MadArt will accost you

When it arrives on the Madison Park scene next month, MadArt is certainly not going to be anything like a typical “art walk.” No staid galleries, no specially designed and repainted spaces for these works of art. No, this will be art in the public domain. Like literally in the neighborhood hardware store. Not expected. Surprising. Shocking even.

MadArt is designed to shake things up and get people talking art down here in the Park, and there’s no doubt it’s going to have impact. Beginning with an opening event on September 12 and continuing for the next 23 days, 21 emerging Seattle-area artists will have their works displayed in the windows of 18 Madison Park merchants. Each piece of art will have been specially produced by the artist to work in the space in which it appears.

The idea of MadArt is the brainchild of Madison Park resident Alison Wyckoff Milliman, who while living with her family in Melbourne, Australia several years ago was one day confronted by art in an unlikely place: the window of a village shoe store. “It was there to be art,” she said, “not there to sell shoes. It stopped me in my tracks because it was so unexpected.” And it got her thinking both about how people normally get to see art and about how artists might benefit from having their art exposed in a different way.

“We’re used to seeing art in prescribed places,” she told me. “And if you don’t go there, you’re going to miss out.” She reflected on the great job the Australians were doing of encouraging young artists and helping them get their work seen. “I thought to myself: ‘We could do this in Madison Park!’ I literally envisioned walking down the street in Madison Park and seeing art in the shop windows.” Her epiphany, after a couple years of effort, has resulted in MadArt.

Milliman is no stranger to the art world, having graduated from the UW as an art history major, worked in the antique-appraisal business for many years, and served on the Board of the UW’s School of Art. She says she’s always been interested in artists and their process, and she was particularly concerned about how new artists might learn the “business of art,” which is just not part of an artist’s training. MadArt has been designed not only to get exposure for the artists involved but to help them think about their art in a business-like way. Artists were required to go through a bit of a drill, for example, in order to participate in MadArt.

First of all, 200 local artists or so were considered for the project. This initial list was whittled down to about 40 artists, whose studios were then visited. Many of those artists were asked to make proposals for inclusion in the project. “We gave them a challenge,” said Milliman. “Visit the sites, talk to the store owners, and propose a design for a site-specific installation piece.” With 18 merchants agreeing to participate, 21 artists were chosen to fill the spaces (some of the artists are working together on an installation).

Among the emerging artists chosen for MadArt is Tamara Codor, whose untitled painting I used above as a teaser for this story. Here she is in her studio with the actual piece she is working on for MadArt, which will be displayed in the Bank of America branch:

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‘Art is supposed to activate’

Bryan Ohno, who has a long history on the Seattle Art scene, bought into Milliman’s vision and joined MadArt as its director early in the process. He defines the spirit of MadArt as having two principal objectives: “to give a new opportunity to emerging contemporary artists to show their work, and to reactivate Madison Park through art.”

Although art is most often seen in a prestige setting such as a gallery, studio, or even a restaurant, “ultimately it disseminates into our everyday lives,” he told me. “Why not have the art start there? Why not have it happen this way in Madison Park?” So, for a period of almost a month, MadArt will give us our chance to see art as part of our quotidian lives: art at the vets, art at the bank, art in the drug store, and art in the real estate office, among other venues.

MadArt presents an opportunity for new artists to help us “see the endless possibilities of visual creativity,” to quote Milliman. The effort will be a success, she says, if it brings people to Madison Park to see the art and if it gets us all talking about what we’ve seen.

Here’s another artist, Cameron Anne Mason, who is lending her talents to MadArt (her hand dyed and sewn silk vessels will be displayed at Anne Marie Lingerie):

For a complete listing of the participating artists, with links to their websites and pictures of their MadArt installations as works in progress, click here.

The fun begins September 12 with a 6:00pm opening reception at Starbuck’s (4000 E. Madison Street), followed by a walk around the various MadArt installations, beginning at Anne Marie Lingerie and ending at Spa Del Lago. As we get nearer the event I will post another story about MadArt with additional pictures.

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[Tamara Codor art photos courtesy of the artist. Cameron Anne Mason photo courtesy of MadArt. Photos of the artists by Bryan Ohno.]

