Posted Fri, Apr 20, 8:23 p.m.

"When mega-retailers have all the power in the industry, consumers benefit from low prices, but the effect on the future of literature—on what books can be published successfully—is far more in doubt." Mega-retailers of books like the titanic Amazon have driven major publishers to be less venturesome in their choices ...

Posted Tue, Apr 17, 2:27 p.m.

I'm very tempted by your organization's generous offer of sending donors follow-up letters, but unless sont les deux consommables et delicieuse, they'll be fed to the recycling bin. (As a Burmese house guest once observed to me and my husband, "I see that much of your rubbish is delivered by ...

Posted Fri, Apr 13, 5:54 p.m.

@Kieth: Thanks for asking for clarification. Robinson is saying that public funding for institutions like schools, libraries, and universities (which our history has shown to be wealth creators for the nation as well as essential to preserving democracy) has been drastically cut, and that leaders have rationalized denying these institutions ...

Posted Thu, Apr 12, 7:55 p.m.

Zachariah writes haiku in cherry blossom time! Arigato.

Posted Thu, Apr 12, 2:11 p.m.

Thanks for this fun, interesting story, Eric. When my husband and I gave up one of our two cars ten years ago, we told ourselves that using Hertz or a taxi on the few occasions when we really needed to drive to separate destinations unreachable on time by bus, bike, ...

Posted Fri, Apr 6, 10:04 a.m.

Susan White, thank you for asking. A list of nonprofits where you can donate and/or volunteer to help homeless people in the region is on the Seattle Foundation Web site - http://www.seattlefoundation.org (type "homeless" into the Search box at top right, and beneath the box click on "Search Nonprofit Organizations"). ...

Posted Wed, Apr 4, 1:44 p.m.

With the topic of Social Security in the story and the comment thread, a reader wrote to clarify the difference between two kinds of SSA disability payments: "There are two types of SS that people with disabilities may receive. SSI (Supplemental Security Income) is generally received by people who don't ...

Posted Tue, Apr 3, 9:38 p.m.

I appreciate this interesting, informative dialogue among readers. Kieth, your comment reminded me of a past Crosscut article by "neighborhood Yoda" Kent Kammerer, in which he mentions the trailer parks of the old days - http://crosscut.com/2009/09/16/social-services/19124/For-some-of-our-homeless%2C-why-not-managed-campgrounds-/

Posted Tue, Apr 3, 12:53 p.m.

BlueLight makes an interesting point. A little while ago a friend posted this comment on Facebook: "Until we look at how we have created housing that is too expensive for a whole segment of our population and rejigger our zoning and building codes to correct this, rest areas, tent cities, ...

Posted Sat, Mar 24, 10:25 p.m.

Thanks for the heads-up, David. The concert Friday night was marvelous.

Posted Mon, Feb 27, 9:03 a.m.

Thank you, Sarah. The P-I has great photos of the event: http://blog.seattlepi.com/thebigblog/2012/02/26/photos-john-t-williams-totem-pole-raised/

Posted Thu, Feb 23, 2:46 p.m.

Thanks for writing, animalal. About half of those who pay no federal income taxes don't earn enough for IRS taxes to kick in. About 22% are senior citizens living on tax-exempt Social Security payments. About 15% are low-wage family earners who receive an Earned Income Tax Credit against what they ...

Posted Thu, Feb 2, 12:45 p.m.

Zachariah, thank you for this smart, compelling, informative "inside look" at the One Night Count. It's an interesting analysis both of the process in light of ONC's elsewhere in the nation and of the different kinds of relevance of our own. BlueLight conveniently forgets the remarkably high numbers of affordable ...

Posted Wed, Jan 18, 7:44 p.m.

@larrycheek: Onnesha Roychoudhuri offers an interesting reversal of your chicken and egg sequence: "When mega-retailers have all the power in the industry, consumers benefit from low prices, but the effect on the future of literature—on what books can be published successfully—is far more in doubt." Mega-retailers of books (B&N; and ...

Posted Sat, Jan 14, 9:45 a.m.

