Another Madison Park restaurant shuts its doors

I wondered why when I walked by Sostanza on a sunny, warm evening earlier this week there was no one on the upper deck having dinner and enjoying the great Italian food and wonderful view. The answer was provided by Seattle Times’ excellent restaurant reviewer, Nancy Leson, on her blog yesterday: Sostanza closed on Monday.

It’s been no secret to many frequenters of this Madison Park mainstay that Chef/Owner Lorenzo Cianciusi has wanted out. The trattoria has been not-so-quietly for sale for several years. Popular and well-regarded for its food and ambiance, Sostanza was definitely a destination restaurant (meaning that people would drive here from other neighborhoods just to have the Sostanza dining experience). Nevertheless, it’s been obvious for some time that Sostanza’s business was hurt by the economic downturn, and perhaps by changing tastes as well. It was also pretty clear that Cianciusi was, after over 14 years running the show, tired of doing so. Sostanza will be missed.

But not to worry. This is definitely not another Constance Gillespie story. Sostanza’s space, according Seattle Magazine, apparently will be filled by a new eatery owned and operated by the former chef of Eastlake restaurant Sitka & Spruce, Cormac Mahoney, and his partner Bryan Jarr. Also associated with the new endeavor, to be called the Madison Park Conservatory, will be former Top Chef contestant Zoi Antonitsas. My wife, Margo Spellman, who is a consultant to restaurateurs and a foodie who knows about this stuff, tells me that “this is a potential culinary coup for the neighborhood,” given the team that’s involved.

It looks like we can look forward to something entirely new and exciting at the end of Madison Street by the early fall.

[Photo courtesy of Sostanza.]

Get ready for Fat Salmon

Those living near Madison Park beach should be prepared for a large influx of early-morning visitors on Saturday as the 12th Annual Fat Salmon Open Water Swim gets underway (for some reason they are actually calling it the 11th Anniversary race, the first Fat Salmon having taken place in 1999). Check-in begins at 6:15 am, and hundreds of swimmers will be getting to the Park bright and early to participate in a pre-race meeting.

Our beach is the destination for two separate Fat Salmon events. There‘s a 3.2 mile swim from the Day Street Boat Ramp (near the I-90 floating bridge) and a later 1.2 mile swim from Denny-Blaine park. The swimmers will be car pooled from Madison Park to their starting points. If you live in the area you may recall from last year that most of the swimmers arrive here by car and quickly fill up all of the available parking within blocks of the beach. The first race starts at 8:30, and the whole show should be over by late morning.

The race gets its name from the prize given to the fastest male and female swimmers in each of the events: a big fat salmon. Here is one of last year’s Fat Salmon winners, Eddie Switaj, showing off his reward.

These races are limited to well-conditioned and experienced open-water swimmers who are members of the US or Canadian master swimmers associations. The number of racers is also strictly controlled, and all of this year’s available slots have been filled for weeks. Fat Salmon is the kind of swim meet where wet suits are absolutely allowed (although many elect to make the race without). The most-recent water temperature reading at Madison Park beach, by the way, showed 66 degrees.

Report of sexual assault at the Tennis Club creates some buzz

The story went out over the air early Friday afternoon. A police dispatcher had requested that an officer proceed to 920 McGilvra Boulevard to investigate the report of a sexual assault at the Seattle Tennis Club. The Central District News, a neighboring blog which regularly monitors the police scanner, reported the call on its website the next day. So while the story became public in a kind of back-channel way, the details were not known.

Rumors about the incident, meanwhile, began making the rounds of STC members and the neighborhood in the immediate vicinity of the Club. Since the story first broke, I’ve been trying to find out whether this was an isolated incident that just happened to occur in Madison Park or something that the community as a whole should be concerned about. Not to minimize the situation—if it’s indeed true—but the incident doesn’t merit being sensationalized. Nevertheless, it is serious.

The Seattle Police have confirmed that there is an active investigation underway of an allegation that a minor was sexually assaulted at the Club on July 7, last Wednesday, two days prior to the date on which the incident was reported to the police. Beyond that the police would provide little information. They did acknowledge, however, that the alleged perpetrator was a known individual and certainly not some unidentified, on-the-loose sexual predator.

Club General Manager Silja Griffin was a bit more forthcoming when I spoke to her this afternoon. She told me that the incident involved two junior members of the Club, both male, and that it occurred in the boys’ locker room. Junior members are children between the ages of 9 and 21 of active club members, so the alleged perpetrator could therefore have been either a minor or an adult. Griffin told me that the mother of the alleged victim reported the situation to the Club and that she and the mother agreed that the police should be called in to investigate. The call was made from the Club. According to Griffin, the Club itself is looking into the episode, and she will be reporting about it to the STC board next week. Expulsion from the Club is one possible outcome, she said.

The police matter is quite a bit more serious. Detective Mark Jamieson of the SPD tells me that incidents of this kind will normally be handed over to the department’s Sexual Assault & Child Abuse Unit if the initial investigation shows there’s cause to do so. In this case, he believes, it is likely that the matter has already been referred to the unit. Once that unit has completed its work, the police may refer the case to the King County Prosecutor’s Office to begin criminal proceedings. It will take some time, he said, for the process to play out.

