On the one hand, a Seattle Public School teacher strike is looking very likely to be called tonight given the latest reports from the bargaining teams. Bleah. On the other hand, a new playground!

Greg Lewis writes:

A few months ago, the John Stanford Playground Improvement Committee applied to the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods for a large project matching grant to implement a neighborhood improvement project on the JSIS school site. Large project grants can be awarded up to $100,000 and require a 1:1 match in value. The match can be comprised of cash and volunteer hours, with most volunteer …

In the land of neighborhood karma, Mark just pulled off perfection. He writes:

I’ve just put up Seattle’s first (?) Tiny Free Library, a little free library just for pre schoolers. I did it because I wasn’t seeing a lot of kids’ books in the existing community library for our two kids (nearly 3 and nearly 4).

So this is small, just big enough for board books, and at around the right height for toddlers. Be great if families started to use it.

It’s on the south side of 44th between Corliss and Bagley.

You can finally get rid of your VHS player- despite years of advertising to the contrary, the 50th street Deli Market is not going to restock with $0.98 video tapes. Thanks to Todd for passing this info on to us:

Looks like 50th Street Market building is being torn down and replaced with 17 “efficiency apartments” in a 3-story building. Goodbye to my Cascade views but hopefully new retail in the building will not sell alcohol to attract drunk vagrants. Store owner told me demolition is set to begin in November. Comment period open till early September.

The DPD posting …