I wasn't aware of this concept, gcordner - thank you for drawing it to my attention. When I Googled the topic, the most numerous links were to patient rights advocates arguing against the idea. Here's an article from about 10 years back, explaining the issue - http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2001-02-12-mental-health.htm. Perhaps another reader ...

Posted Fri, Jan 13, 7:01 p.m.

Matt, thank you (and Woldt and Ramos) for distinguishing between banks like BofA and smaller local banks like Homestreet. My community bank is Umpqua, a relative newbie in the region that went out of its way to resolve, personally, my disabled son’s banking problems when I was overseas. Members of ...

Posted Fri, Jan 13, 4:26 p.m.

@ gcordner: Staying on meds is hard even for "sane" people. We've all had the experience of not completing a full course of antibiotics when symptoms subside, and my friend with diabetes every once in a while can't help playing "chicken" and not injecting her insulin. Why keep putting powerful ...

Posted Thu, Jan 12, 2:10 p.m.

Sue Lockett-John in Seattle sent this email: Congratulations on another thoughtful, well-researched article that looks beyond easy answers to the mental health challenges facing our community. It's obvious that you invested a great deal of time and effort in researching today's article on SPD and county police efforts to engage ...

Posted Thu, Jan 12, 11:33 a.m.

Dorothy L. Lengyel, Executive Director of University Heights Center, sent this email: I am writing to commend you on your recent article in Crosscut. It captures the feelings of many of us that do not believe SPD officers desire to use force or are overwhelmingly flawed as a group of ...

Posted Thu, Jan 12, 10:19 a.m.

CIT, the intensive 40-hour training described in this article, isn't specifically part of the BLEA (Basic Law Enforcement Academy) curriculum, but recruits are taught communication and de-escalation strategies, and every police academy today includes instruction in responding to disabled populations, if only because of the Americans with Disabilities Act. SPD's ...

Posted Mon, Jan 9, 6:21 p.m.

Thank you, Bruce Barcott, for your astute and beautiful tribute to Anderson's heroism, and thank you, Pete, for making sure Crosscut readers see it.

Posted Fri, Jan 6, 5:35 p.m.

BlueLight, the federal bonuses didn't go to those organizations, or to any programs except health insurance for children funded by Washington state - which is the topic of this article. But you know that. It's just that your concerns lie elsewhere. You often comment digressively, and I feel special appreciation ...

Posted Tue, Dec 20, 4:12 p.m.

Cameron, thank you for your informative comment. I assure you that I'm not in denial that immigration reform is essential. So is health care reform, to provide our fellow citizens with the care they need.

Posted Tue, Dec 20, 9:07 a.m.

Now that your question reminds me to think of it, Cameron, in the conversations around me and in the parents' calls to their restless children wandering among the chairs, all the words were English and all the accents American.

Posted Tue, Dec 13, 4:35 p.m.

Thank you, Morro, for bringing the comment thread back to Elizabeth Warren. Other readers may have opinions about Warren, her ideas, and the narrative she has created, which the party can really use.

Posted Fri, Nov 18, 5:58 p.m.

Hi, Debra, the documentary will be finished by the end of the year. Jennifer Jones is the filmmaker, and is in charge of the project; I'm doing research, interviews, and narration. An earlier work by Jones, "Town at the Tipping Point" is linked to the sidebar of this article. (My ...

Posted Sun, Nov 13, 12:59 p.m.

Thank you for this fascinating chunk of our history, TVD.

Posted Fri, Nov 4, 9:17 p.m.

Besides credit unions, small community banks can be a good choice. E.g., I bank at Umpqua, which has no wish to be a national bank and has branches in just 3 PacNW regions. Good people.

Posted Sat, Oct 8, 3:08 p.m.

Thanks to all who responded. As Cameron suggests, illegal immigrants can strain public services (I don't have facts on how significantly this is the case in Washington state), and in a few cases nonprofit organizations have perpetuated themselves after outliving their usefulness. Meanwhile - back to the argument of my ...

Posted Thu, Sep 29, 5:45 p.m.

A correction from Christine Deavel arrived in my email today: "I should tell you that there is now a third poetry-only bookstore -- brave souls! Innisfree, which opened less than a year ago in Boulder, Co. It's a combo bookstore/cafe run by a husband and wife. We're keeping our fingers ...

