Madison Park
The Madison Park Community Council (MPCC) held its annual general meeting on May 27 at the Park Shore Retirement Community (1630 43rd Ave. E.). About 60 people were in attendance — more than the 30 required for a quorum to conduct any official business.
The guest speaker was Maria Koengeter, a transit planner for the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT). She expounded on SDOT’s proposal to create a new Rapid Ride bus line down East Madison Street. The new Rapid Ride idea would eliminate yet another of our local arterials by reducing the general traffic lanes from two each way to one each way, from the waterfront to 20th Avenue. This would have the effect of cutting us off from downtown between 3 and 6 p.m. because one of the westbound lanes are always blocked during those hours, acting as it does as an extended on-ramp to southbound Interstate 5. SDOT’s only real interest appeared to be whether we would prefer the buses to run in the center or in the curb lanes.
A slate of new council members was proposed and adopted by the general membership: Karen Kane, Hunter Robbins and Jackie Jensen. A nominating committee was then established to recommend board officers for next year to report back on June 1, the date of the next general board meeting.
Also, it was approved that the council spend up to $1,600 for the establishment of a new emergency hub for Madison Park.
Subsequently, at the June 1 meeting, the MPCC nominating committee selected the following as its executive committee for 2015-2016: Maurice Cooper, president; Megan Walton, first vice president; John Madrid, second vice president; Hunter Robbins, communications vice president/secretary; Doug Berry, treasurer; and Carol Loe, member at-large.
Also at the June 1 meeting, it was voted to support the September Madison Park Artwalk once again to the tune of $500, the same as last year.
It was also noted that, despite a few hiccups along the way, the latest MPCC Newsletter should be in the mail imminently — hopefully you’ve all received a copy by now.
On June 4, MPCC held the latest in its “Extraordinary Neighbors” series of talks. This time, the speaker was Dr. King Holmes of the University of Washington, an international expert in sexually transmitted diseases.
Our next speaker will be four-star retired U.S. Army Gen. Pete Chiarelli, senior military assistant to former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. He will speak at 7 p.m. on July 29 in Park Shore’s Chapel Room.
Our big event of the month was a joint forum with the Madison Valley Community Council (MVCC). The two councils held a candidates forum in the gymnasium at The Bush School on June 8. The five candidates for the newly created District 3 of the Seattle City Council were all in attendance. The meeting was ably moderated by Barbara Wright, with assistance from MPCC president Maurice Cooper and MVCC president Lindy Wishard.
At its peak, there were 162 people in attendance — a great turnout, and the size of the turnout seemed to surprise even the candidates.
The MPCC board traditionally takes July off, since it is usually peak vacation month, so our next board meeting will take place Aug. 2; everyone is welcome, as usual.
— Maurice Cooper, president