Unusually warm winter weather might be nice for you and me, but it's worrisome for water managers in the region, reports KUOW's Deborah Wang. Mountain snowpack acts as the region's water reservoirs. So far this winter, the mountains have seen below average amounts of snow, and that could mean drought conditions this summer. Read her story here.

The House Capital Budget committee yesterday held a contentious hearing on raising a tax on toxic substances to help keep polluted stormwater out of pretty polluted Puget Sound. But as John Ryan reports for KUOW, for the first five years, more than half the money would reduce the state's budget deficit -- not clean up Puget Sound.

"Critics and even the agency's own board members are growing impatient for the Puget Sound Partnership to take action," he reports.

Read his story on the state of the Puget Sound cleanup here

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Further reading:

Reports: Puget Sound getting sicker; Obama budget slashes money for Sound cleanup by 60%

  Editor's note: In November we wrote about a new study that discovered a variety of chemicals including mercury in the bodies of pregnant women. Today, we follow up on one of those studied moms; she appeared today before a U.S. Senate subcommittee to tell her story. 

   Molly Gray of Seattle for five years struggled with fertility and repeated miscarriages. She searched for an answer to why she was having trouble bringing a baby to term. So -- as she told a Senate panel on Thursday -- she discovered a connection between chemical exposures and their effect on health, particularly reproductive systems, and she made reasonable changes in her life: She did her best to eat organic food and low-mercury seafood, use personal-care products that didn't contain chemicals called phthalates and fragrances, and avoid plastics--both cooking in or storing food in plastic.

  Imagine her surprise when, finally pregnant, she took part in a study of pregnant women that tested levels of chemicals in their...

   Eight indicators show a continuing decline in Puget Sound, while seven other indicators show evidence of improvement, suggesting that on balance there's a slippage in the health of the waterway that sustains orcas, salmon and people, according to our interpretation of the findings in the first new biennial report by Puget Sound Partnership. The Olympian calls it "a mixed bag of improvement and continued decline." 

  However, Partnership executive director David Dicks sees it another way -- "we are making progress."

  Meanwhile, President Obama's proposed budget slashes money for Sound cleanup from this fiscal year's $50 million to just $20 million -- a 60 percent drop.

  That's despite the fact that Puget Sound in July gained the status of national treasures like Chesapeake Bay and the Everglades in the eyes of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The new status was thought to pave the way for substantially more millions in federal dollars to flow here to try...

  Homeless for more than a year after the sale of its historic Beaux Arts sanctuary, Seattle's First United Methodist Church held services week after week at Seattle Children's Theatre at Seattle Center while awaiting construction of a new church building. Now, Sunday marks the grand opening of the new church, prompting the slogan: "Seattle's oldest church is now its newest."

 The congregation plans to mark the passage at 10 a.m. Sunday by walking from the Children's Theatre to the new church a few blocks away at 180 Denny Way for their first service. (Festivities lineup here.)

  Much has been written on the historic-preservation battle waged over the century-old former sanctuary at Fifth and Marion, since saved from development. (See stories here.)

  But what about the first church -- the city's very first church building? It was far more modest.

  According to Historylink.org, today's First United Methodist Church traces its origins to the following:

  On May 12, 1855, Seattle'...

  Totally preventable -- that's the conclusion investigators drew about the 8.7 million gallons of raw sewage that spilled into Elliott Bay from King County's West Point wastewater treatment plant last month, prompting a four-day closure of the North Beach recreation area near Discovery Park. On Wednesday, the state Department of Ecology announced it fined the county $24,000 for three violations, including violating the state's Clean Water Act.

  “King County has taken this incident very seriously, but significant errors led to the spill and made what could have been a small release much larger,” said Ecology’s Water Quality Section manager Kevin Fitzpatrick in a press release.  “The backup system was tested and ready, but inexplicably not used

during the very time for which it is designed.”

  “I’ve made it clear, and our wastewater managers agree, that this incident was unnecessary and unacceptable, and that the division must be accountable,”...

 Listen to this: State engineers say they found a way to cover the cost of a new tunnel along Seattle's waterfront to replace the Alaskan Way viaduct -- it's by, ka-ching, charging a toll.

 Start saving those pennies. A study shows the toll could surpass $4 during peak hours.  Listen here to Keith Seinfeld's short radio story on KPLU

   Scott Gifford two weeks ago thrust himself into the role of Batman -- a guy who's out to save the vampire bats, the armadillos, and his favorite nocturnal animal, the slow loris, from the surprise announced planned closure of Woodland Park Zoo's Night Exhibit (a.k.a. Nocturnal House). He launched a Facebook campaign to try to change the minds of zoo officials. Nearly 25,000 people have joined. 

  Batman met his match on Wednesday.

  That's when zoo officials announced a date -- March 1 -- for the exhibit's closure as an effort to save $300,000 annually. They also announced which animals get to stay and which will get the boot.