At this point all we have is an allegation, as both Jamieson and Griffin noted when I spoke with them. However, everyone is taking this matter very seriously—and that certainly includes the two Seattle Tennis Club families involved.

Swimmer in Saturday’s incident succumbs

The young man who was pulled unconscious from the water off Madison Park Beach on Saturday has died, according to Harborview Medical Center spokesperson Mary Guiden. The victim, who was in his early 20s, was found floating submerged in the water near the diving platform on Saturday evening, less than an hour after the beach’s lifeguards had ended their shift. According to reports, Good Samaritans began CPR on the man before the arrival of police and fire emergency crews, whose efforts to revive him extended for at least 20 minutes, both on the platform and the road-end pier. He was unconscious when transported to the hospital, and he apparently never regained consciousness. The man's name has not been released for reasons of family privacy.

There were media reports on Saturday that the victim was discovered after someone dove off the diving platform and felt a body in the water underneath him. Several swimmers successfully maneuvered the man onto the platform while watchers on the beach apparently called 911. There were still hundreds of beach goers, swimmers, and passersby in the vicinity when the incident occurred. The arrival of multiple emergency vehicles brought many more onlookers to watch the efforts of the EMS personnel. Surprisingly, I am told that no media have followed up with Harborview or the SFD to find out what happened to the man. Those of us who witnessed the sobering scene, however, are unlikely to forget it.

This is apparently the first drowning at Madison Park beach since August 2007, when a man’s body was found floating in the water off of Madison Park. In that case, the man’s clothing and a suicide note were later found on the beach. The drowning on Saturday is believed to be accidental, and the police confirm that there is no on-going investigation.

Several blog readers have commented negatively on the huge police and fire response to this incident. There was a similar reaction by some last year when a girl fell into the water from the diving platform and was apparently knocked unconscious (see the story here). Multiple fire and police vehicles rushed to the scene then, just as happened last weekend. There’s good reason for this huge response in the case of a possible drowning, according to Fire Department spokesperson Dana Vander Houwen. The rule, she told me, is that there must be at least seven responders who are trained in CPR. The reason for this is that CPR is physically exhausting to perform over an extended time, as may be necessary in drowning cases. Anyone watching the performance of the emergency crews on Saturday can attest to that.

Update: The Seattle Times on Tuesday reported that the dead swimmer was a 25-year-old South Korean student named Ahn Hyo Yun.

[Madison Park beach is located at 1900 43rd Avenue E.]

The parade goes by

The day certainly began on a more joyous note, yesterday, than it ended. It was sunny and warm; and the mood was festive—though spectacularly informal—as the annual Kid’s Parade and Picnic got underway at noon. As usual, a Seattle Fire Department engine from the local firehouse led the parade, followed by a swarm of kids, parents, grandparents and other miscellaneous characters.

This is not the kind of parade where anyone worries much about marching in formation, staying in sync, or waving to spectators. Actually, the later were few and far between. This is one event where it’s all about participation.

Some were pushed, and some were pulled…

…and a worthy few had the honor of carrying the banner.

Amateur crowd estimator and parade participant Maurice Cooper said he thought there were between 250 and 300 participants this year. I couldn’t begin to guess. I was plenty busy just trying not to fall over while walking backwards to get these shots.

No goats or ponies made the procession this year. But there were several canine participants to liven things up, including this eager guy:

And, as always, when the eight-minute stroll down Madison Street culminated at the Park, everyone headed straight for the chow lines. So ended Madison Park Days for 2010, a much appreciated production of the Madison Park Business Association.

A grim scene at the Madison Park dock

A little before 8:00 this evening, about an hour after the lifeguards left the Madison Park beach for the day, a young man was pulled unconscious from the water and onto the diving platform. A police boat was quickly on the scene, and CPR was begun.
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Multiple fire emergency units raced to the dock at the Madison Street road end, where the police boat had by then transported the man, who appeared to be in his 20s.

The medics continued to apply CPR for more than 15 minutes, but the man had not regained consciousness by the time he was placed in the medic unit, which transported him to Harborview Hospital.

Update: At 10:00 pm the nursing supervisor at Harborview reported the man to be in "critical condition."

Panhandling in the ‘hood

It is, perhaps, just another testimonial to Madison Park’s isolation from the normal froth of urban living that the sudden introduction of a panhandler into our midst should prove so disturbing—at least to some residents. As we reported last week, someone actually assaulted this guy, who has been cadging at the northeast corner of 41st E. and E. Madison for the past couple of weeks. The verbal and physical violence of that incident are certainly not reflective of our community values, and it appears that the perpetrator is not even a resident of the Park. But the assumption apparently underlying his deranged act—that beggars should not be seen on the streets of Madison Park—is a view that many people living here apparently either tacitly support or at least understand. One resident told me “we really shouldn’t allow it.” She was referring to panhandling, not physical assaults. And I’ve heard even more hard-hearted reactions from others who live here.

