After a decade heading up Queen Anne-based non-profit Successful Schools in Action, which provides educational support, tutoring services and programs to seven public schools in the Queen Anne and Magnolia neighborhoods, executive director Lisa Moore is stepping down from her roll leading the organization.

“I am as passionate about the model and mission of SSIA as I have ever been, but after 10 years I’ve come to the difficult decision that it is time for me to seek new opportunities. I have seen how SSIA’s work has produced clear benefits to students, strong partnerships, and a community that is more engaged in and supportive of our public schools. I am extremely proud of SSIA’s accomplishments,” Moore said in a statement released Wednesday.

Moore will stay on to help SSIA through the coming transition period, while the organization’s board will meet to develop a plan to guide the next phase of SSIA.

“As a founder of SSIA and the only Executive Director in the organization’s 10-year history, Lisa has been an instrumental part of the core of the organization. Our success has been in large part due to her commitment to public education and our neighborhood schools. We will greatly miss Lisa’s leadership and vision,” SSIA Board President Steve Havas wrote in letter to supporters and friends of the organization.

Find out more about SSIA and the services it provides in our neighborhood here.

The Port of Seattle and the City of Seattle are discussing a possible land exchange and creation of a new waterfront park in the Smith Cove area, directly across from Queen Anne at Pier 91. Those discussions could result in a relocated city park and playfield with expanded shoreline access.

This is needed due to King County’s efforts to find a home for a 1.8 million-gallon combined sewer overflow tank.

The county is currently looking to identify potential locations for the tank and one potential location is in Smith Cove, just south of the Magnolia Bridge. The Port of Seattle owns the parcel of land across from the cruise ship terminals currently being used for tenant storage. To the west of that parcel is land owned by the city that is used for the Smith Cove play field.

King County proposes to design and build an underground diversion structure and tank to store peak flows during large storm events. A diversion structure at 32nd Avenue West will transfer flows through a gravity sewer line in the right-of-way to an underground storage tank located in the Smith Cove Park/Port of Seattle West Yard area. After storms have passed, in-tank pumps and force main will send flows back to West Point Treatment Plant in Discovery Park. No treatment facilities will be built at the project site.

The public is invited to provide input in a meeting on March 3 from  6:30-8:30 pm at the Magnolia Community Center at the Catherine Blaine Cafeteria (2550 34th Ave West).

The Magnolia Community Club reports that it has collected and forwarded 74 pages of petitions to the FAA  in opposition to the proposal to lower the Class B airspace over Magnolia and parts of Queen Anne and Ballard.

Well over one hundred people showed up at a Community Club meeting last November to express concern about the proposed change that would lower the floor from 3000 feet to 2000 feet above sea level.  That would mean larger planes flying lower and with more frequency over the community.

The FAA will accept written comments (in triplicate) until Monday, January 31.  If you would like to submit your comments, click here (.pdf) for contact and procedural information.

More than one hundred people showed up at the Magnolia Community Center on Thursday night to hear from the Federal Aviation Administration regarding proposed changes to airplane altitude over Magnolia, parts of Ballard and parts of Queen Anne.

Our sister site, MagnoliaVoice, attended the meeting. You can read their report here.

The joint Queen Anne Magnolia Senior Little League team won the District 8 Wood Bat Tournament in a championship game last week, bringing home the Richard Lee Memorial Trophy!

Photo courtesy of Todd and Melissa Hyatt.

The combined team of 15 and 16-year-olds (made up of members of former rival teams, I might add) took the championship last Tuesday against the team from Richmond. If you couldn’t make it to the game, here’s a play-by-play by team manager Todd Hyatt:

The Richmond team started off the 1st inning scoring their first two batters before eventually being retired. Team QUaM countered with two of their own in the second inning, bringing the score to a tie. Richmond would make a strong attempt in the third , loading the bases with no outs, only to be stopped when David DeGraaf, who stayed home from school that day due to illness, took the mound and retired his side with only seven pitches, benefiting from a QUaM double play.

