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The Woodland Park Zoo is bringing back its beloved Night Exhibit after it closed in the wake of the 2009 recession. According to the Woodland Park Zoo blog, there are plans to open a renovated version in 2018 that will showcase nocturnal animals. Over the next two years, the zoo will designing, renovating and opening the exhibit that, like the original, will be built with a reverse light cycle so that during the day you’ll be surrounded by dark. The updated facility–with new features being considered like a night vision station and digital signage to help you find your way and see nature’s night shift at work–aims at making the exhibit more engaging and interesting. Costs of renovations are anticipated to range between $3-4 million. Although a formal fundraising campaign has yet to begin for the project, the zoo has received a substantial early gift from The Nysether Family Foundation, which in the past has helped fund several zoo projects including the Banyan Wilds Tiger Exhibit and the Historic Carousel Pavilion. Funding will also come several sources, including a public-private partnership and private donations. If you would like to contribute to the zoo you may do so here. 

The SAM cars have come down. After eight years of hanging from the Seattle Art Museum lobby ceiling, the nine Ford Taurus cars that are part of an installation called “Inopportune: Stage One,”  by Chinese contemporary artist Cai Guo-Qiang, have come down. The installation had been on display ever since the Seattle Art Museum opened, but according to KUOW, musuem officials say it was due time for the artwork to come down. In fact, SAM’s curator of modern and contemporary art, Catharina Manchanda, told KUOW that the installation was never intended to be up for more than two or three years. Cai Guo-Qiang’s installation was on display through January 18 and now that the cars have been removed they will go into storage and the museum has no plans of displaying them again. Museum visitors will be greeted with large-scale paintings hanging from the lobby ceiling and curator Manchanda hopes fans of the cars give the new paintings a chance. “Change and variety are truly a good thing! Please be excited for the new things that are about to come!” 

Seattle real estate developer is in jail for poisoning trees. After poisoning 123 trees on the property of another Seattle real estate developer, a Chelan County jail official confirmed to the Puget Sound Business Journal on Monday that Ted Schroth, 47, is in jail in Wenatchee. According to Chelan County authorities, Schroth was working on a project called the Lookout, a 63-acre resort on the north shore of Lake Chelan, when he poisoned the trees on Whiskey Ranch, neighboring property owned by real estate developer Mark McNaughton. Chelan County authorities launched the investigation of the incident in the fall of 2014, when a Whiskey Ranch caretaker found salt at the base of the trees. A surveillance video from a near-by Walmart showed footage of a man who looked like Schroth purchasing around $500 worth of salt and Schroth was charged with first-degree malicious mischief last February. Last month he pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of second-degree malicious mischief. Schroth was sentenced to 45 days in jail, where he was ordered to report on January 4, and ordered to pay $156,413 restitution to McNaughton. According to Chelan County authorities, Schroth has paid the restitution and he is scheduled to be released from jail on February 2. 

A Seattle business leader wants to build an LGBTQ co-working innovation center after Seattle’s LGBTQ Community Center shuttered its doors in 2008. In response to the closure, local business owner and activist George Pieper formed Seattle LGBTQ Community Development, an organization that creates spaces for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community. According to GeekWire, Pieper envisions a large co-working space, with non-profit organizations operating side-by-side. Pieper also has hopes of using the community center as a place to provide job training, resources for seniors, and aid to Seattle’s LGBTQ homeless population. LGBTQ Community Development had originally planned to build the community innovation center in the new Sound Transit Center on Capitol Hill, but according to GeekWire the property was too expensive and had limited space for all of Pieper’s envisioned plans. Two other locations have since been identified as possibilities but Pieper estimates that the new center’s grand opening is still three years out.