Posted Wed, Sep 28, 4:28 p.m.

Sarah90, many thanks for your correction. Here's what Christine Hurley wrote in an email to me today after having read your comment: "We had 22 beds in two locations. We now have 34 beds in one location. So, she's right; it's not a third location. I missed that. However, I ...

Posted Mon, Sep 19, 11:59 a.m.

Sorry, Roger, but there's a lot more to this story than you suggest. I live in the Roosevelt neighborhood and attend meetings of the RNA often. I know that some neighbors may be angry at Hugh Sisley, but they also know that blowing up longstanding neighborhood plans to create greater ...

Posted Mon, Aug 29, 11:29 a.m.

Good point. LIHTCs also apply to private investments to renovate existing viable structures. It's why the operative verb used by advocates for additional low-income housing is often to "create" instead of "build" it.

Posted Mon, Aug 8, 12:03 p.m.

Thank you for this beautiful meditation, Knute.

Posted Sun, Aug 7, 1:11 p.m.

But ... but ... (sputter-sputter) he's not perfect!!!

Posted Fri, Jul 29, 10:05 a.m.

You're a reliable source of humor these days, spin-ster Peg - keep trying!

Posted Tue, Jun 21, 11:50 a.m.

Hi, Gary. The sidebar of "A Father's Day Story" above has links to two stories I wrote after this one ("A Seattle daughter learns a California Way," and "A daughter's Valentine's Day story"). In the sidebars of those two are links to the final story about my dad, chronologically speaking, ...

Posted Fri, May 20, 7:13 a.m.

In an email, Eleanor Owen, a co-founder of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) and founder of WAMI (Washington Advocates for the Mentally Ill), now NAMI-WA, wrote: Article well-worth distributing. However, the real driver of over-consumption of atypical and anti-depressants, is the vested interest of prescribers and providers of ...

Posted Sun, Apr 17, 9:37 p.m.

Thanks for writing, sarah90. One clarification: I was expressing my own ideas about comments above, not outlining "Crosscut's standards" for comments. I'm just one of half a hundred writers here, who disagree about many things.

Posted Fri, Apr 15, 12:26 p.m.

Sigh! Anyway, I tried. I wish you well, BlueLight. And thanks, Benjamin, for further evidence that Crosscut writers can and do (cordially) disagree!

Posted Fri, Apr 15, 11:09 a.m.

BlueLight, if your question asking "what Daddy was contributing" to the income of the single mom quoted in the article was deleted, hurray for Crosscut editors! You claim that you're censored when you "present a side to stories that CC neglects," but it takes some facts and reasoning to "present ...

Posted Sat, Mar 19, 10:36 p.m.

Marvelous review of a fabulous opening night! Thank you, Jean, for words that evoke the wonder of the dances and dancers.

Posted Thu, Mar 17, 10:15 a.m.

My editor may wish that this shameless proselytizing hadn't been posted by one of his contributing writers, but here goes: A great way to start would be to pick just one person who shares our public spaces but is stuck in the invisible ghetto of mental illness or homelessness and ...

Posted Thu, Mar 17, 10:02 a.m.

Jordan, fine story and analysis. I like how you keep your temper! Re Stellflug's idea of treating Pioneer Square as the residential neighborhood it is by making it an RPZ - seems like this is in harmony with long-term regional planning goals of enabling more citizens to live, shop, work, ...

Posted Wed, Mar 16, 6:17 p.m.

Morro, The passive voice sure can sound like officialese. I should instead have written "We designated the garage of one homeowner as our First Aid Center." It was just a grassroots invention by a bunch of people who decided to pool First Aid stuff.

Posted Sat, Mar 12, 1:51 p.m.

@animalal: "Everyone needs to be someplace," as a NAMI-Greater Seattle client remarked to me once, so the answer and relief you propose could be a good stopgap. A far better one is more affordable housing for families and individuals so that people aren't forced into homelessness in the first place. ...

Posted Thu, Mar 10, 1:04 p.m.

