Columbia Citizens

your Wikli-fix: cold as ICE

Baby it's cold outside, but don't let that hold you back. There's all kinds of offerings this week to warm heart and soul.

Bethany Community Garden (Beacon Hill)

The Bethany Garden is a community space located at the corner of Beacon Ave & Graham Street. Its operations are overseen by Bethany UCC church on whose campus it is located. Congregation members and neighbors cultivate their own plot within the garden; we still have lots of spots available for eager gardeners for the upcoming season!

Our goal is to involve more neighbors in the Beacon Hill community and to have a welcoming space for people who wish to grow their own food. Join us! Contact Carole Claasen at moc.liamg|slagckc#moc.liamg|slagckc for more information.

Black History Month community forum

A community discussion featuring Black Panther Party leaders and fighters for African-American rights will speak on the FBI's crusade against them and how the fight continues today.

Speakers: Eddie Conway, Elmer Dixon, Megan Cornish (read more here)

Saturday, February 26, 7:30pm
New Freeway Hall, 5018 Rainier Ave S

Door donation $3. A smoked turkey dinner specially prepared by Jones BBQ will be served at 6:00pm for a $10 donation

date night with Michel Navedo, and tribute to Gram Parsons

After our biggest weekend yet at the theater, with two back-to-back sold out shows, we can't wait for what this weekend brings! We've got three special events happening within our grand brick walls this weekend: a tribute to "Fallen Angel" Gram Parsons, a benefit for Childhaven and we're celebrating Valentine's Day on Sunday with "Date Night with Michel Navedo."

read more & see some video teasers

neighborhood in the news

Jeannie Lang Jones at the Puget Sound Business Journal talked recently with the folks at Harbor Properties. She offers a few new tidbits — a name for Harbor's apartment building, a likely intra-neighborhood relocation for Bike Works, and a jazzy new neighbor.

Later this fall, Harbor will start construction in Columbia City on the GreenHouse, a 124-unit apartment complex located at 3711 S. Hudson Street. At five stories, the $23 million project is smaller than initially proposed and less monolithic in appearance, with two buildings wrapping a central courtyard. Harbor is also renovating the historic Columbia Motors building, which will include the bicycle and repair shop, Bike Works, and possibly a jazz club upstairs, Onslow said.

read more...

Rainier Community Kitchen

Rainier Community Kitchen is an opportunity for neighbors to gather to cook good food together and go home with meals for their families. Our combined shopping dollars go to healthy ingredients and we enjoy learning new recipes as we cook together. Currently, we meet on the second Thursday of the month, 6:30-8:30p.

Register for the class through the RCC. The fee is $25 and you'll enjoy two hours of camaraderie with your neighbors, a sense of accomplishment, and 4-6 servings of 4 menu items to take home.

Saturday story time

11am Saturdays, at the Columbia branch library. Meet your neighbors, sing a song, tell a story, dance a dance - for children ages 2-5 years old.

The Children's Librarians from the Columbia branch and the Rainier Beach branch libraries have teamed up to offer a Saturday story time in Columbia City!

SPLAB Word Orchestra

SPLAB's word orchestra, a multi-voice poetry performance group will be performing at this year's Folk Life Festival.

This year's performance will be a multilingual, cross generational, multicultural effort around the festival's theme "telling our story. " There is room to get involved, if interested contact Jeremy Springsteed at moc.liamg|deetsgnirpsmj#moc.liamg|deetsgnirpsmj

SPLAB.org

vigil & hospitality @ ICE Detention Center

In response to the recent ICE raid on Hispanic-majority trailer parks in Ellensburg last week (which included a helicopter, battering rams, telephones in the park being shut off, and the roundup of people who "could not produce proper identification"), a group of South Seattle residents will be heading down to the ICE Dentention Center in Tacoma on Saturday, Feb 12th.

We plan to be there from noon-3pm, but those who want to build community/carpool may gather at 5028 45th Ave S (John & Freddie Helmiere's home) at 11:15am. We will join in with others to see the prison first-hand, to offer refreshments and a listening ear to the family/friends that are on their way to visit detainees, and to denounce the imprisonments done in our name by profit-making corporations.