At the same time financially strapped tenants owe the financially strapped Seattle Center over $1.1 million in back rent (a situation Chihuly "museum" boosters misleading cite in support of enclosing a couple acres of public land for private gain), the Center continues to kick out and shut down tenants who have their checkbooks open. At least, that's the via-email perspective of Beth McNelley, the manager of the family-owned, soon-to-be-clear-cut Fun Forest.

City of Seattle strung us along until November 23rd going back and forth about whether to let us stay one more year. They have decided not to allow us to stay. We were to close on November 28th, what a nice "Happy Holidays" from the City of Seattle. We will now remain open through January 2nd, then finito!! Get out!!

Wow. Bravo Mr. Nellums. Bravo.

I think the general people out there might like to know, that we were hoping to stay, we were set to pay another $250k to stay until September of 2011. We would have made lease improvements to stay another season. Not only would we have made improvements and either purchased or booked in new rides, Steve Robertson offered to gift the carousel to the city, if they gave us a 2 year extension through 2012.

Now the "Winterfest" Ice-Skating rink is mostly empty, no one knows where it is. We don't have our "Christmas Carousel" down there this year to add to the festive appearance.

But according to McNelley, it gets even worse for non-Wright-backed tenants.

McNelley says that at a recent meeting, city officials told Fun Forest upper management that the Center plans to shut down the Food Court for construction... in July.

JULY? So... all of those vendors who count on tourism, festivals and long hours of daylight to make most of their yearly income, will have to close at the height of the season? How does the City expect them to pay their rents? INGENIOUS!! They will force all of the tenants out of the Seattle Center and turn it into... a wasteland the Wright family will have to save?

Um... yeah, Beth... that sounds about right. In fact, perhaps what we need is not one Chihuly "museum," but three or four. The delinquent Children's Museum, Children's Theatre and Intiman Theatre would all make great venues for displaying Chihuly glass, while the food court could be transformed into the world's first "Glass Court," where tourists could conveniently purchase trinkets from a number of Wright-run vendors.

"The Chihuly Center." I mean, as long as it makes money, why not?