@ Kieth: According to the Land Institute and founder Wes Jackson, the organic polyculture farming of perennial foods requires little or no tilling of the soil, eliminates the need for herbicides, and wards off invasives by dominating the field all year. http://crosscut.com/2010/12/08/agriculture/20428/Learning-to-reap-crops-without-raping-the-land/

Posted Thu, Feb 17, 10:32 a.m.

One of the specific ways in which Reagan damaged this country was that soon after his inauguration he deep-sixed a federal plan begun during the Carter years that would have helped people suffering from chronic mental illnesses live better lives: http://www.miwatch.org/2011/02/_ronald_reagan_and_mental.html Another specific damaging cutback in which Reagan took pride ...

Posted Thu, Feb 3, 8:39 p.m.

Knute, your story lifts my spirits. The images of those cotton-candy-hyper Kennedy kids at Seattle Center and of Bobby hiking old-growth forest in street shoes and riding pants bring history alive in a human way. If the future is an achievement, it's achieved through the labors of human beings who ...

Posted Fri, Jan 14, 5:11 p.m.

Carol, this essay is a gift. Thank you. Your mention of the "grownups" in your final paragraph, who do so much of the work of the world, brings to mind a blog called "The only adult in the room" - http://blackwaterdog.wordpress.com/2010/12/25/im-greatful-2/ .

Posted Thu, Dec 16, 9:12 a.m.

As I noted here yesterday, the article should have made it clear that since the Seattle/King County Coalition on Homelessness is an advocacy organization and not a provider of services, its emphasis would naturally be on politics and economics. The sentence that followed, in my original comment, a paraphrase of ...

Posted Thu, Dec 16, 8:30 a.m.

An elegant solution, as vs. a fee requirement needing to be bureaucratically supervised by outsiders and then collected to pay for the supervision. In Rome you pay a nickel for your grocery bag (most people bring their own shopping bags) and there are no plastic bags tumbling in the wind ...

Posted Wed, Dec 8, 7:56 p.m.

Snoqualman, thank you for noting my error - now corrected.

Posted Tue, Dec 7, 5:27 p.m.

Amazon dominates the book trade because it's ruthless to authors and publishers. As one publisher commented (below), 'It's not the way gentlemen treat gentlemen.' So beware: if cheapness is the deciding factor in where you purchase your books, you'll have fewer and fewer titles to choose among in the future: ...

Posted Sun, Dec 5, 10:59 p.m.

Thank you, ElwoodBlues; and, orino, I'll put your feedback to the best possible use.

Posted Sat, Dec 4, 3:08 p.m.

No point at all - just a pleasant moment on a cold Seattle day, of seeing our familiar letter carriers gathered in a somewhat offbeat setting. While you're at it, orino, was the "Flash Mob Reading - Friends of the Seattle Public Library" a bit more pointful? http://crosscut.com/blog/crosscut/19813/A-Friends-of-the-Library-Flash-Mob--Shh-h-h,-they-re-reading!/. (As you ...

Posted Tue, Nov 30, 4:04 p.m.

@ Melissa Westbrook: Learning about the "context (time written, culture at the time, use of satire, metaphor, etc)" of a book before one teaches it does not require that a book be "suspended" from required classroom syllabi until special teacher-training sessions are held. Reliable Internet resources are available for easy ...

Posted Sun, Nov 21, 5:20 p.m.

Kieth, when Reagan was Governor of California, he shut down many mental hospitals in the state. From a U.S. history textbook on the Web: Governor Reagan "dismantled the public psychiatric hospital system, advocating instead a community-based housing and treatment system to supplant it. Critics argued that not enough state funding ...

Posted Sun, Nov 21, 4:46 p.m.

Amnon Shoenfeld sent me this email: You make some great points about the need for community mental health services, and the quotes from Bruce Gage, Mike Walls and Scott Frakes are right on target. I disagree with the critical comments by Ari Kohn. I think the example you gave about ...

Posted Fri, Nov 19, 10:03 a.m.

I received the following email from Ari Kohn: Judy, Your article is important, and I very much appreciate what you wrote, but it seems to shift the responsibility for this abysmal debacle from the governor and Legislature to the electorate. In that regard, I disagree. The fact is the Legislature ...

Posted Thu, Nov 11, 6:23 p.m.

