The Greenwood-Phinney Chamber of Commerce, and 21 other neighborhood business associations, received city grants today to help small businesses thrive. The grants can be used for business district promotion and physical improvement projects.

Greenwood-Phinney received $5,000. According to the mayor’s office: “Greenwood Phinney Chamber of Commerce’s sustainability committee will work with businesses in Greenwood Phinney to help businesses reduce their operating costs by reducing their carbon footprint. They’ll be working with the City’s Office of Sustainability and Environment.”

“Our business districts are the economic engines that provide jobs and create the unique character in our neighborhoods across Seattle,” Mayor Nickels said, according to the press release. ”This is one more way the city continues to invest in our local business districts, joining neighborhood chambers and merchants associations to support Seattle’s small businesses.”

A total of $128,384 in grants were awarded this morning at Columbia City Theatre. Nearby, the Greater Queen Anne Chamber of Commerce received a $6,000 grant, and the Magnolia Chamber of Commerce received $2,600.

Members of the Greenwood-Phinney Chamber of Commerce got a sneak preview of Taproot Theatre’s “Around the World in 80 Days” on Tuesday night for the open dress rehearsal. It opens to the public tonight and runs through June 20.

Phileas Fogg (Ryan Childers), center, wagers fellow Reform Club members (played by Andrew Litzky and Bill Johns) that he can circle the globe in 80 days. Photo by Erik Stuhaug.

The Upper Crust catering provided hors d’ouevres for about 80 of our neighborhood’s business owners before the show.

Taproot is billing the show as “A madcap, cross-continental race against time packed with adventure, danger, suspense and love,” and it definitely fit the bill.

The entire audience, including us, loved the fast pace and multitudes of character shifts, costume and dialect changes (five actors play 34 characters) and the way the actors continuously jiggled in their seats to replicate sitting on a cross-continental train (looks like they got a great ab workout without leaving their seats!)

The 10,000th cat was adopted from Greenwood’s PAWS Cat City at 8503 Greenwood Ave. N. last weekend. Ten-week-old Amanda was born at PAWS (Progressive Animal Welfare Society) after her mother came in as a stray:

Amanda went home with Lila O’Mahony, of Seattle, her husband and their two children. The O’Mahony family adopted a kitten so she could grow up with the two young children. They had been visiting Cat City since December to teach the kids how to be gentle with a pet, preparing for the adoption day.

PAWS Cat City opened in 1997 with a home-like environment and cats roaming free of cages, so potential adopters can interact with the cats in a comfortable atmosphere. PAWS takes in about 2,000 cats annually and adopts more than half of them through Cat City each year.

Mike sent us this great photo of a double rainbow over Viewlands school last night:

That’s the same Mike we wrote about last weekend, when he complained about a group of teens causing problems at the school on 3rd Ave. NW, just north of Holman Road. A number of people commented on that post that they were willing to start some kind of neighborhood watch and brainstorm solutions to the problem.

Mike is interested in that as well, and invites anyone to email him. “Hopefully we can turn this into some real community action,” he says.

The Seattle Board of Park Commissioners usually meets at headquarters downtown on Denny Way, but this month they’re meeting at Woodland Park Zoo.

The meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. Thursday, May 28, in the Woodland Park Zoo Activity Resource Center near the west entry. On the agenda is a visit from City Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, who is the Chair of the Council’s Parks and Seattle Center Committee. Just last week Rasmussen asked the zoo not to cut down four cherry trees that the zoo’s arborist had said were diseased but which independent arborists said were not.

The Board also will discuss the zoo’s new West Entry Project.

Zoo staff will brief the Board on a new entry to the west side of the zoo that will include a landscaped path from the north end of the zoo, outside the zoo gates, that will give the neighborhood a new connection between Phinney Ave. N and neighborhoods to the north. The zoo anticipates that nearly half of the zoo’s annual visitors will enter zoo grounds through this new entry, while the other half will continue to use the South Entrance located at N 50th St. and Fremont Ave. N.

The new west entry is part of the zoo’s Long-Range Physical Development Plan, adopted in 2004 after an extensive five-year public involvement process.

Briefing papers on all the meeting’s topics will be available online by this Friday.

The Seattle P.I. reports that a teen was robbed at gunpoint last Friday at Sandel Park at 1st Ave. NW and N. 90th St. According to the story, a man sat next to the teen on a park bench and grabbed his cell phone. When the teen tried to get his phone back, the man punched the teen in the face and pulled out a handgun.

The victim was not seriously hurt. Read the full story here. Thanks to Neighbor and Steve for the tip.

It’s the date many parents of young’uns look forward to each summer – the day when the Green Lake wading pool opens. That date this year is June 20. That’s also the day that wading pools at Volunteer Park, Lincoln Park, and Van Asselt Playground open. These four sites will operate from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily, weather permitting.

Looks like Green Lake is lucky, because 11 of Seattle’s 25 pools won’t open this summer because of the need to complete federally mandated safety improvements required by the Virginia Graeme Baker Pool and Spa Safety Act.

The Act, enacted by Congress and signed into law in December 2008, requires that all owners of pools and spas install specified new drain covers and second anti-entrapment systems to protect swimmers from possible injury or death caused by getting caught in pool drains.

