VOL. 18, NO. 9
NEWCASTLE’S LOCALLY OWNED NEWSPAPER
N EWCASTLE
NEWS
LET THE CELEBRATION BEGIN
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2016
HOT START
Liberty football team dominates during 5-0 rampage Page 10
Corridor closure has city, residents concerned BY CHRISTINA CORRALES-TOY ccorrales-toy@ newcastle-news.com Two signs erected in front of the Hansen Bros. Moving & Storage building are causing a lot of controversy. “Attention! This driveway will be closed to thru traffic in the near future,” it reads in all caps. It was enough of a shock to prompt longtime Newcastle resident Bob Ingalls to go before his City Council and ask for an explanation at the city’s Sept. 20 meeting. “That is going to have a huge effect on an awful lot
of people,” Ingalls said, “and I know that there’s a lot of people already very, very concerned.” The corridor in question is the roadway wedged between Tapatio Mexican Grill and the Hansen Bros. building. Drivers frequently use it to avoid taking a left onto Coal Creek Parkway out of the Coal Creek Marketplace, instead going behind the shopping center to connect with 132nd Place Southeast. But most people don’t realize that thoroughfare isn’t a public roadway, and it’s not even technically a street. Eric See CLOSURE, Page 6
Newcastle City Council votes to oppose ST3 BY CHRISTINA CORRALES-TOY ccorrales-toy@ newcastle-news.com PHOTOS BY GREG FARRAR| gfarrar@newcastle-news.com
From the opening parade and welcoming ceremony, and throughout the day, a crowd on Sept. 10 - declared by some to be the largest they had ever seen - made the 2016 edition of Newcastle Days to be a great success on a warm, sunny Saturday at Lake Boren Park. Events included shows by two dance academies, Cornerstone Studio and Blue Dog Dance. The Hazen High School marching band marched in the parade and performed, classic cars were displayed at the Newcastle Car and Truck show, and stage performances included hometown folk and pop musician Mary Elworth, Global Village, Creme Tangerine, and Alan White & Friends.
The Newcastle City Council unanimously passed a resolution recommending voters reject the Sound Transit 3 ballot initiative. The $54 billion plan would bring 62 miles of light rail to the region, but as council members pointed out at the Sept. 6 meeting, there’s little in it for Newcastle. “The whole plan just does not seem right,” Councilman Allen Dauterman said. “It doesn’t seem to benefit the area uniformly. It’s a weighted plan.” Councilmen John Drescher and John Dulcich drafted the resolution that describes the initiative as “without precedent, too expensive and has
no time horizon.” The ST3 proposal includes property tax, car-tab and sales-tax increases to fund the project. Drescher and Dulcich estimated the measure would place an annual added tax burden of $1,500 on the average Newcastle family. The duo used what they called conservative estimates See COUNCIL, Page 2
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