Six Years and Waiting

Announced almost six years ago was the purchasing of the Elks Lodge in downtown Tacoma. Roughly a month ago came the announcement that renovations were finally beginning. Why the six year lag you ask? Well, the purchasing company, McMenamins has your answer.

To find the answer you first need to know who is McMenamins? McMenamins is a Portland based entertainment company that holds properties throughout Oregon, Bothell and now Tacoma. They also only work on one project at a time, which explains the gap. With the Bothell building now complete, it is finally Tacoma’s turn.

Another recent announcement was that the City of Tacoma has awarded McMenamins with the bid for Old City Hall, located across the street from the Elks Lodge.

McMenamins has a thirty year history of turning historic buildings into entertainment and lodging locations. They are currently planning on renovating the Elks Lodge to feature an event space and a rooftop garden, accompanied by three restaurants, a bar, and a brewery. To top off this massive renovation, there will also be approximately 46 hotel rooms for guests to stay and play. The Old City Hall, which will be a few years behind the Elks Lodge, will be a complimentary experience for guests. The plan for Old City Hall is to have at least 60 hotel rooms, a gift shop, soaking pools, community and private meeting spaces, along with a jailhouse themed bar and a rooftop restaurant featuring a greenhouse. The Elks Lodge will have more of a unique floor plan with a labyrinth of different types of rooms, while the Old City Hall will keep its classic design consistent throughout the building.

This is looking to be two very large renovations with promising outcomes. These plans will not only take the burden of these two beautiful yet deteriorating buildings off the shoulders of the city but it will also be an amazing new opportunity for tourism and small businesses to flourish.

The Elks lodge has been purchased completely by McMenamins and due to it being a private selling process, no firm timelines were made mandatory for this building.  However, they are hopeful there will be an opening mid-2017. The Old City Hall is on a lease to potentially own status with firm deadlines so as not to experience a six year lag as with the Elks Lodge. Final details, deadlines, and costs have not yet been set but City Council is hoping to have everything approved by early next year. Decisions on if this will be a purchase to own property are still unclear and neither party is giving an indication on which way they are leaning.

With only a handful of historic buildings left to renovate in Tacoma, many people are looking to see what possible projects could be on the horizon for the companies who were outbid for the Old City Hall. Companies such as, Daniels Real Estate, a Seattle based company with experience in historical restorations, lost to McMenamins but is still interested in moving to Tacoma. Some are speculating that the Washington Building on Pacific Ave, the University-Union Club at 539 Broadway, and the Mansion on Broadway may be next to join the ranks of Tacoma’s beautiful historic renovations. Tacoma has a strong grip on their past and is not going to let changing times take away from the rich history that we have to offer. Restoring historic buildings is classically Tacoma and here to stay for many more generations to enjoy.  

Spaceworks Tacoma - Activating Space

Activated space.

It’s one of the most important elements of community development and neighborhood revitalization. It’s importance is understood by both high level urban planners and grass roots community organizers. It speaks both to architectural design and the importance of third spaces for people to gather, and it speaks to everything in between.

In Tacoma we have an inventive and robust effort that understands the importance of activated space - it’s called Spaceworks Tacoma.

Spaceworks is a partnership between the City of Tacoma and the Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber of Commerce that is designed to activate empty storefronts and vacant spaces in the city with art and creative enterprise.

Property owners donate their vacant spaces and Spaceworks makes those low-cost temporary spaces available to artists, entrepreneurs, organizations, and community groups who transform those spaces with creative business, art installations, short term community based projects, or pop-up events.

Spaceworks also provides training, professional development and technical assistance to the participants in the program. 

Have you seen a Spaceworks installation around town? Have you visited a Spaceworks business? Have you attended one of a plethora of creative events and parties held in a Spaceworks activated spaces?

If not, what are you waiting for? They are all around you - in the downtown neighborhood, the Hilltop, the 6th Avenue corridor, and throughout the city.

On June 3rd from noon - 1pm, Spaceworks Tacoma will be highlighted in the Walk Tacoma series for 2015. Spaceworks is hosting a free, guided Public Art Walk that will be lead by Public Art Specialist Rebecca Solverson with the City of Tacoma.

