s president, Richard Mitchell, in the current issue of the Bar Bulletin, the KCBA’s monthly organ. The KCBA is scrambling in the wake of complaints it awarded “not qualified” ratings to women, minority and gay candidates facing the voters for reasons having little to do with their judicial competence.

Given Seattle’s vaunted reputation as a liberal city–it just voted overwhelmingly for same-sex marriage and recreational marijuana use–this is pretty ironic stuff. Continue reading

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Reaching Seattle, a growing scam morphs online

Online fraud pixLike music, the world of scammery involves variations on a theme. One that has received some attention lately involves elderly folks getting desperate pleas for money from grandchildren supposedly caught up in emergency situations, like the immediate need to post bond after an arrest in a foreign country. The plea often comes in the form of a phone call over a connection so poor the grandparent actually thinks flesh and blood is on the horn. The caller asks that the money be wired quickly. That the money went poof becomes apparent when it turns out grandson Bob all along was at his home in Seattle, or wherever, and not in trouble with the law.

This is known as the grandparent scam, and it’s no stranger to the Seattle area. But this is not limited to grandparents, nor phones. The heist can be attempted online, as I discovered this morning when I got a desperate email in the name of a casual acquaintance from California that I hadn’t seen since becoming New To Seattle last year. A scammer had hacked his Yahoo email account, obtaining a list of stored addresses. That scammer then established a Yahoo email address with a slightly different spelling and started firing off electronic missives.

Call it Dastardly Digitizing for Dollars. It would almost be funny were it not for the possibility that someone actually could get hosed.

Normally, I don’t respond to such clearly dodgy unsolicited email. But this was sort of interesting, and a potential cautionary tale for others. So I decided to play along a bit. I’ve changed the name of my acquaintance. But otherwise, here is the full back-and-forth: Continue reading

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Stampless in Seattle

Post office in Seattle's Magnolia neighborhood

Post office in Seattle’s Magnolia neighborhood

My local post office branch in Seattle was out of the stamps I needed today. Really.

Since I became New To Seattle last year, this is not the first time I have experienced this. And before I became New To Seattle, I never ran into a post office branch missing a full inventory of its most important retail product. Ever.

It’s clearly some kind of a management issue, although I am not in a position to say whether the fault is mainly local or national. After all, thanks to Internet bill-paying, the Postal Service lost $15.9 billion in its latest fiscal year, and only some of that (I assume) stemmed from the Seattle operation. Continue reading

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Marijuana legalization is giving Seattle a goofy reputation

What kind of national image is Seattle projecting now?

Jay Leno

Jay Leno

THE TONIGHT SHOW WITH JAY LENO (National Broadcasting Co.)

December 13, 2012

Transcript

Opening monologue

JAY LENO (host): Here’s something interesting. Researchers at the University of Washington have begun studying whether our existence is real, or if we are all just living in some kind of virtual reality like “The Matrix.”

(Audience giggles)

LENO: Which is quite an idea. Oh, did I mention that they just legalized marijuana up there in Washington? 

(Loud sustained audience laughter and applause)

LENO: Did I mention that?

(Continued loud sustained audience laughter and applause)

On the UW research about whether we really are here, Leno was referring to coverage of an apparently real press release the university proudly put out.  But that wasn’t Leno’s only crack during the same monologue last night at the expense of Seattle’s most esteemed academic institution.

LENO: Researchers at the University of Washington are now developing a dissolving condom. A condom that dissolves. Guys, let me tell you something. If you’re stupid enough to use a condom that dissolves, this is a story you can one day tell your kid.  

(Audience laughter and applause)

I don’t know whether it’s worse to be ridiculed for strange scientific research or for drug use. But move over Amazon.com, Microsoft, Costco and Starbucks. It is becoming clear to me that the local legalization of recreational marijuana is resonating around the country, and even the world, in a way that is not especially helpful to any reputation Seattle has as a venue for serious stuff. Continue reading

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Laws on weed and weddings put Seattle back in the news

Seattle marijuana users last night by the Space Needle (Jim Seida/NBC News)

Seattle marijuana users last night under the Space Needle (Jim Seida/NBC News)

Hey, I have a terrific idea for Seattle’s Convention and Visitors Bureau, which is looking for a new branding phrase to replace its official sounds-like-a-nudist-colony “Metronatural Seattle” marketing campaign.

“Seattle High”.

Some might take this as a reference to all the mountains ringing the city, and their beauty. But I am picking up on the insane publicity that Seattle is getting today since it became legal at 12:01 a.m. for adults in Washington State to possess up to one ounce of marijuana, and also to apply for a same-sex wedding license.

After surviving coverage of its inability to handle snow as well as the impolitic remarks of the newly crowned Miss Seattle, Seattle is once again the center of wide attention.

This morning, still New To Seattle, I watched a breathless reporter on CNN reporting at the foot of the Space Needle, where hundreds of Seattleites gathered in the middle of the night to light up in the wake of the November 6 initiative, which took effect after the required 30-day waiting period. (Never mind that smoking weed in public, like drinking beer on the street, remains a crime.)  Similar coverage graced the other national TV networks (a CBS report talked about the blowing “winds of change”). I saw references to TV crews in Seattle from England and other countries.  The news really filtered down to a local level in far-flung places. “Seattle Giddy as Washington Legalizes Pot,” read the headline on the website of WLTX-TV in Columbia, S.C. Continue reading

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Monumental Seattle (Part 2)

Earlier this year, still New To Seattle, I posted my first survey of the monuments and other public art that help to define Seattle. I highlighted a bunch–with commentary, of course. It’s time for another round–with commentary, of course.

"The Wall of Death", Seattle

“The Wall of Death”, Seattle

But first I have to get and hold your attention. The permanent installation to the right should do just that.

“The Wall of Death”–yes, that’s the name right on it–is a giant orange ring atop a dozen or so giant metal spikes. Fortunately for the cheery image-makers at Seattle’s Convention and Visitors Bureau, it sits somewhat out of sight under the University Bridge (which carries Eastlake Avenue E. over the Lake Washington Ship Canal) along the Burke-Gilman Trail. So it’s seen mainly by joggers, bicyclists, workers in a few buildings, University of Washington students out for a stroll and really morbid, determined tourists. It was erected–believe it or not, with government funding–in 1993 by the father-and-son team of Mowry Baden and Colin Baden. By one account, the orange ring commemorates an old daredevil circus stunt of a speeding motorcyclist using centrifugal force to drive around the inside of a similar object.

Ready for some more? Continue reading

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