QUaM really opened it up with a five run fifth inning, capped by a 2 RBI double,to center field by Connor Hyatt. One last effort in the fifth inning by Richmond as team QUaM eliminated two runners off the base paths, one at home with a throw from center field by Hyatt to Nick Tajalle who made a diving  tag to secure the scoreless inning. Error free defense and solid team effort were the cornerstone of the QUaM victory. But in the end, relief pitching from Blair Henning would prove to be too much for Richmond,  closing on the mound with four shutout innings and five strikeouts.

And according to Hyatt, they’re the outfit to watch, referring to the QUaM Seniors as “a winning combination of two former rival teams, melded to a success, as the new team to beat at this year’s All Stars.”

As of this morning, Monday, June 7, Queen Anne and Magnolia are in second place in KEXP’s 5th annual “Hood to Hood Challenge” summer membership drive, which pits Seattle-area neighborhoods against each other to see which can raise the most money for the independent, non-profit radio station.

Winning neighborhoods receive a day of live, free music shows put on at different venues around said ‘hood by the folks at KEXP. West Seattle won the challenge last year and celebrated with a day of musical festivities just last month. Before that Ballard was the two-time reigning champ.

Right now listeners from Queen Anne/Magnolia have donated $9,255, putting us in second place behind Capitol Hill/First Hill/Madison Park with $11,340. Donations can be made starting at $10 and up (there are goodies for those who donate $100 or more) and can be made through the end of the drive this Friday, June 11.

The competition is steep this year, as both sister neighborhoods Ballard (currently in third place) and Wallingford (currently in fourth) are looking to make a comeback and steal the win at the end. We’ve got four days to step up and beat Capitol Hill, First Hill and Madison Park! Can we do it, Queen Anne and Magnolia?

The Seattle Police Department has arrested two suspects after a string of burglaries in Queen Anne and Magnolia this weekend. According to the SPD Blotter, officers from the West Precinct “responded to an unusual number of occupied burglary/prowler/alarm calls on Queen Anne Hill” beginning at around 3:30 a.m. on Sunday, May 30. No suspects were located at the time, but SPD said “there was evidence that the crimes had occurred.”

Then, a few hours later, at around 5:50 a.m. a homeowner in the 3000 block of 38th Ave W in Magnolia confronted two suspects who were attempting to break into his home. The victim immediately called 911 and gave officers a description of the two suspects. While setting up a containment area, two officers saw one of the suspects, a 19-year-old, and arrested him. He was later questioned by detectives and booked into King County Jail for Investigation of Residential Burglary. A second suspect was located by a K9 officer, who found the juvenile male suspect, later positively idenitified by the victim, hiding in the bushes a half a block away. He was arrested, questioned, and later booked into the Youth Services Center on the same charge.

During the course of the investigation, it was determined that the juvenile suspect used a car key stolen in a previous burglary last week to steal the vehicle they used to commit the burglaries on Queen Anne and Magnolia this morning.  Officers located the stolen vehicle after the homeowner saw one of the suspects attempt to start the car as part of their getaway.  When they couldn’t get the car started, they fled on foot.

According to SPD, detectives are working to see if these two suspects are connected with any other crimes.

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn’s ‘Walk. Bike. Ride’ initiative means some big changes for Nickerson Street.

It was announced today that this summer Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) will change West Nickerson Street to include one driving lane in each direction and a center two-way turn lane. The new configuration, between Warren Avenue North and 13th Avenue West, will reduce the number of motor vehicle lanes and add an uphill bicycle lane. The downhill traffic lane will have sharrows, shared lane markings for bicycles. There will be marked crosswalks installed at Jesse Avenue West, Cremona Street, and Dravus Street.

The city expects the changes on Nickerson to reduce vehicle speeds and collisions. The speed limit on Nickerson is currently 30 mph, but SDOT says that average speeds are significantly higher. The report claims that narrowing the space for motor vehicles has been shown to reduce travel speeds and the kinds of collisions common on Nickerson.

Our sister site, MagnoliaVoice, first reported in March, 2009 that the city was planning to reduce Nickerson to one lane of traffic each way and add bicycle and center turn lanes.  The plan was not well received and after a number of concerns were raised, the city backed off the plan and put changes to Nickerson on hold.

