Time for Island to have artistic and cultural center
As a performing artist, Founder/Artistic Director of the Russian Chamber Music Foundation of Seattle, and a resident of Mercer Island, I want to highlight the importance to this community of having its own performing arts center. We are a wealthy and cultured community, and the time is right to build the Mercer Island Center for the Arts.
MICA will be a catalyst for all performing arts activities on Mercer Island, a facility that will meet the our expectations.
Mercer Island is a wonderful place to live — the new MICA facility will make it even better.
Natalya Ageyeva
Benefits for some, or for all?
There appears to be some confusion over Mercer Island Center for the Arts (MICA) and Youth Theatre Northwest (YTN). Neither are public entities. We taxpayers don’t own them, nor do we participate in their financial audits and outcome.
For example, MICA claims it can only pay a dollar a year for 50 years to lease and build a proposed 38,000 square-foot structure on an acre of Mercerdale Park. Yet it plans to charge anticipated tenants for space and audiences for future cultural events. YTN collects hefty fees from its students and will charge those who attend its current and future performances.
On the hand, we, the public, through our taxpayer dollars, pay for cultural, band and sports opportunities at our schools, and sports fields, tennis courts and parks for all.
MICA and YTN provide admirable benefits for some. Islanders’ tax dollars provide a common public benefit for all.
Jean Majury
Campaigns too distracting
Morning commutes all week have been horrible at the intersection of Island Crest and 40th due to the circus of the campaigners.
As I waited three lights to make my left turn, no sooner had I thought how dangerous it all was when a walking high schooler was hit by a car right in front of me.
The walker had the WALK signal, but was hit by an obviously distracted person. He flipped up on the hood and when the driver braked, he slid off and almost went into the busy traffic. Disoriented and shocked for a bit, he shook himself off and seemed OK.
The irony was that with all the campaigners around, at least there were many people there to help the kid back to his feet.
Perhaps whoever gets elected to the City Council can then ban the campaigning that goes on at the busiest and most dangerous intersection on Mercer Island.
This town bans kids from school yard tag for their safety. Let’s protect the high schoolers walking to school and unblock the 40th/Island Crest intersection by barring this annual distraction. It is a traffic headache for an already busy rush hour and it is clearly dangerous.
John Williams
