It was supposed to be Tacoma’s 2nd psychiatric hospital. Here’s its status
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Tacoma psychiatric hospital site remains undeveloped after permits expired
- Signature seeks project reconfiguration amid cost increases and funding issues
- Owner settled lien but owes property taxes as of July 2025
Five and half acres at the corner of South 19th and South Proctor streets in Tacoma remain undeveloped despite longtime plans for a new psychiatric hospital.
In September, The News Tribune reported on the lack of progress at the site.
Nearly one year later, it appears original plans might be changing.
Representatives of Signature Healthcare Services, based in Corona, California, originally filed a pre-application with the city for site development in 2017. An LLC affiliated with Signature is the property’s owner.
The hospital gained a Certificate of Need from Washington state Department of Health in 2019. A media representative for DOH told The News Tribune in response to questions July 3, “The project is still in compliance and the certificate continues to be valid.
“DOH’s most recent progress reports indicate Signature is looking at reconfiguring the project, which will likely lead to them requiring an amendment,” John Doyle, a public information officer with state DOH, wrote via email.
“According to their latest progress report, the project is undergoing a reconfiguration of programming and financing due to anticipated cost escalations,” Doyle added.
No further details were provided. Estimated project costs were at $42 million by 2019.
Permit situation
Permits on file with the city for construction of the proposed 105-bed hospital have expired or been canceled, according to the city’s online permit portal.
City media representative Maria Lee, in response to questions, told The News Tribune via email on July 2 that “new permits would have to be applied for to restart the process.”
She added, “Currently, Code Enforcement is actively tracking the property.”
It’s also been awhile since the property owner has been in touch with the city on next steps.
“Our Permit Compliance team has sent out communications to the property owner, but there has not been acknowledgment or response to those communications,” Lee wrote. “It has been nearly nine months since Planning & Development Services Department staff members have had contact with the developer.”
The lack of communication and lapsed permitting efforts remain a turnabout from Signature’s earlier battle with the city and state for the right to build.
Signature’s initial Certificate of Need request for the Tacoma site was denied in early 2016 in favor of a separate request entered for Wellfound Behavioral Health, just a few blocks east on South 19th Street.
A settlement agreement was later reached, clearing the way for the second hospital’s approval from state DOH. The land-owning LLC affiliated with Signature also won its case against the city challenging the site’s rezoning process.
Liens, payoff, other debt
Locally the site’s LLC owner, affiliated with Signature, has been the defendant in a debt-collection lawsuit involving a construction contractor and subcontractor who performed work at the site before work was paused in 2022.
A recent filing in the case avoided a selloff.
The suit received a default judgment in October 2023 in Pierce County Superior Court, and the contractors won approval to collect on more than $2.86 million owed via property foreclosure at the site.
An order of sale was issued March 2024 in the case. A sheriff’s sale scheduled for June 28, 2024 was canceled “at the request of judgment creditor’s attorney,” according to a June 26, 2024 court filing.
On May 28, 2025, a “full satisfaction of judgment” filing was entered, which eliminated the contractors’ liens.
Despite clearing the books on that front, the owner appears to be behind on this year’s property taxes, according to the property’s assessment listing online, owing more than $53,000 as of July 1.
While interest on that amount accumulates, the owner has awhile to catch up, as county foreclosure occurs when a property is three or more years behind in payments.
Along with its challenges getting the Tacoma site started, Signature has faced issues elsewhere.
Cyberattack
In January 2024, Signature experienced a cybersecurity incident exposing patient data to unauthorized individuals over the span of two days. Notification letters to affected people were being sent out by October, according to The HIPAA Journal.
The company stated that “additional safeguards have been implemented to prevent similar attacks in the future.”
It is unclear how many people were affected. The private company offers mental health and substance-abuse treatment in its 19 acute-care hospitals in Arizona, California, Massachusetts, Nevada and Texas, according to its website.
Problems persist in California
In March of this year, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that one of Signature’s for-profit facilities in California, Santa Rosa Behavioral, exposed patients to violence and neglect as a result of issues including understaffing, compounded by the state not adequately addressing known problems for nearly a decade.
A Signature representative told the Chronicle, “Each hospital takes all incidents and negative outcomes seriously, investigating and adjusting protocols or retraining staff to prevent recurrence.”
The report noted that the hospital, which opened in 2013, is being sued for negligence and fraud by a family whose son was sexually assaulted at the site by his roommate.
Signature has denied the allegations.
The company previously faced a decade-long case in California over an ex-employee’s sexual misconduct at its Vista Del Mar facility in Ventura, California, as well as seeking restoration of involuntary admissions privileges at the site last year.
Previous reporting from The News Tribune contributed to this report.