Madison Park Beach No. 1 in the summer

The Seattle Parks and Recreation department reports that our beach is the “most heavily attended” beach in the City, at least during the summer. It sure looked that way yesterday, with multitudes of sun worshipers, swimmers, and waders thronging the beach area. Even so, it’s a bit of a surprise to me that we surpass both Golden Gardens and Alki in popularity. Perhaps easy access is the reason.

Ice cream is still available at the beach, by the way, for those willing to await the periodic arrival of the musically-challenged ice cream truck:

The tent may be gone, but private enterprise goes on. The Parks department confirmed to me in an email this week that it was “community concerns” which led the Parks’ contract manager to suggest that the vendor fold up his tent earlier than planned.

Meanwhile, across the street in the play area of the Park, the newly engraved pavers (installed earlier this week) were on display for all to see.

It seemed to be a picture-perfect day:

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As an aside, blog reader Alice Lanczos reports that the political website The Huffington Post is having a contest for Best U.S. City Beaches, and Madison Park Beach is currently running in 8th place (up from 9th place earlier in the week). She wonders, however, about this comment by the person who nominated the Beach: “Be sure to stick around for an incredible sunset, known to locals as the Protestant Sunset.” Perhaps I’m just not a local, but that’s news to me. A Non-Denominational Sunrise would be a more likely phenomenon at Madison Park Beach, don’t you think?

New media gets into bed with the old

This is me, in a photo by my friend Barbie Hull, looking pretty darn pleased with myself. Perhaps even a bit self satisfied. I started this blog four months ago on a whim, and since that time there’s been slow but steady readership growth and increasing visibility for Madison Park Blogger. There have been over 900 unique visitors to the site since inception (not a few of them landing here by mistake), and last week MPB averaged just over 60 unique visitors per day. Late last month the biggest story I’ve ever covered (Girl injured jumping off diving board) was viewed by almost 200 people; and the recent dump-truck-runs-into-laundry story was also big news, with about 120 viewers.

Well it’s progress, though not at a level that would make other Seattle bloggers envious. A story I posted earlier this year on the Capitol Hill Seattle website, for example, was viewed by 554 people. And it was far from being the biggest story that blog has ever covered. I could certainly garner more exposure for myself by writing for them than doing this blog, but I have other goals. For one thing, I actually think someone should be covering stories specifically about the Park.

Not that I’m uninterested in a bigger audience, however. In fact, to get more visibility for this blog I’ve made what some might consider a pact with the devil. I consider myself a new-media citizen journalist, but in order to be discovered by more Madison Parkers I have nevertheless aligned myself with part of the creaky old media, a newspaper. Specifically, the Madison Park Times. Beginning with the paper’s September issue, MPT will be picking up my monthly review of the Madison Park real estate market. What the paper gets out of the deal is editorial content that it hopes will be of interest to its readers. What I get is the opportunity to inform a wider audience through my reporting and, not incidentally, a chance to publicize this blog. I see it as a win/win, since I am not in competition with the Madison Park Times and would like to see it remain a viable channel of communication for Madison Park.

Even so, I’ve had my qualms. The paper did, after all, lay off its paid reporter who had covered Madison Park. In providing copy for the paper, am I somehow being unfair to people in the trade who have lost their jobs? But if I am being unfair, it turns out I’m apparently right in line with the thinking of several other bloggers in this town who yesterday announced their affiliation with part of the big old media: The Seattle Times. This presumably will mean providing the Times with editorial content that could have been provided by paid (read union) staffers covering Seattle beats. As the Times has pared down staff, it has needed to find other ways to get content. This new foray into the neighborhoods is a part of that effort. Whether this is a good deal for the neighborhood blogs, however, is less clear to me. Most of these blogs are in competition with the Times for advertising dollars, so everyone is going to have to tread very carefully if these partnerships are to work to the advantage of both sides. It’s an experiment, and only time will tell.

Another part of the old media suddenly making a play for the neighborhood audience is KOMO. I was a bit shocked the other day when, after I mentioned to someone that I did our neighborhood blog, she asked “Oh, do you work for KOMO?” She had heard (though not seen) that KOMO has started a Madison Park neighborhood blog, but she had never heard of mine. Such is the power of TV to get a story out (at least to a certain audience demographic).

