Gelb Building

The current residency for /dev/hack.

4534-½ University Way NE, Seattle, WA 98105. See Directions.

Rent is $2200/month.

Layout

We get offices A,B,C,D & H, sharing & subleasing rooms E & G to SCN, have shared access to kitchen, bathroom, meeting room, and utility closet. Andrew the Therapist subleases office F (User:Maia, User:Eliri, and User:Ellie have his contact, in case we need to access his office for electrical work, etc.).

Each office is roughly 300 sq. ft.

some land/building documents (if you're interested):

Occupancy

The entire space has been able to support maybe 50-65 people total, although it gets really cramped at that point depending on how often folks are relocating around. The kitchen, being the largest room can support 30 people without major reorganizations of it and 45 when setup to *just* have chairs.

Entering and Exiting

Entrance

Exit

Mail

Our full mailing address is:

/dev/hack
4534 1/2 University Way NE
Seattle, WA 98105-4528

All ZIP+4™ codes that work(unconfirmed) for us are: 98105-

4528
4511
4518

warning! ⚠️

Mail delivery is unreliable and you should not address mail to the space that you care about:

Letter mail gets delivered to the bottom of the stairwell, but only our regular postie has the code. A substitute carrier will often leave mail with the City of Seattle University Customer Service Center below.
- There is no slot on the front door to slip mail through.
Amazon/FedEx/UPS/other private carriers will likely not be able to deliver to the inside of the building unless you make them a code with HomeAssistant.

There is a PO box to use for official space business. if needed, talk to User:Maia

personal use

Some things require you to publicly list your address somewhere (for example, ham licenses). Feel free to use the space as your listed address, but make sure to keep in touch with us / give us a place to send you your mail when we get it.

package lockers

There are two Amazon lockers available within a short walking distance of the space (~2 blocks)

Amazon Locker - Rhett (7-Eleven, 1105 NE 47th St)
Amazon Locker - Slagle (Prof. Copy n Print, 4200 University Way NE)

Internet (external)

We use Atlas Networks as our external internet provider. We're currently on a month-to-month plan at ~$80/month.

Note: Yes, we know they suck and are unreliable and it's really annoying. No, we're not going to get Comcast or whoever out here to run new copper lines. See the below for our continuous fiber project. 👇

direct fiber to the UW datacenter coming soon™™™™™™™™™™™™

Internet (internal)

Mostly documented at Network.

We have NICs wired throughout the space, both RJ45 and RJ11. Though they have strange proprietary faceplate connectors that are in limited supply.

Electricity

Billing

as of 2025-08-18 we are charged a flat base service charge of $40.96 ($0.64/day) + the "small energy general" rate of $0.1241/kWh.

This comes from https://www.seattle.gov/city-light/business-solutions/business-billing-and-account-information/business-rates.

Electrical Meters

There is an electrical meter at the back of the hallway near the large city of seattle power shutoff switch. This meter combines both /dev/hack electricity and City of Seattle electricity.

every time that disc spins around once it’s 7.2Wh
1.1Wh per radian

The meter for solely the /dev/hack floor is inside the comms closet.

Electrical Circuits

The electrical breaker panel at devhack is located on the wall of Office F (Andrew the Therapist room), next to the utility room.

Do not enter Andy's without giving him a heads up first. He sees patients and has to get the HIPAA stuff out of sight first.

The following table documents known panel mappings. Two boxes with arrows pointed at each other indicates joined breakers.


Breaker #	Description	Description	Breaker #
1	↓ROOF UNIT↓	↓ROOF UNIT↓	2
3	↑ROOF UNIT↑	↑ROOF UNIT↑	4
5		South side rooms lighting, excluding utility room	6
7		North side rooms lighting, hallway, bathrooms, utility room	8
9			10
11			12
13	↓"GROW ROOM"↓		14
15	↑"GROW ROOM"↑		16
17			18
19			20
21			22
23			24
25	Kitchen Sink outlet		26
27		Server Room Outlets	28
29			30

Of note is that "grow room" refers to a specific 220V circuit within Andrew the Therapist's office & connected to the comms closet.

HVAC

We have both central AC & heating. AC is handled via vents in the ceiling and a roof-mounted AC unit. Heating is handled via radiators and a boiler in the furnace.

Thermostats

There are three thermostats total

We think two of them (near staircase bathroom and kitchen) control the air conditioning and one (near office e/SCN's side) controls the boiler.

Important: we're currently in the process of replacing all 3 thermostats with smart ones that can be added into Home Assistant. This will be expanded once they're all working. For now, the old Honeywell thermostats are deprecated and are expanded further in Deprecated Honeywell Thermostats.

Central Heating / Radiators

The radiators can be adjusted individually with valves. Sometimes the valves get stuck, and can be forced with pliers. Sometimes the valve will crumble when forced.

Apparently the central boiler can be adjusted via an unknown thermostat (see Deprecated Honeywell Thermostats). It can also be manually turned off at request of the landlord but that's an entire process.

Note: we don't pay for gas/heating.

Central Cooling

See: A/C Summer Cooling

Plumbing

Our kitchen sink doesn't easily get hot but allegedly does after a long time

The walls / "home" improvement

I'm fairly certain from drilling into the wall (when planning the bike wall) that its plastered drywall. At least between the kitchen and the meeting room.

Some of it might have been replaced at some point. The walls in the lounge, hub and foundry are all most likely original and quite thick without much space behind the plaster.

the walls at devhack are lath and plaster
Pretty much anywhere is good, just make sure you avoid electrical and pipes. Stud finder should help with that
Just use anchors

Security

Our space does have an automated security system that we have hacked.

Omni Security

Our point-of-contact w/ space security stuff are either Allen or his boss Jared.

Jared set up the security of the space a long time ago

Both seem amenable to our Security Hacks that we've implemented, although Allen is a lot more excited about it / thinks it's cool than Jared.

Current point of contact for security system stuff is probably User:Maia or secondarily User:Ellie / User:Zack

Admin

Our current point-of-contact property manager is Mike, handled via User:Eliri

Our maintenance guy is Ramón, very cool & chill.

Roof

File:File:Photo 4965379491992022403 y.jpg

Let's Make the Gelb Building a Historic Building

This information was copied over and expanded from https://bugs.devhack.net/ticket/719

The Gelb building is listed in the Pacific Coast Architectural Database and was listed on the Department of Neighborhoods Historical Site Listing circa 2012-2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20120609231132/http://web1.seattle.gov/dpd/historicalsite/QueryResult.aspx?ID=9

(This link without looking at an old version through the IA redirects to the seattle.gov homepage and does not appear to be active, nor does the Gelb building appear on the current historical site map.)

Why

"ensures our longevity, low rent, and the aesthetic of our home."

How can we do this?

This fund exists for helping preserve buildings in the state of Washington for up to $3000. Available if we put together a plan for next year in order to retain or return the building to a historic state. This fund is closed for this year as of 05/16/2025.

https://preservewa.org/programs/grants/valerie-sivinski-fund/

This would require us to be a member of the Washington Fund at the ‘Non-Profit Organization’ level or above ($75). https://preservewa.app.neoncrm.com/forms/general-membership-form

Might go towards starting to fixing the roof and part of the celing where it was damages by water ingress and helping to start the process on getting asbestos removed as mentioned in https://bugs.devhack.net/ticket/26.

How can you help?

Look into grant funding, state and city asbestos abatement programs and the like.