This particular art walk will be 1.5 miles and will explore the local public art and murals found throughout the Hilltop neighborhood. The walk will start at People’s Park on S. 9th and MLK Jr. Way.

One of the more whacky and fun projects that Spaceworks will be involved with is in partnership with the Cartoonist League of Absurd Washingtonians (CLAW) and Downtown on the Go (DOTG).

CLAW has their Open Swim event tonight, May 27th, 7:30 pm at King’s Books. DOTG is sponsoring this open swim event by providing ten blank white bike helmets to be drawn on and decorated by attendees.

The plan is to have the decorated helmets serve as a traveling exhibit for DOTG to be orchestrated by Spaceworks. Rumor has it these helmets might end up on the heads of some well known Tacoma personalities during the Downtown to Defiance event in September. Finally, the helmets will be auctioned off and the proceeds split between DOTG and the CLAW Student Scholarship Fund.

Now that is some creative partnership if you ask me.

The thing about activated space - it is both a function of the space itself and the people that populate it. Spaceworks is doing it’s part. Let’s do ours and populate these spaces with our presence and our dollars.

Gift Card Giveaway to Downtown Businesses

The City of Tacoma is wrapping up construction on Pacific Avenue in downtown Tacoma.  To celebrate they are giving away gift cards each week to people who stop into at least two businesses in the project area.

Pick up your passport at any participating business. Then visit one additional business to be qualified to enter the a drawing to win one of five great prizes!  Drop off your Pac Ave Passport through December 31 at either Learning Sprout Toys or the Tacoma Art Museum's Franciscan Polar Plaza Skating Rink. No purchase is necessary.

There are a variety of downtown businesses participating some of which are below.  For the full list of businesses participating, please see below the jump.

Some places you may already go downtown that are participating:
Aesthetica Clinique (801 Pacific)
Blitz Florist (909 Pacific)
Dorky’s Arcade (754 Pacific)
Granolas Frozen Yogurt (1716 Pacific)
Lucky Penny (950 Pacific)
Pacific Grill (1502 Pacific)
Savor Creperie (1916 Pacific)
Tacoma City Grocer (1250 Pacific)

For more on the project and the passport, please visit: www.cityoftacoma.org/pacave

Spaceworks Creating Businesses and Filling Vacancies

In the past, Spaceworks has done a great job of highlighting local artists doing work in and around Tacoma. While continuing to support artists, the Spaceworks program has shifted to include more creative entrepreneurs who are turning their work into businesses.

This shift has not gone unnoticed as Kathleen Cooper of The News Tribune noted on the cover of Sunday's paper: http://www.thenewstribune.com/2012/08/19/2260852/spaceworks-fills-voids-for-art.html.  

"What began as a program to use vacant downtown storefronts as showcases for Tacoma’s vibrant artists has started to focus on business incubation, and it’s working. 

In the past few months, three groups that found free space in commercial buildings through Spaceworks Tacoma have made the leap into the marketplace. A youth-focused creative arts organization, working in the city for a decade, has its first permanent headquarters. A man who rehabilitates and sells antique pianos has his own shingle. And four women who create unique home décor will open their retail store next month in the heart of Tacoma’s Antique Row."

As the Chamber continues to support innovation and entrepreneurship throughout the County, we look forward to strengthening Spaceworks role in helping small businesses get off the ground.

Retail Recruiting- IDA Conference Part 1

I am in Milwaukee, Wisconsin this week at the International Downtown Association Conference. The conference, hosted each year by a different city U.S. or Canadian city provides lectures and conversations on downtown retail development, safety and security, creating great public spaces, parking management and urban design. I’ll be reporting over the next couple days on what I learn.

It’s comforting to know that when it comes to downtown retail, Tacoma is not alone. Milwaukee, a city of nearly 600,000 people has blocks of vacant store fronts and towers of vacant office space just like us. However, Milwaukee is taking bold steps to combat their downtown vacancy rate and rejuvenate their street life. In addition to a city branding campaign and functional wayfinding system, Milwaukee has hired retail consultants, CivicVisions not to just revitalize downtown retail, but to transform downtown through strategic retail recruitment.

We all know that amenities attract people, but it’s attracting the right mix of amenities to downtown that’s tricky. To do this, Milwaukee’s consultant CivicVisions suggests:

· There is not quick fix to retail recruitment. A downtown retail strategy is a long-term plan that is implemented over three to five years or more.