KOMO’s Madison Park blog is not much of a blog, however. And for a good reason. KOMO launched 43 Seattle neighborhood blogs this month, all written by one KOMO staffer located downtown, and apparently without anyone “on the ground” in any of the actual neighborhoods (except to the extent that KOMO staffers happen to live there). This is what KOMO has to say about its blogs: “We are the place for conversations to start and communities to connect on the issues that are important and relevant to where you live. We’re taking the news gathered in and from your neighborhoods and publishing it in a place you care about. “

Maybe so, but after almost a month of operation, KOMO’s Madison Park site has not produced a single story about Madison Park (although they did upload two pictures of the dump truck crash in Madison Valley). And there hasn’t been a blog posting over there in the last week. Like the Seattle Times/neighborhood blogs affiliation, KOMO’s invasion of the neighborhoods is an experiment in progress. And it’s been tried before.

The Seattle PI was probably the first of the old-media outlets in town to attempt an affiliation with neighborhood bloggers to create original content. In the PI’s case, that effort was limited to its on-line site, which is still in operation. You can judge the success of this effort by taking a look at the Madison Park/Madrona page. In case you didn’t just click on the hyperlink, I can save you the effort by telling you that today’s stories from Madison Park include one about speed bumps in West Seattle (from July) and a list of road and bridge closures (from May). The Ballard and Capitol Hill reader blogs on the PI site do have current content, so it is possible for Hearst (owner of the PI site) to get the locals to provide free content. But it’s obviously a hit-or-miss thing.

As for KOMO and The Seattle Times, I wish them luck in finding the right way forward, especially if it means more and better coverage of neighborhood news in this town. Meantime, I’m just going to keep doing what I’m doing down here in the Park. I hope you’ll stay tuned.

The police respond: “Call 9-1-1”

As a follow up to my “Why the police won’t come running” story last week, I asked the Seattle Police to respond to my commentary--and they did.

Officer Timothy Greeley, who is the community liaison officer for Madison Park, agreed with the thrust of the story but had a few clarifications to add. While it is true, he said, that there is no regular patrol for Madison Park, there is a “beat car” assigned to the Charlie 3 beat, which includes Madison Park. That patrol, he said, tends to focus on the “hot spots” of the beat “and you’re not one of them, fortunately for you.”

He noted that Charlie 3 (which also includes Madison Valley, Montlake and parts of Madrona and Capitol Hill), is one of the biggest beats in the City; so while there’s a lot of action on the beat—it’s just not usually in the Park. Greeley indicated that if there’s an on-going problem within the beat that can’t be handled by the regular beat patrol, he would get involved in directing additional police resources to deal with the problem.

What message would the Seattle Police most like to communicate to Madison Park residents concerned about potential criminal behavior in the neighborhood? “Call 911” he said. “Don’t hesitate if you hear or see anything suspicious, call immediately.”

Greeley reports that many people are afraid to call 911, thinking that their problem may not be an emergency and that the line should be used only for emergencies. But the 911 system is used primarily for dispatching police officers to investigate anything that needs investigation, he said. The 911 operators are well trained to move non-emergency calls to the right department. The system is also used to evaluate the volume of crime incidents and help allocate police resources, he said.

Greeley commented that when there were recent incidents of suspicious activities at the Park, not one resident called 911 to report it. The only way the police found out about the problem, he said, was the result of calls from the media and from citizens calling non-emergency police phone numbers, ones that don’t necessarily have 24/7 coverage (such as his).

“It’s not possible to tie up the 911 phone line,” he told me. “It’s a great piece of technology, so use it.”

July Real Estate Report

What happened to the trend?

Madison Park home sellers looking for a sign that the tide has turned in the local real estate market may have to wait a little longer for their good news. The upward trend in sales volume that characterized the last quarter does not seem to have kept its momentum into the summer.

During the second quarter of the year six homes were sold on average each month, a significant increase in volume from the two sales a month recorded at the bottom of the market last winter. In July, however, only four houses were reported sold in Madison Park, according to the King County Assessor’s Office, and no houses were recorded as sold during the first half of August. These initial results for summer home sales break the trend line, making it harder to argue that a recovery is underway:

Just to put these numbers into perspective, there were 14 homes sold in Madison Park (including Broadmoor and Washington Park) during July and the first half of August last year, and there were 16 sales in 2007. There’s a hopeful sign in the fact that through mid-August there were seven houses listed as “pending” sale by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service (MLS). But the four closings to date this summer certainly define a market that’s still drifting in the doldrums.

