Piya's Perspective

A few months ago, I had the following conversation about my neighborhood with a co-worker…

“Oh, right, where the juvenile detention center is.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, I remember driving past that when I was younger.“
“I’ve seen the sign ‘Echo Glen Children’s Center“ but thought it was a daycare or something.“
“I’m pretty sure it was a juvenile detention center.“

Or at least, that’s close to how the conversation went.

Anyway, for the last few months, I’ve been meaning to look it up on the internet – not quite brave enough or have the time to take the dead-end detour to see the place.

Last night, I finally did just this…went to google and searched on “Echo Glen Children’s Center”.  I didn’t actually read the first link I followed, and after clicking around the site a bit, found myself at the home page for the Issaquah School District – that doesn’t scream juvenile detention center to me.  After returning to that first page however, I actually read the first sentence…

   ‘Echo Glen is Washington’s juvenile detention center.’

Washington’s juvenile detention center?  Yes…down the street from where I live is the educational juvenile detention center for the entire state of Washington.  Ahh…what a lovely thing to learn.  At least the picture makes it look nice.

Last year, King County was trying to find a location for a Sexual Offender Halfway House, and North Bend was on the list of options.  Luckily a two-story warehouse in South Seattle was chosen instead, but being in an area that is considered for these types of buildings only goes to show how much Puget Sound is growing and that what used to be considered “the boondocks” is getting eaten up by residential neighborhoods.