An email forwarded from the Seattle Ratepayers' Association argues that because "City Light does not have an Asset Management Plan and it has an outdated strategic plan," a review process must precede any rate hikes: "Less than one year after passing the largest single rate increase in almost a decade, ...

Posted Sat, Nov 6, 9:48 a.m.

Fellow Crosscut writer Bob Simmons emailed this Hugo story to me: Hi Judy, Years ago at Hugo House, a celebration of Hugo's life and work featured interviews and readings by his former students and others whose work he had lighted. One successful writer (I can't remember who it was) who ...

Posted Thu, Nov 4, 8:13 a.m.

Laurie Carlson sent in this email from Oregon's Fairview Farm Dairy: [I]t's not just one family that will suffer, but likely many of the small cheese makers, if people turn to industrial cheese thinking it's "safer." We're expecting a consumer backlash against raw milk cheese, and pricing a pasteurizer this ...

Posted Wed, Nov 3, 11:31 a.m.

Hmm-m, I should have reread that comment: "Thanks to you, my realm's not so purple now."

Posted Wed, Nov 3, 10:45 a.m.

So good to hear the voice and well-informed historical perspective of my teacher Roger Sale in his writing at Crosscut again. Forty years ago he prompted me to start getting my prose under control. Roger, do you remember calling me the queen of adverbs? Largely thanks to you, my realm's ...

Posted Tue, Nov 2, 4:11 p.m.

Russ Salvadalena, at Washington State University Creamery, sent me this email: The Estrellas are such a great family, it is hard to see them go through this. Listeriosis is a serious concern and ALL cheese makers would suffer if consumers couldn't be confident about the safety of their cheese supply. ...

Posted Thu, Oct 28, 9:02 p.m.

@smacgry and Snoqualman: Please don't consign me "hopefully soon" into my grave. Many of us grey-headed characters love biking around town, and love fellow cyclists, too, especially if they heed the rules of the road. (Roads in Seattle, though, aren't always kind to the aging behind: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3v45SkhDtNA .)

Posted Tue, Oct 26, 10:07 p.m.

"Capital craves stability" - according to what economist? The phrase is is a right-wing talking point, most recently used against ending tax breaks for the enormously wealthy. Capital craves, if anything, instability: global mobility, innovation, constant growth, profits rising fast and high on "my" investments (often meaning the other guy's ...

Posted Mon, Oct 25, 4:42 p.m.

Carol Smith is my hero and role model.

Posted Fri, Oct 8, 12:47 p.m.

Right on, Hubert Locke! A woman of your generation, I'm lucky to be able, still, to ride my bike around town, and I love it. But my pedaling days are naturally numbered, and the cane is sure to replace the 2-wheeler I dote on right now. For those of us ...

Posted Mon, Oct 4, 12:06 p.m.

I loved reading this. Some random thoughts you inspired, Knute: Until after the mid-20th century, there was no word for "nature" in the Japanese language. In the traditional Japanese mind the human and natural worlds were inseparably interwoven, as they were in the traditions of many of America's First Peoples. ...

Posted Thu, Sep 23, 10:47 p.m.

@ woofer: Housman's ensuing lines are also fine: Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink For fellows whom it hurts to think: Look into the pewter pot To see the world as the world's not. And faith, 'tis pleasant till 'tis past: The mischief is that 'twill not last. Oh ...

Posted Sun, Sep 5, 4:41 p.m.

Ann, how marvelous that you wrote this for Crosscut! I hope you'll send in many more stories. This is such a pleasure to read.

Posted Thu, Aug 19, 12:14 p.m.

Knute, my sentiments exactly (but better expressed)!

Posted Sun, Aug 15, 9:24 p.m.

Email from Ed Hewson, Roosevelt Development Group partner: Hi Judy, I just read your article on the Roosevelt Comp Plan revision. I am sure you will find some amusement that the sinister, mysterious developer for the Sisley properties is in fact one of your Lakeside English students from the 80’s ...

Posted Tue, Jul 14, 8:02 p.m.

Berger mentions a group of U District churches currently exploring the idea of moving from their present buildings and co-locating on a single site in the neighborhood. This "ecumenical campus" would accommodate a variety of coordinated human services as well as public amenities such as a park and a venue ...