Local Digest
Magnuson Park lights-out approved

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The agreed-upon hours are included in a plan to redevelop a section of the Northeast Seattle park into a recreational-sports complex featuring seven synthetic-turf fields. The plan also calls for two unlighted fields and an unlighted, grass sports meadow for many different sports.

The city so far has about $12 million set aside, enough to build three or four of the athletic fields, the sports meadow and environmentally sensitive wetlands.

Six of nine council members participated in yesterday's parks committee hearing. The full council is scheduled to vote June 14 on the Magnuson plan.

Police seek man suspected of trying to abduct woman

SEATTLE — Police are still searching for a man who attempted to abduct a 19-year-old woman from a South Seattle bus stop yesterday morning.

The woman was waiting at a bus stop in the 5900 block of Swift Avenue South at South Albro Place around 10:15 a.m. when the man drove by and asked her if she wanted a ride, police said. The woman declined, and the man drove away.

He then parked and walked over to the bus stop, where he again offered her a ride. When the woman refused, the man pulled out a knife, put the tip of the blade to her back and tried to pull her toward his car. She resisted, and he got in his vehicle and drove away, police said.

Monorail service unlikely until end of next week

SEATTLE — The Seattle Center monorail probably will be out of service until the end of next week, after independent engineers inspect the burned Blue Train and its twin Red Train.

The city-owned Center must conduct a public bid process for the inspection contract, which takes a few days, spokesman Perry Cooper said.
 
A restart of monorail service would then depend on the inquiry's findings, and whether the system can operate safely, he said.

Fire broke out in the Blue Train's undercarriage Monday afternoon, trapping 150 riders on board until rescuers arrived.

County budget committee approves 12-story building

SEATTLE — The Metropolitan King County Council's budget committee yesterday approved plans to build a 12-story office building on the site of the existing county parking garage.

The $85 million project, which includes a new parking garage across Fifth Avenue from the existing garage at Fifth Avenue and Jefferson Street, is intended to save money by consolidating county offices now in scattered rental properties.

County Council Chairman Larry Phillips said the project will save the county $16 million over the 28-year life of the mortgage. The proposal still must be approved by the full County Council.

Felony charges are filed in fatal traffic accident

SEATTLE — Prosecutors filed vehicular-homicide and felony hit-and-run charges yesterday against a 22-year-old man who is alleged to have caused an accident that killed Catherine "Kelly" O'Neil Henson, 46, a well-known member of Seattle's sailing community.

Ricardo Diaz Ramirez, of Auburn, was speeding and driving with a blood-alcohol level of 0.20 percent, more than twice the legal limit, on Feb. 22 when he went through a stop sign and hit a truck, according to charging papers filed in King County Superior Court yesterday. The truck flipped over and landed on a vehicle driven by Henson, the charging papers say.

Ramirez is scheduled for arraignment on June 16.

Information is from Seattle Times staff and news services.