University District vacant building burns, police seek person of interest
Two alarm fire in Seattle University District
Vacant building burns in university district. Two people escaped the building alive before responders arrived and no one was found injured in the building.
SEATTLE - A two-alarm fire swept through a vacant building in Seattle’s University District neighborhood Monday morning.
Two people were able to escape, but a search for others had to be scrapped temporarily to ensure the safety of firefighters.
Seattle police said the incident began as an investigation into an incident of domestic violence. By 10:30 a.m., firefighters were deploying a defensive attack as the flames grew.
Seattle program to track vacant buildings an effort to bolster neighborhood safety Joel Moreno, KOMO News reporter
Seattle program to track vacant buildings an effort to bolster neighborhood safety
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Seattle s program to track vacant buildings that have a history of trouble is putting new strains on the city s resources even as a monitoring program that works to keep each location sealed up and safe is facing difficulty because some property owners are not pitching in.
Vacant buildings that fall into disrepair can be a magnet for illegal behavior and pose a safety hazards.
“There was a fire in there at one point which puts our property at risk because if this whole thing burns down what are we going to do?” said Daniel Dimas, whose workplace adjoins an empty commercial property now occupied by squatters. “You can smell drugs from this side. I m sure they ve tapped into the electricity somehow because they re listening to TV or radios