Barred Owls Seen Near Thornton Creek

Take a look at this photo. Can you find three owls?
owls1If you didn’t spot them, scroll down to the second photo below with hints.
These Barred Owls were seen Tuesday in Thornton Creek Park #2, southeast of the 15th Avenue NE bridge. The photographer speculates, “they appeared to be a family, but I am not a wildlife expert.”
According to a wikipedia article,

Barred Owls may be partly responsible for the recent decline of the Northern Spotted Owl, native to Washington, Oregon, and California. Since the 1960s, Barred Owls have been expanding their range westward from the eastern US, perhaps because man-made changes have created new suitable habitat in the west. When Spotted Owls and Barred Owls share the same environment, the latter are generally more aggressive and out-compete the former, leading to decreased populations of the native owls.

Due to this, in 2007 the George W. Bush White House announced a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposal to shoot Barred Owls to reduce the threat they pose to the Spotted Owl. It was never put into action.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
owls2

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UPDATED: Community Council Meeting Places This Summer

Updated: June 6th: The Victory Heights Community Council will NOT be moving its meetings this summer. Thanks to negotiations with the Parks Department and representatives of the Co-Op Preschool, we can continue to use the Preschool Building in Victory Heights Park for our June and July meetings (August is still being skipped in lieu of the Neighborhood Night Out event on August 6th). We hope to see you at our usual location in the Park on June 18th.
Previous: The board of the Victory Heights Community Council announced new venues for general meetings this summer due to unavailability of the Co-op Preschool building in Victory Heights Park. It was decided it was better to hold meetings in homes within Victory Heights rather than try and get public rooms in Lake City, Northgate or Meadowbrook.
The June 18th meeting will be at Ardith Lupton’s, 10408 23rd Avenue NE, on her deck (it’s covered in case of rain) starting at 7 PM.
The July 16th meeting will be at Heidi Smeller’s, 1717 NE 105th Street, starting at 7 PM.
In August, in lieu of a general meeting, we will be organizing a Neighborhood Night Out near the park on August 6th. More details on that as we get closer.
The public is always welcome at our general meetings, a good place to talk with other neighbors, see what issues are affecting Victory Heights, and hear presentations. Please come, we hope to see you there!

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Neighbors Paint Over Graffiti

paintingLast Saturday, ten volunteers from around Victory Heights assembled to clean up the neighborhood and paint over graffiti. Here, Kate Waterous repainted a utility cabinet on Northgate Way which had been tagged, “Graffiti transcends all boundries.” Alas, it didn’t transcend a new paint job!

You can report graffiti on someone else’s property or city property to the city for clean up: http://www.seattle.gov/police/prevention/graffiti.htm . They also provide instructions on how to clean up graffiti on your own property.
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Knickerbocker Restoration Moved To 2014

KnickerbockerThe Seattle Public Utility (SPU) project to restore the Knickerbocker site of Thornton Creek (at the foot of 20th Avenue NE at NE 100th Street) has been rescheduled to  May 2014.
SPU announced in a letter to residents that,

Construction is planned to begin in late May of 2014 and be complete by October, 2014. City contractors will be on site early this summer to begin preparation for construction next year. They will treat and remove some invasive weeds to reduce re-growth following construction…. Crews will be making follow-up trips to the site in fall of 2013 and next spring.

Related: Knickerbocker Restoration Would Be First In The Nation
Related: Knickerbocker Site History
Originally the project had been announced to be done during summer 2013 but SPU is still working to obtain the completed environmental and building permits by late summer/early fall. Due to impact on fish and foot traffic during the school year, it can only be worked on during the summer months.
In addition, cedar trees in the north end of the project site will be removed, despite requests from the community that they be relocated. The city couldn’t afford to do so because of poor access and the low feasibility of their survival. But they wanted to note:

The project will incorporate the removed trees into the project design as in-stream structure, and more than 500 trees will be planted on the project site, including 265 cedar trees.

Please take a moment to “Like” the Victory Heights Blog Facebook page.

