Controversial South Tacoma warehouse project to get public airing at Thursday meeting
Plans for a multi-building warehouse project in South Tacoma will get a public airing Thursday (April 14).
The meeting, to be conducted online over Zoom, is set for 6 p.m. Details to join are posted on the city’s website where it has its own page titled “Bridge Industrial BNSF.” A recording of the meeting will be posted at a later date.
The meeting is the result of growing public criticism over the plans, currently in the city’s permit-review process, but the meeting does not constitute a hearing.
“In short, the meeting is another way to provide information that’s available online, only much summarized, and to receive comments orally,” said Shirley Schultz, principal planner with the city’s Land Use and Zoning.
The meeting is set to have a presentation from both the city and the applicant. Participants wishing to speak will be allowed three minutes per comment, with meeting breaks every 30 minutes until the conclusion.
Bridge Industrial is a Chicago-based industrial park developer with a growing presence in Western Washington. It has been acquiring properties in Pierce and King counties in recent years for warehouse/distribution developments with no signs of slowing down.
This week it announced a 40-acre joint venture development in Everett at a cost of more than $100 million. The company has leased over 1.5 million square feet of space and has acquired land to develop and/or completed development on over 7 million square feet of Class A industrial sites throughout the Northwest, according to its Everett announcement.
In Tacoma, it purchased an assemblage of parcels, around 150 acres, in the South Burlington Way area from BNSF Railway in September for $158.3 million for its future Bridge Point Tacoma 2MM. It was one of the top land sales in the county in 2021.
The initial announcement of its plans described it as a 2.5 million-square-foot, state-of-the-art industrial site, consisting of four buildings along with 20 acres of trailer storage space.
Pushback has grown from South Tacoma neighbors and other residents following the initial public notice issued Feb. 8, with written and oral comments against the project submitted at City Council sessions each week.
Approximately 75 percent of the site area would be impervious surfacing from buildings, parking and circulation. The city notes on its project website, “There is a stream and biodiversity corridor on the site; this will be protected and restored as part of the project.”
Critics have focused on the estimated truck traffic, potential problems with impervious surfacing as it relates to a city aquifer, and environmental concerns of development happening on a Superfund site, among other issues.
The city, on its site, notes, “As a land use permit the decision is made administratively by the director of Planning and Development Services. .... The decision is not made by the City Council or the Planning Commission.”
“I’m aware that the city doesn’t vote on the warehouse complex, but I believe that the project conflicts with many of the city’s policies and declarations,” resident Barb Church said during Tuesday’s council session’s community forum. “The warehouse proposal would add thousands of truck and vehicle trips daily. Councilman (Conor) McCarthy has always said that vehicle traffic is the largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. If we followed the city’s climate action policy, this project would not be allowed.”
In a statement sent from Bridge to The News Tribune on March 1, the company said: “Bridge is fully committed to delivering a project that complies with all environmental regulations, and we will continue our work with both the City of Tacoma and relevant public agencies to ensure our final plans meet these rigorous standards.”
Council member Conor McCarthy addressed the project directly during Tuesday’s regular council meeting and sought more information on mitigation factors, noting, “We’ve received a ton of emails and then a ton of comments tonight about the industrial warehouse project.
“... Two really, really big issues that should be reached, which I’d like to understand more about, specifically, (are) how the impacts in the Groundwater Protection District are mitigated or are going to be attempted to be mitigated, and the traffic and the emissions associated with that.
“I think those are really significant issues to understand in greater detail as we go through the process.”
Schultz anticipated a broad audience for Thursday’s Zoom meeting.
She told The News Tribune, “Other reviewing staff from the city and from outside agencies are encouraged to listen, and I expect that many of them will either attend the meeting or review the recording later.”
Ahead of Tuesday’s council meeting, nonprofit environmental group Communities for a Healthy Bay issued a release calling for residents to submit comments to the city requesting an environmental impact statement for the project.
“After careful review with our Policy and Technical Advisory Committee, which includes geologists, chemists and contaminated site experts, we’ve determined that Bridge Industrial’s proposal is missing a much-needed analysis of the environmental and human health impacts that are required by state law,” wrote Erin Dilworth, policy and technical program manager with CHB.
Schultz told The News Tribune via email on Wednesday that an estimated 450 comments had been received at that point, with about two-thirds of those submitted as form letters.
She had no estimate on when a determination would be made, once public comment period has closed.
“It will probably take a week to get everything transmitted to the applicant, reviewing staff, and reviewing agencies for review and response. Staff and agencies typically have responses within a couple of weeks, but the applicant controls their own response timeline,” she wrote.
“It’s during this time that the City will be working on additional mitigation requirements as well as project revisions. For instance, the project as submitted doesn’t meet the requirements for our Critical Areas Code at this time, so that all needs to be revised.”
Schultz noted that among a long list of factors in getting to a determination triggering an EIS, two were critical. One was whether there are additional environmental impacts that have not been mitigated, along with whether there are possible mitigation measures that could be required using SEPA substantive authority to mitigate those impacts. The second factor is whether there are “likely significant adverse environmental impacts that have not been mitigated to a nonsignificant level.”
As noted on the city’s project website, “The City has made a preliminary determination that a SEPA Mitigated Determination of Nonsignificance is probable, and that a full Environmental Impact Statement will not be required – subject to review and commenting by the public and agencies with expertise.”
She explained the process if a determination of significance was made.
“If there is a (determination of significance), we would issue a determination and notify everyone who has commented as well as the parties that already received notice and ‘probably’ issue a preliminary scoping document at the same time. There would be a public scoping meeting to determine if anything else needed to be added to the EIS review. Then the applicant would prepare a Draft EIS, it would be issued for public comment, and then there would be a Final EIS issued.”
The comment period has been extended through close of business April 21. Comments about the project can be mailed to Shirley Schultz, Principal Planner, 747 Market St, Room 345, Tacoma, WA, 98402 or sent via email to shirley.schultz@cityoftacoma.org or call 253-345-0879.
This story was originally published April 14, 2022 at 5:00 AM.