  Gone from the zoo and being sent to new homes at other accredited places will be several animals from the 61-animal exhibit, including seven blind cave fish, two Coendou (prehensile-tailed porcupines), two Douroucoulis ("night monkeys"), two Galagos ("bushbabies"), one Tawny frogmouth, and these bats:

  *all 19 vampire bats

 * all 8 African...

     The Mariners started the week with five possible salary-arbitration cases.

    That number is now down to two with Seattle having gotten an agreement on a five-year, $78 million deal with right-handed starter Felix Hernandez and with closer David Aardsma and setup reliever Mark Lowe both agreeing on one-year contracts to avoid arbitration.

    Aardsma, who had never saved a big league game until bursting onto the scene with 38 saves and a 2.52 ERA, agreed to a one-year, $2.75 million deal, and Lowe, who was 2-7 with a 3.26 ERA, accepted the Mariners’ offer of $1.15 million.

    Right-handed reliever Brandon League, who was picked up from Toronto in the Brandon Morrow trade, and first baseman Casey Kotchman, acquired from Boston with the Red Sox getting infielder Bill Hall, have not agreed to new contracts that would avoid arbitration, although negotiations continue.

    The Mariners are giving the 23-year-old Hernandez an average salary...

As we told you back in September, the King County bean-counters have eyed electric trolley buses as a potential cost savings to help solve Metro's multi-million dollar shortfall in funding. A decision is due later this year on whether to scrap the trolley buses and convert all of the routes to diesel.

Although the city of Seattle doesn't have a direct vote in Metro's decision, staff at the city Department of Transportation appear to have concerns about the trolleys going away. Transportation Planner Jonathan Dong has been making the rounds to community meetings around the city, gathering public feedback on the trolley bus system. They'll then compile that feedback and present it to Metro to use in their decision making process.

Read more here from Central District News.

And answer the city's survey to give your feedback on the idea here.

For more background, here's a city-prepared "fact sheet" on the electric buses.

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn, who won election as the city's top official after a campaign against replacing the Alaska Way Viaduct with a tunnel along the city's waterfront, on Wednesday said he'll ask the city council to approve a $241 million emergency ballot measure to replace the seawall that's deteriorating under it.

Seattlepi.com's Chris Grygiel reported on the mayor's morning press conference on the waterfront:

Mayor Mike McGinn is asking Seattle voters to approve a $241 million ballot measure to replace the city's deteriorating seawall, citing a "potential for catastrophe" if it fails.

"We have known since 2001 that the seawall is unsafe," he declared.

"We're going to ask the citizens of Seattle to replace the seawall -- for safety reasons -- as soon as possible."

That means as early as 2014, the mayor explained -- two years before a new waterfront tunnel replacing the Alaskan Way Viaduct is expected to be finished.

McGinn said he would submit a measure to the City Council for a possible vote as soon...

With the death toll mountain from this week's earthquake in Haiti and government aid only just beginning, it's natural for people across the planet to want to find ways to help.

But the Washington Secretary of State's office is warning people to be cautious as well as generous when it comes to donating to those who promise help.  Spokesman Dave Ammons says the state maintains a list of registered charities and suggests that would-be donors check first to make sure a charities that promises to help in Haiti is legitimate.

Here's his advice:

While the Charities program within the Secretary of State’s Office wants you to be generous, it also urges you to not let emotions cloud good judgment when it comes to donating your money.  Often, scammers use tragedies like these to say they are helping a cause and to pocket the donations of generous people. Don’t be fooled!  Make sure the group is registered with the Office of Secretary of State by checking online. Ask how much of your...

  More than 9,000 people in just a few days have joined the "Save the Woodland Park Nocturnal House" Facebook group in hopes of keeping bats and other animals at Seattle's beloved zoo. Yet  money-crunched Woodland Park Zoo maintains that closing the exhibit will save $300,000 annually and there's next to no hope the zoo will change course.

  "We cannot accept gifts restricted to keeping the Night Exhibit open," states the zoo's new Frequently Asked Questions page dedicated to this topic.

  Fans of the 61 critters that live at the Nocturnal House -- including three armadillos and several bats -- plan to gather from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday at the exhibit, partly as a fundraiser for their cause. See our earlier story here.

  The zoo, meanwhile, plans to offer a few staff members to mingle with visitors at its Education Center, near the southern gate at North 50th Street and Fremont Avenue North in Fremont, from 1:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. The idea is to mingle and field questions about the proposed...

    If you have the flu, surprise -- it's virtually certain to be swine flu. Yes, swine flu, which has prompted 262 hospitalizations in King County since the start of the flu season on Oct. 5. Sixteen people during that time-frame are known to have died.

   "Virtually all of the flu circulating nationally is H1N1," as opposed to seasonal flu, says James Apa, spokesman for Public Health-Seattle & King County .