· Define a distinct geographic area of downtown to attract retail to. Do not try to attract new retail everywhere at once.

· Hire a trained retail recruiter who is familiar with our community and committed to it, has plenty of retail and merchandising experience, and is good at both building relationships and selling the community’s vision.

· Identify the type and quality of businesses you want and be discerning about the ones you go after. Businesses attract other like-businesses, but the wrong business can inhibit recruitment of the ones you want.

· Property owners must be part of the solution and help to develop a strategy that incentivizes the right mix of retail services and amenities.

· Façade updates that modernize buildings and improve merchandise displays will likely need to be part of the strategy.

This makes sense to me. Maybe it’s time for Tacoma to try out a retail recruiter again…

City Center Lunch and New Tacoma Awards Draw a Packed House

The Pacific Grill Event Center was packed at noon on Friday with over 150 representatives from businesses across Tacoma. They came to see the Sixth Annual New Tacoma Awards at the Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber’s quarterly City Center Luncheon. The event drew a record crowd not only for the luncheon, but also for the Pacific Grill Event Center since its opening. Attendees also included Congressman Norm Dicks and his staff.

While the Luncheon generally focuses on what’s coming soon for downtown Tacoma, this spring version had the Chamber and Absher Construction presenting the 2009 New Tacoma Awards winners for the following four categories:

Ghillarducci Award - received by Hotel Murano,
recognizes successful new development, renovation or beautification. There were 13 nominees for this award.

Union Station Award – received by Gintz Group,
recognizes leading organizations, companies or individuals that have built or sustained momentum for revitalization. There were 6 nominees for this award.

Popham Award – received by Benjii Bittle,
Deputy Executive Director of the Broadway Center for the Performing Arts. This award was named in honor of the late News Tribune Columnist Art Popham, and recognizes the individual that has done the most to build community spirit. There were 11 nominees for this award.

Schoenfeld Award – received by hello, cupcake,
recognizes exemplary performance and pizzazz as a retailer. There were 8 nominees for this award.

Attendees also heard about the future of the Lemay Car Museum and its downtown Tacoma economic impact, the future of Tacoma’s Farmer’s Markets, and the City of Tacoma’s bike Month activities in May.

Visit http://www.tacomachamber.org/ for more information or call Chelsea Levy, 253.627.2175, chelseal@tacomachamber.org.

Don’t Miss Your Chance to Recognize Outstanding Contributors to Downtown

Every year the Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber’s New Tacoma Awards recognize businesses and individuals that make outstanding contributions to downtown Tacoma. This year the Chamber and Absher Construction will recognize 2009 New Tacoma Awards winners at the City Center Luncheon on April 17th, 2009. Nominate a community leader today!

The four award categories are:

Ghillarducci Award - recognizing successful new development, renovation or beautification. Past winners of this award include 505 Broadway- The Sirius Group and the Tacoma Art Museum

Union Station Award - recognizing leading organizations, companies or individuals that have built or sustained momentum for revitalization. Eric Cedarstrand for sustaining momentum for revitalizations and India Mahal Restaurant for their pioneering spirit and commitment to downtown are last year’s winners of this award.

Popham Award, in honor of the late News Tribune Columnist Art Popham. This award recognizes the individual that has done the most to build community spirit. Past winners include Layne Alfanso of Geo Engineers and Marty Campbell of Buzzard Records and Stadium Video.

Schoenfeld Award - recognizing exemplary performance and pizzazz as a retailer. Past winners include Grassi’s Flowers and Gifts and Urban Exchange.

Award nominations are due no later than 4:30 on March 23rd. Fill out the nomination form online on the Chamber’s website or print the form and return to Chelsea Levy, Metropolitan Development Manager, Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber , PO Box 1933, Tacoma WA 98401, Fax:(253) 597-7305, Email: chelseal@tacomachamber.org

Parking Requirements (or not) in the IFSA

The Planning Commission heard recommendations last week from the City Council’s Environment and Public Works Committee and the City Manager to eliminate parking minimums and maximums in the International Financial Services Area (IFSA) downtown. The draft amendment was approved to move forward by the Planning Commission, and they will hold a public comment session on February 4th. The City Council is expected to hear public comment on the proposal in April.

