Best Crab Cakes

Random post of the week… I’m on a search for the best crab cakes around and have tried about a dozen places, most in Skagit County but also a few in Seattle most notably Dahlia Lounge. I’ve been told, and have read, that Tom Douglas makes the best crab cakes in the world. Those that believe that have not yet tried the crab cakes at Cafe Adrift in Anacortes.

The crab cakes at Adrift are simply amazing. Perfect thickness, not a bunch of mayo, cooked to perfection, great Thai Chili sauce to accompany it and a cool friendly atmosphere to eat it in. If you haven’t been; go. If you know of another crab cake that ought to get some recognition, please leave a comment so we know.

-nate

Anacortes Community Shelter Project

After several years of fund raising and work with the comunity the Anacortes Community Shelter  Project has broken ground and building has begun. The project, lead by Eric Johnson, has raised 2.2 million and has another $200,000 to go. While I think it’s an outstanding project, and a much needed one for Anacortes, I don’t understand the need to build. There are currently two 13 unit apartment buildings for sale in Anacortes, both in the mid to upper 1.4’s, meaning the project could have been up and running long ago, with no builiding needed and they’d end up with more units than their current design allows. But that’s just my Realtor mind at work. And yes, this was pitched to either the board, or memebers of the board more than once.

In any case, the project has started and I think it’s a great thing for our community. Homes are being torn down on 27th street just off Commercial and work will begin soon, Nels of Strandberg Construction has been contracted to build. Eric has done a great job getting this going and our suprising amount of homeless here in the community will benefit. One of the draws to this project is that they do not just house homeless, they have to subscribe to a program to get themselves back on thier feet if they want to live in the Shelter and I think that treating the cause rather than just solving the problem is important. This is just one of the reasons I’ve joined with those in my companty to donate over $5,000 to the project over the last few years, with more to come.
Well done Eric and crew!

-Nate

City of Mount Vernon Urban Growth Area Public Hearing

The Mount Vernon City Council will talk about expanding it’s Urban Growth Area to allow for more Commercial and Industrial growth May 28th at 7:00 PM at the Police Campus. This is your chance to express your views on the expansion. Here is the agenda. Another important meeting coming up on June 11th is the Downtown Waterfront Draft Masterplan, this will guide the growth in the Downtown Core and surrounding areas for the next 20 years. I think it’s important to push the inclusion of mixed use zoning and encourage residential development in the core area which will in turn boost business and the overall viability of downtown Mount Vernon. Of course better public access to the river should be a part of this too, and a permanent Farmers Market with some covered areas. From a quick read of the draft these seem to be included and should be reinforced via feedback to the City.

 

–Nate

Skagit County bucks the trend!

If you saw the Seattle Times article this weekend on sliding housing prices, I hope you read the whole article and not just the headline. If you read past the typical alarmist-sell-more-papers headline you will see that Washington State isn’t doing that bad, and in fact is doing good in some areas; Skagit County being one of them. Of 363 U.S. metro areas that the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) follows, Wenatchee had the thrid-highest appreciation rate, Yakima was 17th,  and every other Washington city they study also posted paositive appreciation rates fir the first quarter of ‘08 over the last quarter of ‘07. The Mount Vernon/Anacortes area was one of the areas called out for increaseing prices rather than slipping prices. So Skagit County, while this isn’t 2005, we aren’t doing so bad at all.

 

–Nate