Even though recent sales figures are not positive, in other respects things are at least not getting worse. For example, the level of for-sale inventory has been holding steady at about 100 homes for several months. Based on current pendings, that represents about a 14-month absorption rate. Not robust, but much better than the 30-month rate or higher recorded in the first quarter.

Values, meanwhile, also seem to be holding up. Zillow.com estimates that the median home in Madison Park has declined in value by only 4.7% in the past year. Of the 99 Seattle neighborhoods the website surveys, only four have a better record than Madison Park of retaining their home values in this down market. Some, such as East Queen Anne, have seen declines of 20% or more, in Zillow’s estimation.

Our real estate market continues to be characterized by relatively big and expensive homes, with the bigger and more expensive of these dominating the list of properties for sale:

The median home currently on the market in Madison Park (condos and townhouses included) has a list price that is 74% higher than Zillow’s estimate of the median value of all area homes. Of the 76 houses for sale, over 40% of them boast at least 4,000 sq. ft. Many of these properties have been on the market for a year or more (one Broadmoor house has the record at 460+ days).

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Here’s a snapshot of the current listings in Madison Park (Washington Park and Broadmoor included), based on data from Redfin.com:

Houses

Listings: 76
Median Asking Price: $1,995,000
Median Square Footage: 3,870
Median Price per Square Foot: $516
Average Days on Market: 83
Percentage with Price Reductions: 45%
Average List-Price Reduction: 8.2%

Condos & Townhouses

Listings: 28
Median Asking Price: $525,000
Median Square Footage: 1,152
Median Price per Square Foot: $456
Average Days on Market: 95
Percentage with Price Reductions: 45%
Average List-Price Reduction: 7.2%

The most expensive home currently on the market is a $12.8 million waterfront mansion located in the Reed Estate (1500 42nd Ave. E.). The least expensive is a 680 sq. ft. condo, listed at $279,000.

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The four-bedroom, 3,300 sq. ft. home pictured above is located across the street from McGilvra School at 1620 38th Ave. E. and is a listing of Coldwell Banker Bain agent Laurie Way. At $1,300,000, the house is actually one of the more modestly priced properties currently on the market here in the Park.

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Chasing the Market Down

A continuing phenomenon of the current real estate market is the disconnect between the expectations of sellers and perceptions of buyers over home values. Almost half of those with homes on the market have had to reduce their list price at least once to try to catch the market as it has headed downward. And while the average price reduction so far in this cycle has only been 7-8%, many sellers with unrealistic expectations have taken a beating while trying to “chase the market down.” The most extreme example of this is a five-bedroom Washington Park view home (610 Hillside Drive E.) which went on the market over a year ago at $2,795,000 and, after numerous price reductions, is currently listed at $1,549,000--a 45% come down. But have the owners finally caught the market? Until someone makes an offer, it’s hard to tell.

Windermere Associate Broker Lincoln Thompson believes that one of the biggest problems with the market right now is that with so few sales occurring, especially in the upper market, there just isn’t enough data available to properly determine values. Owners, agents, buyers and appraisers are all without information, and this is causing a lot of discomfort for everyone. Agent Jonathan Himschoot of Windermere agrees, saying “the hard thing is finding the right price. How do you pull comps when there’s so little to compare to?”

One agent told me that she thinks many sellers who want to put their houses on the market perceive that they are taking an actual loss if they list their houses at a price consistent with the current market. But for most people in Madison Park who’ve owned their homes for any appreciable period, the only thing they will be giving up is part of an unrealized gain, a different thing entirely. But try telling that to someone who set the value of his own house on the basis of what his neighbor got when selling his house two years ago.

Several other agents that I spoke with told me that many buyers are just as unrealistic as the sellers, expecting big discounts from the list prices. The fact is, however, that on average Madison Park home sellers are currently getting 97% of their list price at sale. Small comfort, perhaps, to those who have had their houses on the market for months without any offers.

