City Chooses Eminent Domain to Create Park

In a surprise announcement, the SeaTac City Council had voted Tuesday to use the controversial “eminent domain” procedure to take over the section of Angle Lake shoreline between the existing public park on the North and the vacant Hughes property to the South. The intent is to create an admission-based Nude Beach with a eco-friendly promenade made of recycled materials.

“The council chose to leverage eminent domain due to fear in delays from having to deal with any clothed NIMBYs in that area,” said new Planning Commissioner Emma Riel, herself a self proclaimed nudist and a recent transplant from Slooflir, PA. “As we continue to recover from the recent extended economic downturn, we still need to locate a strong source for additional tax revenue streams to offset the city’s increasing operational expenses. That’s why we’re turning this beautiful strip of waterfront into the northwest’s first admission-based Nude Beach. Plus, it’s going to be eco-friendly and very green, what’s not to like?”

Plans were presented in a spontaneous, private city council “special session” that took place in an unmarked room upstairs in city hall late last night. A large satellite photo of the area in question was hung on the wall and marked “Area XXX,” and included censored photos of naked, middle-aged men.

“There’s nothing wrong with a Nude Beach, people just need to adjust their attitudes about the human body” said Consultant Lucy Gucci, a noted local nudist who’s often seen cavorting at Lake Burien with her German cousins. “I’ve been fighting for this for years, and can say without a shadow of a doubt that if God didn’t want us to be naked, we’d all have been born already fully clothed wearing black turtlenecks. Plus, the proposed promenade will be eco-friendly, and a $10 cover charge will help fill the city’s coffers. Why would anyone be opposing this?”

Reports are that a general contractor has already been hired. Bulldozers and other heavy equipment will start clearing the shoreline of all vegetation as early as this weekend. The expected park opening is yet to be revealed but estimates are that it will happen on Memorial Day Weekend 2015.

Planning Commissioner Riel compared this new, eco-friendly nude beach concept to a successful one she helped developed in the mid-1990s at Lake Dangle in Slooflir, PA, which now generates well over $2.5 million dollars in annual revenues through admission fees and pay-per-view volleyball matches.

Below is the map illustrating the new Nude Beach, currently called “Area XXX”. One suggested name for this annexed area was ‘Another Angle Park’.

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(Postscript:  This is an April Fools Joke)

The Spring Newsletter is Coming!

We’re excited to announce that we are less than two weeks away from distributing the 2015 edition of the Angle Lake Shore Club Spring Newsletter to all active members. 

Our Spring Newsletter will be packed with information regarding club activities and announcements you won’t want to miss. 

If you are an active Shore Club member who has previously indicated your preference of receiving the newsletter via email, you should notice our new online version includes a more media rich, visually pleasing design offering more photos and color graphics and dynamic formatting than what our print edition allows.  Our goal is to keep our newsletter production and distribution costs to a minimum by enticing you with a much more entertaining, desirable electronic edition that may motivate members to elect to receive an electronic edition instead of choosing the hard copy black and white snail mail option.

Electronic copies are scheduled to be distributed the week of April 13th, our print addition should hit post boxes the week after. If you have not received a copy of the newsletter before the end of April, any one or more reasons might be the cause: 

• You have not renewed your active membership in the ALSC.
• We do not have your current or correct email address on file.
• Or our email to you may be lying in your spam filter folder!

If you'd like to verify your member status and/or confirm that our record keeper has your correct contact information – please send an email with your request to the Shore Club email box at anglelakesc@gmail.com. Membership renewal forms are available for download HERE.

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Easter Bunny Coming to Town!

Sunday, April 5th between the hours 9:00 and 11:00 AM, the Easter Bunny will be hoping from dock to dock with his basket full of eggs ready to hand out treats to any eagerly awaiting children and their families.

If you have small children at home and/or will have grandchildren visiting on Easter Sunday and would like to ensure a special visit from the Easter Bunny, please contact Rosalyn Rombauer no later than Friday, April 3rd to request a stop. Send email to ros.rombauer@gmail.com providing your name, contact phone number, address (post number) and indicate of how many children are expected to be present.

Also Note:  If you have a gift basket that you wish to have personally presented to your child by the Easter Bunny, please have these baskets delivered to Ros before the deadline of Friday, April 3rd as well.

Special recognition and appreciation goes to Rosalyn and her team for continuing to bring this fun and memorable community event to Angle Lake each year.

Happy Easter!

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Long Over Due?

It seems that no matter where you turn costs are on the rise but does anyone recall the last time the dues for the Angle Lake Shore Club were raised or for that matter are we certain if they’d ever been raised at all since inception of the club? While the cost of our volunteer labor has remained flat, expense for the materials needed to execute our various shore club events have risen.

