Seattle Local Pulse: World Cup Day, Little Saigon Enforcement, and Summer Ahead

Good morning, this is Seattle Local Pulse for Friday, June nineteenth, and we are waking up in a city that is all about the World Cup right now, even as real life keeps moving around it. We start down by Seattle Stadium, where Team USA faces Australia at noon. Sound Transit says Link trains are running every eight minutes most of the day, and even every four minutes through International District Chinatown, so we really want to leave the car at home and ride the train in. Seattle Department of Transportation is closing streets around the stadium to cars until about seven tonight, so traffic on Fourth Avenue South and around Pioneer Square will be tight. Weather wise, FOX 13 expects us to climb into the low eighties by the end of the match, sunny and warm along the waterfront and in SoDo. Health officials remind us to hydrate, wear a hat, and go easy on the alcohol if we are standing in line or packed into the march to the match. From City Hall, Mayor Bruce Harrell’s office is rolling out a new enforcement push in Little Saigon near South Jackson and Twelfth. According to FOX 13 Seattle, the plan sends more officers to focus on open air drug dealing and stolen goods, paired with more than a million dollars for outreach, overdose prevention, and treatment. The city says people contacted there will either be booked into jail or offered diversion and services. On the crime front, Seattle police report a busy but mostly controlled night around downtown with isolated thefts near the stadium and a couple of assaults in Belltown. There are no major public safety emergencies tied to the World Cup so far, but extra patrols remain around the International District and along Third Avenue. In the job market, hospitality is hiring hard. Local hotel and short term rental analysts say bookings for June are still down roughly twenty percent from a year ago, even with the Cup in town, so many hotels around Denny Way and the waterfront are offering bonuses and flexible shifts to attract staff. Real estate agents in Ballard and West Seattle report that open houses last weekend drew about a third fewer people than a month ago, but prices for well kept homes between six hundred and eight hundred thousand dollars are holding steady, with buyers waiting to see what interest rates do later this summer. Culturally, we have the Fremont Fair and Solstice festivities rolling through the weekend, with art, music, and the famous parade drawing people to Fremont Avenue and the Burke Gilman. In the Chinatown International District, community groups are hosting a Summer Kickoff with food vendors, lion dancers, and live music to bring families back to South King Street. In schools, Garfield High’s girls track team is celebrating several state titles, and Roosevelt’s jazz band just returned from a national festival with top ensemble honors, giving our students a well earned spotlight as they slide into summer break. For a feel good moment, volunteers along Alki Beach and Myrtle Edwards Park spent the last few evenings picking up trash left by early World Cup visitors, turning what could have been an eyesore into clean shoreline just in time for today’s sunshine. Thanks for tuning in, and remember to subscribe so we can keep sharing these stories with you. This has been Seattle Local Pulse. We'll see you tomorrow with more local updates. This has been a quiet please production, for more check out quiet please dot ai. For more http://www.quietplease.ai Get the best deals https://amzn.to/3ODvOta