Because of the nationwide demand for the drain covers and anti-entrapment systems and the skilled labor required to install them, there are delays in the work all over the country.

Parks is working to install this safety equipment in 10 swimming pools, and will begin work on the wading pools as soon as Parks receives permits from Public Health – Seattle & King County.

East Queen Anne Playground and South Park Playground will open June 22. Eight more wading pools will open over the course of the summer, as their drain work is completed: Cal Anderson Park, June 29; Wallingford Playground, July 1; Dahl Playground, July 6; Delridge Playfield, July 8; Hiawatha Playfield, July 20; E.C. Hughes Playground, July 27; Bitter Lake Playfield, July 29; View Ridge Playfield, August 3. 

The five water spray features at Ballard Commons Park and Miller Playfield are open now; those at John C. Little, Sr. Park, Pratt Park, and Judkins Park will open on Saturday, May 23. The last day of operation for all wading pools and spray features will be Monday, September 7 (Labor Day).

The wading pools that won’t open this summer are: Soundview; Highland Park; Georgetown; Beacon Hill; Powell Barnett; Peppi’s Playground; Ravenna; Northacres; Gilman; Sandel; Magnuson.

Update 3 p.m.: KING 5 just reported that the bear was spotted at Twin Ponds Park in Shoreline and officials believe it has been contained within the park, which is, obviously, now closed.

Updated 7:30 a.m.Seattle Police and wildlife officers spent most of the early morning hours trying to capture a small bear roaming the neighborhood. The bear ran through yards and down back alleys, first spotted at 15th Ave. and 77th St. just after midnight. (If you’re curious if the animal ran by your house, My Ballard reader Silver tracked the police calls in the forum here.) Wildlife officers were armed with tranquilizer darts and a tracking dog, and they told us to stay in our car as we followed the chase at a safe distance.

But the bear was too quick. By 3 a.m., it had disappeared in the area around 11th Ave. and 92nd St. Officers decided to call off the pursuit, but the animal resurfaced at 5:30 a.m. at 133rd and Meridian. An officer on scene early this morning told us they believed this is the same bear that was spotted yesterday around Discovery Park — they believe it made the swim over the Ship Canal to Ballard. (Thanks Silver for helping with the story this morning!)

The yearly Master Builders Care Foundation Rampathon Event builds decks and ramps for mobility-impaired folks. This year’s event built two ramps for Greenwood residents.

The Rampathon event was officially Saturday, but Irons Brothers Construction, Inc., got a head start two weeks ago by building a ramp for Greenwood resident Narda Curlee, a former dance and gymnastics instructor who was seriously injured in a car accident and now uses a wheelchair.

Here’s the crew beginning framing on Narda’s side yard:

And here’s Narda and some of the crew on her finished ramp (left to right, Melissa Irons, Rhett Irons, Joseph Irons, Victor Alvarez, Scarlet Haney, Jake Arnesen):

Yesterday, Greenwood resident Mae Webb also got a new ramp, built by Jackson Remodeling of Ballard. Her story and a photo are in today’s Seattle Times.

Mike emailed us about an incident he witnessed at the old Viewlands Elementary School on 3rd Avenue NW, just north of Holman Road:

Tonight a group of about 5-7 teens thought it would be fun to throw things at cars as they passed by on 3rd Ave. They had a couple of young kids on skateboards act as “lookouts.” I called the cops twice, and the second time they said somebody else had reported the projectiles as water balloons. Thankfully nobody got into an accident, but sadly the police were only able to make a quick pass an hour after our first call — and the kids came back right after! They appeared to be utilizing some younger kids (12 or 13) on skateboards to act as lookouts. A pretty advanced prank.

Viewlands is an easy place for miscreants to hide out, with frequent tagging in the back and easy access to Carkeek Park on foot. I’d love to start brainstorming how to make that area less appealing to them.

If anyone has any ideas or would like to help tackle this issue, please put a note in comments below.

The city recently launched a few different initiatives to keep people more informed of transportation issues.

The Construction Coordination website provides consolidated information about projects planned by city, regional and state transportation agencies, as well as large private developments and special events citywide.

The Construction Coordination site features interactive GIS-based maps with construction information displayed by quarter; planned detour routes; project information with a link to the project website and contacts; optional layers depicting bicycle and freight routes; and a link to the Washington State Department of Transportation 2009 Construction Web site.

The new Travelers Information website provides real-time information on traffic conditions for major arterial streets in Seattle, as well as nearby highways. It’s designed to be a one-stop trip planner with color-coded roadways indicating traffic volumes, plus images from city and state roadside cameras. It also displays information about traffic impacts from ongoing incidents or planned events, and links to mass transit resources.

Let us know if you’ve used either of these and how you like them.

We just discovered the new Aurora Seattle news blog, which promises to tell “stories from Seattle’s favorite street.”

Aurora Seattle started at the end of April. The most recent story has a picture of a group of people reminding drivers to share the road with pedestrians. Smack in the middle of that group is someone in a full chicken suit. Good stuff. And nice to know what’s happening just outside our neighborhood.