What began as a seemingly routine proposal for a traffic revision ended with the Tacoma City Council approving a temporary ban on large-scale “retail establishments” Tuesday night, amid community fears that a developer is stealthily planning a big-box store for the sprawling Elks Club property in Central Tacoma.
The six-month moratorium – belatedly walked onto the council’s agenda at the meeting’s opening – halts the city’s acceptance of any new applications or permits issued for “combined format retail establishments that exceed 65,000 square feet in the aggregate.” The council picked the size so such stores – typically about 90,000 square feet – would be halted, but smaller businesses wouldn’t be, Councilman Ryan Mello said.
Council members who supported the ban said its intention is to give city staff and planning officials more time to study zoning issues and potential impacts such major developments can have on neighborhoods.
“I think this particular action gives us the opportunity to step back and take a deep breath,” said Mayor Marilyn Strickland, before the council approved the measure.
The developer, Jeffrey Oliphant, who runs JLO Washington Enterprises, could not be reached for comment late Tuesday.
The council initially was to consider a proposal that would allow U-turns at the intersection of South 23rd Street and Union Avenue – a measure in part meant to facilitate what had been a development quietly in the works for the nearby 18-acre property now harboring the Elks Lodge. Records show JLO entered into a purchase and sale agreement with the Tacoma Elks Lodge 174 in February 2010.
But the development plan, which had come before a council committee last week, left some council members and citizens scratching their heads in recent weeks. When specifically asked to provide details about the project, Oliphant has publicly cited a confidentiality agreement and declined to do so.
Members of the Central Neighborhood Council began pushing for answers, receiving through a public disclosure request a preliminary site plan for an “Allenmore Mixed-Use” project consisting of a 760,000 square-foot medical campus. It included a 125-bed hospital, medical, dental and research offices, a pharmacy warehouse, general office space and retail space.
But city officials say they learned only Monday that the original plan has since changed.
Oliphant told city staff he “was pretty certain that his medical campus concept was not something that he could put together because that client had stepped out,” said Bob Levin, of the city’s Economic Development Department. “It sounds as if his fallback was to go with retail and smaller medical mixed-use.”
MultiCare, the potential client, had considered the Elks site and the Russell building downtown, while recently looking at adding up to 100,000 square feet of office and lab space in Pierce County. But the Tacoma-based nonprofit, which recently cut staff, is now proceeding cautiously, a spokeswoman said Tuesday.
Central neighborhood residents now worry Oliphant may seek to build a Walmart or another big-box store. Lawyer Doug Shafer, a member of the Central Neighborhood Council, noted Tuesday that Oliphant has built a shopping center with a Walmart in Federal Way.
“That makes us understandably suspicious,” Shafer said.
He was joined by several other residents, activists, union leaders and former Mayor Bill Baarsma to publicly speak in favor of the temporary big-box ban.
After removing the traffic revision proposal from its agenda, the council walked on the moratorium, sponsored by members Mello, Lauren Walker, Jake Fey and Marty Campbell.
“If this is a medical complex, I think we all will be very happy,” Walker said. “The problem is, we just don’t know. This step is needed to bring clarity and to address the rumors.”
Among other things, the ordinance notes large retail establishments “may have unintended and often unconsidered economic, environmental and social impacts,” and the council “believes in promoting competition to protect and benefit the public interest.”
Along with the 6-month ban, it directs city staff to further study related zoning issues and impacts and to report back to the council and planning commission. A public hearing on the moratorium is to be held within 60 days.
Walker, Mello, Fey, Campbell, Strickland, David Boe and Victoria Woodards supported the measure, with Joe Lonergan absent for the vote and Spiro Manthou abstaining.
Manthou said he understood his colleagues’ reasons for wanting more time to study the issue, but added he couldn’t support using a “moratorium for stopping a specific project.”
Also Tuesday, the council put off a vote on revising a development agreement with the owners of downtown’s Pacific Plaza to allow a private medical clinic for Davita employees to lease ground floor space meant for retail. At the council’s direction, the city will seek to negotiate financial considerations from the development’s owners and study potential impacts the prospective clinic would have on public space adjacent to Pacific Plaza.
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