The man doesn’t seem to be particularly aggressive, or at least I’ve never seen him accost anyone. He’s the same guy, by the way, who used to sell Real Change newspapers in front of Bert’s (on the northwest corner of the same intersection). He told me that the management of Bert’s didn’t like him bothering their customers and asked him to move to a different location. When he moved across the street he didn’t take the papers with him, deciding that he would just ask people for money.

Is this a better-paying gigue than selling papers? He’s not saying, but the implication seems pretty clear. He could still sell papers if he wanted to, apparently. But he doesn’t. “I’m not sellin’ nothin’,” he told me, in a not belligerent way.

The guy who beat him up was hauled off to jail, and the signs that the attacker (or someone else) posted high on a telephone pole at that corner have since been removed. One sign read “The hungry 1s (ones) don’t beg.” This was the other sign:

Surely the grammatically challenged sign poster is not from around here!

[My apologies to that reader who took me to task earlier this year for my use of the term ‘hood when referring to Madison Park. When I do so, please believe me, it is entirely in the ironic sense.]

Weekly Crime Report 7/5/10

Don't lend your cellphone to strangers!

During the afternoon of June 28, a man walking along Lake Washington Boulevard at 32nd Avenue E. was approached by an unknown male who asked if he could use the man's cellphone. A couple of minutes after the man handed the over the phone, three other males arrived on the scene, and all four of the men then walked off together. Though the victim yelled for them to give him his cellphone back, surprisingly he was ignored!

Carprowls

There were incidents of car prowling on the 1700 and 1300 blocks of Lake Washington Boulevard E. (the Arboretum) on July 1 and June 29, respectively. No details were provided in the police reports of what may have been taken, if anything, from the vehicles.

Graffiti and more

The only other criminal incidents reported last week were of property damange due to graffiti on a residential construction site on the 300 block of Mercer Street on June 30; a liquor law violation on June 29 at the Shell station convenience store; and a disturbance at a residence on the 1500 block of 42nd Avenue E. on July 1 (no details given).

Altogether a pretty tame week crime wise, with no one beaten up in the neighborhood.

Another retailer to exit The Village

Madison Park’s retail core—what‘s left of it—is about to be hit with another defection. At the end of July, Ropa Bella in the Park, the women’s clothing store which has been a mainstay of the Park’s retail district for years, will decamp for Madison Valley. Word on the street is that at about the same time, Dermaradiance, the skincare spa next door, will be also moving out.

These exits from the commercial building at 4105 E. Madison Street follow closely upon the loss of Sun Precautions (which closed up shop a few months ago) and the earlier retreat of VanQuaetham Chiropractic (which moved to Madison Valley last summer). Both of those spaces remain vacant at 4105, although the onetime basement location of the chiropractors was briefly occupied by a yoga studio last year.

Rumor has it that building owner, Sander Properties, is in negotiation with a “national” retailer to fill the entire first-floor shop space, although the deal has apparently not been inked. I was unable to make contact with Sander last week to verify the story. What is not in question, however, is that we will soon be experiencing a major shift at the very heart Madison Park’s retail district (referred to by the Madison Park Business Association as “The Village”).

The way the whole thing seems to be playing out is perhaps a bit ironic. Some may recall that Madison Park Books, which previously occupied the Ropa Bella space, was thought to have been forced out of business when the building’s owner indicated that there was going to be a big increase the bookstore’s rent if it wanted to stay. At that time, the landlord had a prospective tenant waiting in the wings that was willing to pay the higher rent: Ropa Bella. This time, as we understand the situation, Ropa Bella wanted to move to smaller quarters in the same building, but the landlord apparently needs all of the first-floor space in order to accommodate another—presumably higher paying—tenant.

In the meantime, Ropa Bella is preparing for its move to Madison Valley, where it will soon be ensconced in a shop near All the Best Pets, a much smaller space than the clothing store currently enjoys here in the Park. What’s next for the big space the store leaves behind remains an open question.

Madison Park Days are coming!

Madison Park Days are virtually upon us. The annual event, which culminates each year with the Children's Parade and the Picnic in the Park, is scheduled for July 8-10. The fun begins with the Sidewalk Sale, which runs for the three days beginning next Thursday. It ends with the parade and picnic on Saturday the 10th. Hopefully the weather will be decent by then, since this is the Park's premier annual event--and one that a lot of Madison Park families really look forward to.

The parade will start down E. Madison Street fairly promptly at 12:00 noon, with staging to begin in front of the Madison Park Wells Fargo branch at 11:45 am. If you want to be in this parade you better get there on time, since the short parade route down to the Park means the procession takes only five minutes to complete. The picnic follows. Come one, come all--and bring your goat!

Madison Park Days are sponsored, as always, by the Madison Park Business Association, which for some unaccountable reason fails to mention the fact on its website. (Thanks to those who wrote in to the blog asking about when it's all going to be happening this year).