Many organization and individuals in Queen Anne and Magnolia have spoken out against the change, as Nickerson is a thoroughfare frequented by many in both neighborhoods on the daily basis. The Magnolia Community Club (MCC) took a strong stand against the plan, saying that Nickerson is the primary route for Magnolia residents traveling to Fremont, Wallingford and the University district and that the route is already frequently congested.  Randall Thomsen, MCC president at the time, sent a strongly worded letter to the city, stressing that Nickerson is the alternative to West Mercer Way to access the proposed bored tunnel that will replace the viaduct.

The MCC said that when the viaduct comes down there will be a substantial increase in vehicles seeking access to I-5 and the tunnel by using Nickerson. Even with four lanes, Nickerson will be congested. With only two lanes, it will likely be overwhelmed.  The MCC said that the changes to Nickerson are meant to improve safety for bicycles and pedestrians but the improvements will be marginal when weighed against the potential for congestion. There are 19,300 vehicle trips on an average day on Nickerson.

The cost for the changes is about $200,000, coming from the voter-approved Bridging the Gap transportation funding measure. Work will begin this summer with completion by spring 2011.

Seattle Public Schools will be hosting in-person Open Enrollment at the Queen Anne Library, located at 400 W Garfield St., next Tuesday, March 30 from 5:30 to 7 p.m.

The Open Enrollment period ends on Wednesday, March 31. Those interested in enrolling in-person will need to bring their registration and/or application forms with them to the in-person sign up. (Read up on Queen Anne’s new Option school, Queen Anne Elementary, here).

If you’d like to enroll before next week, Open Enrollment will be happening at the Magnolia Library, located at 2801 34th Ave W, from 5:30 to 7 p.m. tonight, Monday, March 22, as well as the Ballard Library, located at 5614 22nd Ave NW, from 5:30 to 7 p.m. on Wednesday, March 24.

The average sale price of homes in Queen Anne/Magnolia rose 9.1% last month – from $550,000 to $600,000 – compared to January 2009. Our news partners, the Seattle Times, reports that home prices throughout the city of Seattle also rose for the first time in nearly two years, though prices in the rest of King County have continued to fall.

While prices rose 3.8 percent overall in Seattle in January, they fell 6.5 percent on the Eastside, 8.5 percent in Southeast King County, 11.1 percent in North King County and 11.2 percent in Southwest King County.

The report measures sales in the combined Magnolia/Queen Anne area and finds that there were 43 homes sold in January 2010 compared to 19 homes sold in January 2009. There were 70 homes listed for sale in January 2010 compared to 96 listed for sale the same time period a year ago. From the Seattle Times:

Zillow.com, the online real-estate marketplace and database, says its research through November indicates homes in Seattle generally have depreciated less than suburban homes since the market’s 2007 peak.

“It’s a bull’s-eye pattern — concentric circles,” said Stan Humphries, Zillow’s chief economist.

Seattle and many other central cities are faring better, he said, because many buyers are willing to pay a premium to live closer to work and such urban amenities as theaters, concerts and parks.

Read the full Times story here.

Our sister site (and neighborhood), MagnoliaVoice, has reported that the same coyote that has been repeatedly spotted these last few weeks has now been seen again. A reader reported seeing the coyote at around 10:30 on Wednesday night in the alleyway between 20th and 21st avenues W (about one block north of Dravus).

Get the full story here.

The coyote spotted at Terminal 91 last week and the week before, may have made another appearance in the area. Our sister site, Magnolia Voice, has reported another coyote sighting in the 2800 block of 23rd Ave West, near the Interbay line between Magnolia and Queen Anne.

A reader sent in pictures of the coyote taken in their front yard at approximately 10:30 in the morning yesterday, Sunday, November 22. She says the coyote “doesn’t appear to be the least bit skittish about humans in its immediate vicinity,” and was able to get close enough to snap this picture. Read the whole story at Magnolia Voice.

Yesterday afternoon detectives from the Seattle Police Department West Precinct located and arrested a man suspected of attacking a man with a pipe in Magnolia back in August when the victim refused to provide cigarettes or money to the stranger while in his car on the 2200 block of Thorndyke Avenue W.

As part of an ongoing investigation, the identity of a 35-year-old man was discovered, and at around 2 p.m. yesterday he was taken into custody and transported to the Robbery Office for questioning. He was later booked into King County Jail for Investigation of Robbery.