Nickels vs. Sisley: Fight!
He may have struck out on the Viaduct, but Mayor Nickels is taking a swing at one more source of urban decay: Hugh and/or Drake Sisley, at least in their role as North Seattle’s Lords of the Slumlords.
The Seattle Times argues it’s mainly the brothers’ properties along NE 65th Street, just east of Whole Foods, which are the target of yesterday’s proposal by Nickels to increase fines for trash and debris on properties ten-fold. (This was apparently lost on the P-I’s commenters, of whom only one mentioned the Roosevelt connection in the discussion section attached to that newspaper’s article.)
You might remember the Sisley brothers from the arrest of their white-supremecist gun-runner enforcer in 2005. Hugh claims he’s holding on to the rundown bungalows along 65th in order to build an eventual ‘urban village,’ something the Roosevelt Neighborhood Association doubts.
“Sisleyville”? Wow. They’re like cartoon villians.
I live in Roosevelt, and, walking down 65th, you can tell by sight which houses are owned by Sisley. It’s pretty amazing how dilapidated his properties are, especially when contrasted by the really nice ones just a block away. This is one Nickels initiative I can support!
I’ve been driving through the Roosevelt neighborhood for years, wondering why in such a prospering area so many of the houses are complete dumps, just begging to be demolished and turned into mixed use buildings. As soon as I read that they are all owned by one crazy, redneck slumlord who wanted to name the neighborhood after himself, it all made sense why no development is progressing. This wacko needs to sell of to the developers who have offered to buy his properties, so something will actually be developed. Hey, Hugh. You’ve made too many enemies in the neighborhood and city to ever get anything built as long as you still have a stake. Please just take the next purchase offer from a developer and move on!