Georgetown

The SPD Blotter has reported that the Arsonist for the fire at 6710 Corson Ave. in Georgetown has been arrested. I thought the report should be copied and pasted verbatim, but now want to add my spin to the on going saga with some pictures.  The previous article about the Arson fire was posted the morning after the fire and at that time all the officials that were talking to us all gave me the impression that the building would be torn down. I was standing talking to the owner Allen Hua at the time and I think he thought it was going to have to be bulldozed. They had not let him in to look at it yet. That was then and this is now. I am posting 3 pictures taken 2/16/12. If you look at all three you can see the entire top floor was on fire. The flames were shooting out of the windows until the fireman could get the people off the roof and cut holes in the roof so the fire could go straight up. If you look at the white light in the first picture you can see daylight through a hole in the roof.  The night of the fire I could stand on my balcony (I was very close to the fire and could see the fireman going to the roof from inside). That being the case it had to burn the ceilings all out and I am sure it could not have missed doing damage to the studs or beams or whatever holds a roof up. Partitions are all burned. One fireman told me the entire top floor would have to be torn off at the very least but said he was not a building inspector. That is not happening now it seems.

The place has been nothing but a hot bed of trouble for years. Drug sales, prostitution, fights, and all of us neighbors get to listen to the most filthy talk. It appears the owner is going to just be able to cobble it together, cover the burned stuff with plywood. His last fight with the city at another slumlord complex (he owns 6) he fought on the fact that they were discriminating against a poor Chinese farmer. He lives in a million dollar home in Issaquah and keeps these dumps open because he will rent to people who do not dare fill out a credit check or prove anything. I read where he makes approx $195,000 a year on these so called “low rent” places. We neighbors have no recourse, police, fire department, everyone is aware of the problems at 6710 Corson but do absolutely nothing to correct the situation. I would think after a certain amount of drug over doses, people sitting on the curb hand cuffed, the place would be boarded up. I have had to have bars put on my windows and have always been expecting the place to burn up. You can’t have 11 (single occupancy rooms) with several buddies (visiting) 24/7 doing drugs, fighting, drinking and not expect something bad to happen. One time I thought one guy was going to kill another one (yelling that he was). I called 911 and they arrested the fellow. I ended up with a subpoena to come to court. Wasted a whole day. I got paid $10.00 before taxes and neither guy even showed up.

I do not know how to end the cycle there but felt I should put it in the paper for Independent Thinkers and hope some of  you will get to thinking and leave comments below. LLL

During the night of Jan. 22 and morning of Jan 23 there was a huge apartment house fire at 6710 Corson Ave. This fire was ARSON. It is a three story building and the entire top floor was engulfed in flames. This happened right between wind storms or the house right beside it would be gone too. At least 8 people lost their homes and everything they owned. No one got killed. The tenants were lined up across the street for a few hours with nothing but what they had on their backs when they escaped. Approx 3 hours later a red cross car arrived and handed out blankets. Another couple hours later a red cross van came and took them all away.  A photographer took pictures of that so it was basically a Red Cross photo op.

This apartment house has been a hot bed of trouble. It might be what you call low low income people but I want to expand on that a little. These were housekeeping rooms and I believe there were 2 apartments that had their own bath, so there was a lot of people that had to go down the hall and share a bathtub on the main floor or go to the basement or upstairs to share a shower. Lots of street people or people who would park an old motor home on a side street would come and use the facilities. It was impossible to know how many or who really lived there. The police and fireman came at least once a month for drug busts, or over doses or fights, you name it and it happened over there. This was an accident waiting to happen. Why I wanted to expand on low income it appeared to be non working people who paid HIGH RENT because this was a place where the landlord did not do a background check. He got paid double what the room was worth and if you didn’t like it you couldn’t just move because half didn’t even use their right name. One would rent a room and a few buddies moved in. The place should have been closed down years ago but somehow managed to exist. Fights where yelling was I am going to kill you etc. over and over and over. Until the 23rd.

Fireman, detectives, a tenant that lived there, and the owner of the building all have told me it was ARSON. Right on the start they said it was. I am not sure how they could tell immediately but that seemed to be obvious to them all. There have been several versions which is common to any story. But when I asked one fireman if he thought a firebug was loose and we neighbors were in danger he said he didn’t think so. He said this fire was set to hurt or kill someone on the top floor. It was set in the doorway at the top of the back stairs. A fire bug that wants to watch a fire would usually just torch something at the ground level and make a fast get away. Also, a tenant said just before the fire there was a loud explosion which woke them and they all escaped because of that. Of course the detectives, fireman or police are not going to tell any of us neighbors the details and we know that but none the less this was a BIG BIG STORY. That being the case why was it not on the front page of the Times? Why was it not on every TV channel as a leading Seattle news story? KIRO and KOMO had about a 2 second spot of the red cross handing out blankets. No story about how big the fire was, no story about ARSON.  How can that be. It is scary to think you are actually getting the news when you read the only paper in town or watch the local news. If a story this big and important wasn’t mentioned how many other really important things are they NOT telling us. My point completely is we are only told what officials want us to be told.  That is very scary. I am going to try to find out from the times why they did not even mention it at all. Hope all of you readers do too. I am sure you can check with the fire department to know my story is true. At least 3 blocks of Corson Ave was full of fire trucks, medics, etc. LLL