During the November board meeting a motion was made to consider an increase in annual membership dues to ensure the quality of our events can be maintained. With the introduction of new events such as the Easter Bunny Dock Hop, Lake Area Clean Sweep, Santa Christmas Cruise and the Polar Bear Plunge, a moderate increase in spending has been realized. However that modest increase is greater when coupled with the continuing uncertainty of our annual fireworks show and the absence of the related fireworks donation drive that has traditionally helped provide the necessary funding to help cover these additional events. 

After thorough discussion, the ALSC Board of Directors was of unanimous opinion that the Angle Lake Shore Club dues are due for change. We all agreed that raising our dues is the most prudent method to insure that our events continue as we consider these family centered activities help to exemplify the type of neighborhood that we are proud to live in.   

    

We’re confident that you’ll also agree that the prior rates charged for membership have been long overdue for a change.  As of January 1, 2015 the dues for joining or renewing an ALSC membership will increase for a single member from $5.00 annual to $10.00 and a family living under the same roof will increase from the current $10.00 annual membership fee to $20.00.  

A membership renewal and event order form is conveniently available on the BLOG if you choose to mail in your dues; or use to pay at an upcoming spring event or when our Fishing Derby Volunteers are out later in April selling derby/raffle tickets.  

We are most appreciative of our volunteers and the continued financial support of our community that help to make Angle Lake a most desirable place to live.  Thank you!

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There's an App for That!

Use “Click N Request” to identify and report non-emergency civic issues, such as public works, quality of life, graffiti removal and other environmental issues.

See a street light out?  Find a pothole? Have a environmental question for the City? Who do you call? For all of your non-emergency needs, you can make requests online, 24/7 x 365 days a year, from anywhere you can access the internet.

The service is called 'ClickNRequest' and is available through contract with a company called CitySourced, provider of a real time mobile civic engagement platform. CitySourced provides a simple and intuitive platform empowering residents to identify civic issues and report them to city hall for quick resolution resulting in a positive, collaborative platform for real action. 

The service is designed to route your request directly to a ClickNRequest administrator, who will review your request and determine the best department to respond to it. A responsible department representative will be assigned to process your request, investigate the situation, if necessary, and dispatch the correct personnel to complete the requested action.  

Once each request has been completed, it remains a part of our ClickNRequest database, which allows the City to track all requests and make sure they are responded to quickly, and helps department managers track growing trends in different locations around the City.

The reporting service is accessible via two platforms:

• Through an electronic form available on the City of SeaTac Website
• Through a SmartPhone Application download available for iPhone, Android, Windows Phone 7, and BlackBerry.

With the use of this application in collaboration with concerned citizens and their interest to work together to promptly report issues, we can all help to make this area a more livable space in which to live in.

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Save the Daylight!

As a reminder, Daylight Saving Time begins Sunday, March 8th. In the US, Daylight Saving Time starts on the second Sunday in March of each year and ends the first Sunday in November of each year.

You may have asked yourself, “Why do we put ourselves through this every year, and why does daylight need saving, anyway?” And if so, I am here to help provide some answers! Daylight Saving Time (the proper name for this spring-and-fall clock change thing) is all about longer summer days. And living on or near a lake, who doesn't appreciate longer summer days?!. The "saving" comes in because, with an early sunrise, people generally sleep through part of their lovely summer day, in effect wasting daylight (in fact, "The Waste of Daylight" was the name of a 1907 booklet handed out by William Willet, an early proponent of Daylight Saving Time).

The Daylight Saving Time 2015 time change is fairly simple: Most anything computerized, from a cell phone to a laptop, jumps ahead all on its own. Most other watches and clocks need to be reset manually, so we can inevitably forget to change one and confuse ourselves the next day.  But even with this slight inconvenience, we have it pretty easy -- in 1916, the first implementation of Daylight Saving Time in England consisted adding 20 minutes every Sunday in April. Less of a shock to the system, I suppose, but then it's no surprise that the month-long ordeal was ultimately changed to a single time change in March instead.

Since the 1970s, energy conservation has been the primary reason for the summer time change -- later daylight means we turn on the lights later, saving energy. The 2015 time change will be observed in different parts of the world, though not at the same times. The European Union, for example, springs forward on the last Sunday in March on the 29th, so you'll have to subtract an hour from the time difference for three weeks, unless you live in Hawaii, one of the US territories, or Arizona in which case there is no 2015 time change. Well except for the Arizona Navajo Nation community which does observe daylight saving time.  Simple, right? 

And if it seems like Daylight Saving Time starts early every year, you're right -- sort of. Beginning in 1986, Daylight Saving Time started on the first Sunday in April and ended on the last Sunday in October. But in 2007, Congress revised the dates to the current March-November calendar in order to extend the energy savings gleaned from earlier rising.

So come this Sunday March 8th morning as you struggle to wake up from the effect of losing that extra hour of precious sleep – keep in mind that we always seem to adjust, overcome and forget about the time change ... at least until November.

How will you spend your extra hour?

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