   "The simple answer is we can't say for sure why."

    Normally at this time of year, health officials definitely would be seeing seasonal flu strains circulating now, but it hasn't happened, Apa says. One theory is that the pandemic strain crowds out the seasonal-flu strains.

   "But the short answer is: we really don’t know," Apa says.

   In an attempt to keep as many healthy people as possible flu-free, Public Health-Seattle & King County announced Friday that there's lots of H1N1 vaccine available at participating pharmacies...

It's against the law in Washington to talk on a hand-held cell phone or send a text message while you're driving. But you can't get a ticket for it unless police first top you for another violation, say, speeding. That's a loophole some state lawmakers and traffic safety advocates hope to close. (read full story here)

Related story: Bill targets distracted driving

Sea–Tac Airport signed a deal last month to get 10 percent of its jet fuel from vegetable oil, instead of petroleum.

Government and airline officials say turning crops into jet fuel will help the global climate and reduce America's dependence on foreign oil. KUOW's John Ryan looked into the truth of those claims. He found it all depends on how farmers respond to the growing demand for alternative fuels.

 Read full story here.

 Related story by John Ryan: Skagit farmers wary of biofuel crops

Where do you turn when you are in a low wage job and the boss just refuses to pay you? That's the problem some day laborers in Seattle are facing. (more)

  If vampire bats could talk, they might say this economy sucks. Crunched for money despite near-record attendance, Woodland Park Zoo on Tuesday sent a letter to members and supporters announcing it'll save $300,000 annually by closing its Night Exhibit, which houses 61 animals including three armadillos and lots of bats. In a real-life twist on Survivor, the zoo knows so far that it plans to keep only one of three bat species (as yet undetermined). The other bats are to be booted off the island, so to speak, and placed in new homes outside the zoo.

  Now fans are trying to come to the rescue via a fundraiser and a Facebook campaign, which argues, in part: "It is by far the best exhibit at the zoo and is pretty unique. While times are tough, we need to not lose the things that make the Zoo so great. For many this is their only chance to actually see the wonderful creatures that inhabit the nighttime world..."

  Commenter Krystal Bishop agreed: "I couldn't imagine a worse idea than shutting down...

  Employees at the Transfer Station on North 34th Street in the Fremont/Wallingford area got a surprise Monday when they discovered an "OD green-colored" 155-millimeter Howitzer artillery round amid the debris of a Dumpster being emptied at 9:30 a.m.

   And it was live.

   According to the Seattle Police Department's blotter:

  Seattle Police Arson Bomb Squad detectives responded to the scene.  U.S. Army Explosive Technicians out of Fort Lewis were notified and responded.

  It was determined the artillery round (a M116) was manufactured in 1951 and was a live ‘Smoke Projectile’ complete with a small bursting charge.  The projectile was secured by the Army Technicians and returned to the military base for proper disposal.

 

King County Council has just appointed Jan Drago, a longtime Seattle City Council member, to fill the seat left vacant by the election of Dow Constantine to be county executive.

The Seattle Times reported over the holiday weekend that Drago had emerged as a possible candidate to break a deadlock on the council about a replacement. Drago just completed her most recent term on the City Council; she is expected to serve as an interim appointee on the County Council and not seek election when the post comes up for a vote in November.

King County Councilmember Larry Phillips said it was "time to end the impasse" and moved to vote for Drago. After the vote that made her the newest council member, Phillips released this statement:

I made it clear on December 14th with my vote for Senator Joe McDermott that I strongly support him as the best representative to fill the District 8 vacancy. He has an impressive show of support from the people of District 8, has demonstrated leadership as a state senator tackling many...

Want to know more about some of Seattle's great older buildings? The non-profit preservation group Historic Seattle has released its 2010 calendar of events, which include chances to visit and learn about everything from mansions to factories, gardens and former school buildings.

The group will have events at such locations as the Stimson Green Mansion, the Phinney Center, the Sunset Club on First Hill and the Nucor Steel Mill.

Information is available at www.historicseattle.org. A PDF brochure of the group's 2010 events is here.

You may recall that Mike McGinn's "open-source" transition to his mayoral post encourages the public to tell him their top ideas for Seattle, and so far two ideas have shot to the top, garnering the most votes on his web site: "Expand as much light rail and subway as possible" stands far and above at No. 1. Lagging  behind at No. 2, "legalize marijuana and tax it."

And McGinn is in favor of both.

Well, what other top vote-getters?

Here are the top 20, as excerpted from the open-source web site:

1. 1,149 votes

   Vote

    

   Expand as much light rail and subway as possible

   Seattleites have resorted to using mediocre and unreliable bus transportation as the only mode of mass transit since the failure of Forward Thrust. Expand light rail on the west side, connect neighborhoods like UW, Ballard, Fremont, Wallingford, etc. Look for smart financing methods to grade se... More

   by Sherwin Lee | 37 comments-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------...