The IFSA, as you might guess, is the area between 8th and 15th, Commerce Street and I-705. So what does this recommendation mean? Basically, there are current minimum and maximum parking requirements for new development, and lifting those regulations would allow for a market-based approach to determining the number of off-street parking stalls that accompany new development in the IFSA.

And why might this change matter? The proposal cites two overarching reasons. The first is that eliminating parking minimums and maximums in this area would be an added draw for potential developers. Land availability, strict development restrictions, and limited parking options are common challenges for those looking to develop in urban areas, and this could provide an additional incentive to move to Tacoma.

The second reason is largely environmental. The proposal follows the City’s Green Ribbon Climate Action Task Force recommendation to focus planning and zoning decisions on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Eliminating parking minimums will discourage single-occupancy vehicles and encourage transit and non-motorized transportation, which is good for business as well as the environment.

The Planning Commission Public Hearing will be February 4th at 5:00 pm at the City Council Chambers in the Tacoma Municipal Building (747 Market Street, 1st floor). Click here for more information.

Can You Hear the Whistle Blowing?

In what may turn out to be one of the biggest announcements this year, the Tacoma Rail's Mountain Division revealed this week that it has signed a 10-month pilot agreement with the Spirit of Washington Dinner Train.

The train's original route--from Renton along the shores of Lake Washington and over the historic Wilburton Trestle--was slated to end due to the expansion of I-405. Now, the popular excursion train will begin its trial route in Tacoma August 3rd and will run through May 31st, 2008. The train's new route starts just south of the Freighthouse Square in downtown Tacoma where passengers will board and begin their three-and-half-hour roundtrip to Lake Kapowsin in Eatonville.

Long-term support from local business and community leaders--including substantial earmarks from Congress in recent budget cycles--have helped make the "Train to the Mountain" a reality.

Tacoma's New Postmaster Will Address Luncheon

Suzanne Chaille, who was appointed Postmaster for Tacoma last month, will address the Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber's City Center Luncheon this Friday. Chaille previously served as Postmaster for Auburn since October 2005, and was Officer-In-Charge for Tacoma since August 2006. She succeeds John Lee, who transferred to Beaverton (OR) as Postmaster.

Chaille is expected to update attendees of the U.S. Postal Service's intention to lease a new retail facility downtown and put the federal agency's historic downtown building up for sale.

Chaille began her postal career as a Clerk/Carrier in Alliance, OH in 1973. She subsequently served the U.S. Postal Service in Florida, Arizona, and California. In 1993 she was appointed Postmaster for San Jose (CA) and in 1998 District Manager, Marketing in Atlanta, GA.

Chaille has a BA in Business Administration and a Master’s Degree in Operational Research, both from California State University. She attended a three-year Advanced Business Administration Program at Arizona State University and completed the Executive Leadership program at Duke University. She is currently an Adjunct Professor at DeVry University in Federal Way teaching classes in Financial and Managerial Accounting and Business Finance.

Now Open: Commencement Bank

C.R. Roberts' interview with Commencement Bank President and CEO Hal Russell--commemorating the financial institution's opening in downtown Tacoma--brings out some points that show just how far downtown has come in the past decade.

Commencement Bank is a high tech enterprise, Russell says, noting that "much of the banking that people used to do has become electronic, computerized. It’s online." For those of us who remember the initial efforts 8-9 years ago to position downtown Tacoma as a high tech center, it's nice to see this commitment to technology. Of course, the bank strives to be equally high touch.

Even better is Russell's statement about why he located in downtown. "I want this to be the best place for my folks to work," Russell told Roberts. "I want this to be a wonderful place for customers." In pursuing these goals, Russell considered fourteen locations--all downtown. Since one of the BIA's primary purposes since its inception in 1988 was to make downtown a great place to work and shop, this is great to hear.

Commencement Bank is open today at 1145 Broadway. Stop in or give them a call at (253) 284-1800.

A Provident Change?

According to the Puget Sound Business Journal, LinMar Management Inc. recently purchased the Security Building in downtown Tacoma for $6.1 million. LinMar has changed the name of the building, located across the street from the North Park Plaza parking garage, to the Provident Building, the building's original name when it opened as the home of Provident Life & Trust Co. in 1903.