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Arson Suspected During Burglary On 20th Avenue NE

From the Seattle Police Department Blotter:

Neighbors observed smoke coming from a North Seattle home and called Seattle Fire Department (SFD).  On 5/26/13, just shortly after 9:00 p.m., officers responded to a home in the 11000 block of 20 Av NE . SFD was already on scene and advised officers that when they arrived they found the front door open with its window broken out.  SFD contained the fire which appeared to have been started in a back bedroom closet.

After further investigation, it was determined that the residence had been burglarized and then a fire started.  The suspects attempted to enter via a basement door and when that didn’t work they entered through the front by breaking the window.

It is unknown at this time if anything was taken. Arson Bomb Squad (ABS) responded and took over the scene.  CSI responded also and processed the scene.

 Anyone with information about this crime is asked to call 9-1-1. Anonymous tips are welcome.

Posted in Community, Crime | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments

Report Graffiti For Removal Saturday

Seen any graffiti around Victory Heights? A Spring Clean party of volunteers will be going around the neighborhood on Saturday morning, picking up trash and removing graffiti. If you know of a “tag” somewhere, please let the organizer know so someone can deal with it.

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Community Council Seeks Emergency Block Captains

Last night’s meeting of the Victory Heights Community Council included a presentation from the Emergency Planning Committee about how our neighborhood should respond in the event of a catastrophic disaster that shuts down the normal means of communication and travel. To that end, a map has been created with each block in Victory Heights broken down into “zones” with the hopes of finding a Captain for each zone who would first liaise with residents in their zone in coming months, distribute city brochures on emergency preparedness, and in the event of an actual emergency, contact their neighbors, and be responsible for relaying information to a central location.
Read the full minutes of the May Meeting.
The city and emergency planning experts advise that every household should be prepared to be self-sufficient for up to three weeks before outside aid, food, electricity or water might be restored in case of a disaster. The purpose of the Planning Committee is to make residents aware of what they should do beforehand, as well as letting them know what plans for the community have been put in place. If you would like to volunteer as a Captain for your block, please let us know. The Committee will train Captains for doing outreach as well as supply all the brochures and information they will need. We all hope of course that such a disaster never occurs but we want to be ready if it ever does.
Other items discussed at last night’s meeting included the Spring Clean scheduled for Saturday, the recent break-ins in the area and how to let the police know about suspicious activity (we are their eyes and ears, call 911 if you see something that looks wrong), building a Little Free Library near the park so folks can exchange books, and organizing the picnic/Night Out in late July or early August for the entire neighborhood.
The next meeting will be Tuesday, June 18th, at a location to be determined (the Pre-School doesn’t have use of the building in the park during the summer months).

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Join In On Neighborhood Cleanup May 25th

Ardith Lupton, President of the Victory Heights Community Council, is organizing a neighborhood cleanup on Saturday, May 25th.  She has ordered supplies for one dozen volunteers to help clean up the neighborhood.  The kits include paint for graffiti removal, grabbers to pick up trash and trash bags along with vests.
Despite being over the Memorial Day holiday weekend, she says, “Hopefully there will be plenty of neighbors who will stay ‘in Town’ and want to participate.”
Unfortunately, it does not include improving the traffic circles and replanting flowers, etc., although residents could vote at Tuesday’s meeting about spending some money from the treasury to purchase flowers for select circles if someone wants to do some planting.
Ardith will be the point person and will meet volunteers in front of the Pre-school building in Victory Heights Park at 9 am on the 25th to get started.

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Community Council Meeting May 21st

The Victory Heights Community Council will have its next meeting on Tuesday, May 21st at 7 PM in the Pre-School building in the park. All residents of Victory Heights are encouraged to attend and help improve our neighborhood.
Unfortunately, the planned speaker from Sound Transit won’t be able to make it this month. But we will be discussing the efforts of the Emergency Preparedness Committee to assemble block watch captains for every street in Victory Heights. Also, planning a pot luck in August during the annual Night Out, and building a free lending library station for the neighborhood.  There have also been a rash of break-ins recently, including one of the Community Council’s board members! Police response has been good, but we still need to keep an eye out for suspicious activity. Find out how you can help.

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Tree Trimming Along 20th Avenue NE

treecutToday, contractors for the city were trimming trees along 20th Avenue NE, presumably as preventative maintenance for the power lines that run along the street.

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