Over the summer the Greenwood Community Council has been recruiting volunteers to participate in “Greenwood 2035” study groups to coincide with Seattle’s update of its Seattle 2035 comprehensive plan.  We’ll educate ourselves about growth, development and infrastructure issues, learn about how things get done in Seattle, and discuss how to involve people who don’t usually participate in neighborhood discussions.   

Despite being as grown up as I’m likely to become I still think of the year as starting in September and ending in June – so if you’re like me, welcome back to the new school year.  Fall means we are getting the study groups organized and set up soon, so I’d like to encourage you one last time to join the Greenwood 2035 study groups.  If you are interested, please take a moment to fill out a survey by clicking here.  The survey questions ask about your interests in the study groups, the times you could be available each month, and your likes and pet peeves about Greenwood.  If you know of others who are or may be interested in the study groups please forward this email to them too.

(This is the topic of this Tuesday’s community council meeting – agenda coming in a separate email).

Volunteers are needed for the following study groups:

The Greenwood Community Council has weighed in with the Seattle City Council in support of including funds in the upcoming parks ballot measure to develop a park on the site pictured here, just north of the Greenwood Library.  The Parks Department purchased this property for a future park, and businesses there are relocating.

Once vacant, the building will be demolished.  If there is no funding to improve the property into a Greenwood Library Park, it may sit vacant indefinitely.  We’ve urged the City Council not to let that happen.

To see the GCC letter to Councilmember Bagshaw, click here.

The Seattle Neighborhood Summit will take place on Saturday, April 5 from 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. at the Seattle Center’s Exhibition Hall, located on Mercer at 3rd Avenue N. next to McCaw Hall.  Mayor Murray is sponsoring a Neighborhood Summit this coming Saturday to set the tone for how his administration will relate to neighborhoods during his term. Many of the Greenwood Community Council board members will participate, and invite anyone interested in neighborhood issues to join us.

At a brainstorm during our March Greenwood Community Council meeting, these were the issues members suggested be raised as priorities for Greenwood. If you attend the summit you might want to raise some of these, along with any other issues that motivate you to attend.

Notes from the GCC March Membership Meeting
Brainstorm on Community Issues
to Raise at the Neighborhood Summit

Provide for Non-Car Transit (Walk, Bike, Bus) – especially Sidewalks!
Improve people’s ability to walk, bike, and use the bus in and around Greenwood.

– Make a strategy for sidewalk development in Greenwood and plan for it in the budget.
– Ensure ample and accessible mass transit service.
– Improve walkability through more sidewalks, safe intersection crossings.
– Create more bike-friendly infrastructure.
– Do greenways “right.”

Plan for the Park @ Greenwood & 81st Street
Create a plan to fund, design, and develop the land planned for a park at 81st & Greenwood Ave.

– The businesses will be moving out and there’s no budget or plan for how to develop the property
– A prominent location on Greenwood Ave. may lie vacant for some time if there are no park improvement.

Support a Vibrant Business District
Find ways to attract and retain businesses to Greenwood’s main corridors.

– There are a lot of empty storefronts in the “downtown” area near 85 & Greenwood.
– The upper part of Aurora continues to have crime and social service issues
– How can the community weigh in on what businesses are established in Greenwood?
– Ensure there’s parking for residents (as more high-density housing is built) and visitors.

Communicate with and Support Community Councils
Provide channels for the city to have a more active dialogue with community councils and support their development.

– Provide venues/staff to learn about community priorities.
– Share how the city is addressing each community’s issues (plan, budget).
– Discuss (not just present) and enable input on challenging topics.
– Provide funding for community council outreach and staffing neighborhood centers.

For more information on the 2014 Seattle Neighborhood Summit, visit http://www.seattle.gov/sns2014. .

View the full agenda here.

For the past couple of years the Greenwood Community Council has generally met on the third Tuesday of odd-numbered months – which is an odd schedule to remember, and today I forgot as well.  This would normally be our January meeting night, but if you were planning to go please don’t because we will not meet this month (and my sincere apology for this ridiculously last minute note – now five minutes before the meeting time).

Over the past couple of months we have been regrouping a bit.  We’ve had some board turnover.  We thought that our reservation for the library meeting space was ongoing, but in fact it expired at the end of the year and other groups have booked the space for January and February.  We missed a meeting in November because all of us were too busy.

Personally, I’ve come to the conclusion that we need to go back to a monthly schedule, and have booked the library meeting room for the remainder of the year on third tuesdays of each month beginning in March.  The board is in agreement on this.  Our original intent in meeting less frequently was to produce more interesting and well planned meetings; instead I think we’ve lost a lot of people who might attend if we met on a predictable monthly basis with a more standard agenda that provides a speaker on a current topic and updates about ongoing neighborhood issues from people following them.

We are trying to arrange a meeting in February at an alternative location, we’re seeking new members for our board, and we’re looking for ideas about how to focus our meetings and activities to be most relevant to you and Greenwood.  I will write again with a more complete update soon.  Please let me know by replying to this message if you have thoughts, suggestions, or want to get involved.

— Rob Fellows, GCC President