Next month we’ll take a look at two other factors having a significant impact on house sales in Madison Park: the difficulty in finding mortgage financing, and the downside of the new rules governing appraisals.

[Thanks to Windermere agent Wendy Skerritt for her help in providing market data utilized in this report. Please note that the Average Monthly Homes Sales chart above, which shows different historical data from the numbers used in the June real estate report, has been adjusted to exclude sales that are not the result of properties being placed on the public market (such as changes of ownership within a family as part of an estate settlement, etc.).]

Gone (sort of), but not forgotten

The vendor who has been selling ice cream and pop from a tent near the bathhouse this summer is no longer a fixture of the Madison Park beach scene thanks to the efforts of some area residents. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that it’s his tent that is no longer a fixture, since the vendor himself has been turning up this week in an ice cream truck and selling his products on the street next to where his tent had been located. He reportedly does not have the City’s permission to do so, however.

Beginning on Monday this week, the City effectively revoked the concession. As I reported last week (“Private profit using public resources?”), a petition drive was underway here to oust the concessionaire due to concerns over safety and the competition he provided to area merchants. The City, while claiming that the vendor has not been “evicted” from the Park, did confirm to me that “he was asked to leave early.” But we’re not really sure why.

Seattle Parks & Recreation Department spokesperson Dewey Potter told me that the Parks official who made the “leave early” decision was not in town this week, so she was unable to say what led to the result. She acknowledged that the City did receive the petition from area residents this week, but the petition actually arrived after the vendor had already been asked to leave the Park. I've been told that a Park resident unconnected with the petition campaign went directly to a Parks manager with her complaints and got action. The lower-level employee who originally approved the concession declined to be interviewed for this story.

According to Potter, until last week the City had never been notified that residents had concerns about the concessionaire’s activities in the Park. However, according to a Madison Park Community Council member to whom I spoke, an email from the MPCC was sent to the City on June 12 and was responded to by the City on June 23, essentially rejecting the concerns outlined. It was for this reason, she said, that the petition was started jointly by the Council and the Madison Park Business Association. Approximately 100 residents added their signatures to the petition, which was hand delivered to the City this week.

Potter told me that she was surprised by the reaction to the vendor this year, since the City had granted a Madison Park concession in each of the last two years. This is news to many of us who live near the Park; but if true, the concessionaire was certainly not a very visible presence. And he also didn’t snake an electrical cord from the women’s bathroom across public walkways.

Potter also denied that when it comes to city-park concessions there is any difference between a park like ours, located within easy walking distance of area merchants, and a park—like Magnuson or Matthews Beach—which is remote from ice cream and pop vendors. She told me that from the Parks Department perspective the needs of park users are paramount. Interestingly, I understand the formal response from the City to the MPCC’s email earlier this summer noted that park users might be endangered by having to walk across a street in order to get sundries from area merchants. This was apparently cited as a justification for having a Park concession here.

Now that the petition has been delivered, Potter assured me that the Parks Department will be taking the concerns of area residents very seriously. “We will investigate each of the issues raised in the petition,” she said. But Madison Park residents still shouldn’t expect to be notified next year if her department grants another concession. That’s just not part of the process, she told me.

[Above photo, courtesy of Seattlest, shows the concession tent earlier this summer at its location near the intersection of E. Howe Street and 43rd Avenue E.]

Swim for Life a big success

I got a bit off assignment this morning, as I was supposed to be covering the Puget Sound Blood Center's 12th Annual Swim for Life Across Lake Washington. I was diverted, however, by the spectacular crash of the dump truck in Madison Valley. Nevertheless, here's a photo of a member of the first team to make it across the 2.5-mile course, which began at Medina Beach.

The swim started at 7:30, and the first swimmer arrived at the Madison Street dock at about 8:45. Not bad. She was a waif-like teenage girl without a wetsuit! Supposedly the water was realtively warm (70 degrees in some spots), but most of the swimmers I saw definitely had wetsuits.

Swim organizers told me that the event, which raised money to fund a new bloodmobile for the PSBC, had significantly more participation than last year. About 250 swimmers made it across the lake, even though not all of them could do in with a an hour-fifteen time.