Tacoma considers plan to save neglected historic buildings from demolition

May 31, 2013 11:57 am
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Downtown Tacoma's Luzon Building, designed by famed Chicago architects John Wellborn Root and Daniel Hudson Burnham, and constructed in the 1890s, was demolished in 2009 after the City of Tacoma deemed the historically significant building a safety hazard for fear it would collapse after decades of neglect. (FILE PHOTO BY TODD MATTHEWS)
Downtown Tacoma's Luzon Building, designed by famed Chicago architects John Wellborn Root and Daniel Hudson Burnham, and constructed in the 1890s, was demolished in 2009 after the City of Tacoma deemed the historically significant building a safety hazard for fear it would collapse after decades of neglect. (FILE PHOTO BY TODD MATTHEWS)

Tacoma City Council’s Neighborhoods and Housing Committee will meet next week at City Hall to discuss an initiative underway that aims to improve the City of Tacoma’s enforcement codes in order to prevent “demolition by neglect” of historic properties throughout the city.

According to a report prepared by city staff, Tacoma has many distressed properties, some of which are listed on the local and national registers of historic places, either individually or as contributing structures within listed historic districts. Long-term neglect of a historic building becomes very costly to abate, and can lead to the loss of the building. Ideally, intervention early in the cycle of decline is less costly, according to city staff, but existing enforcement codes, including Public Nuisances (Tacoma Municipal Code 8.30) and Minimum Buildings and Structures Code (TMC 2.01), provide few options for proactively abating substandard building conditions before they threaten the safety and longevity of a building.

To address this issue, the City of Tacoma plans to explore the development of an ordinance to prevent “demolition by neglect,” which is defined as the process whereby a property owner neglects a historic building until the only course of action feasible to abate the resulting hazards to public health and safety is to demolish the building. The city will also explore the possibility of creating an “emergency preservation fund” that could be used to help prevent the deterioration of Tacoma’s iconic historic structures.

Key elements of this proposal, according to the staff report, include applying the proposed ordinance to properties listed on the Tacoma Register of Historic Places, National Register of Historic Places, and to contributing properties within locally and federally designated historic districts; addressing existing and commonly used maintenance standards, as well as maintenance standards to protect “character defining features” of historic buildings; providing specific penalties designed to prevent the practice of accumulating violation fines as a “cost of doing business”; providing incentives to encourage owners of neglected properties to find new ownership; and providing means for the City of Tacoma to proactively abate conditions which threaten the existence of a building before it becomes “dangerous.”

Tacoma Historic Preservation Officer Reuben McKnight and Tacoma Interim Planning and Development Services Department Director Peter Huffman will provide an overview of the plan, its scope, and the potential strategies for addressing the issue to Tacoma City Council’s Neighborhoods and Housing Committee during a meeting on Mon., June 3 at 4:30 p.m. in the Tacoma Municipal Building, 747 Market Street, Conference Room 248. A copy of the agenda is available online here.

Downtown Tacoma's Luzon Building, designed by famed Chicago architects John Wellborn Root and Daniel Hudson Burnham, and constructed in the 1890s, was demolished in 2009 after the City of Tacoma deemed the historically significant building a safety hazard for fear it would collapse after decades of neglect. (FILE PHOTO BY TODD MATTHEWS)

EDITOR’S NOTE: Three buildings come to mind when thinking about an ordinance that could help save historic structures from demolition by neglect: the Luzon Building, which was designed by famed Chicago architects John Wellborn Root and Daniel Hudson Burnham, and constructed in the 1890s, and was demolished in 2009 after the City of Tacoma deemed the historically significant building a safety hazard for fear it would collapse after decades of neglect; Old City Hall, which has faced foreclosure, was damaged by a fire set by a transient, was deemed ‘derelict’ by city inspectors, and was listed as ‘endangered’ by a local historic preservation group; and the Winthrop Hotel, which is in need of nearly $16 million in deferred maintenance, according to a report prepared four years ago.

To read the Tacoma Daily Index‘s complete and comprehensive coverage of the Luzon Building, click on the following links:

To read the Tacoma Daily Index‘s complete and comprehensive coverage of Old City Hall, click on the following links:

To read the Tacoma Daily Index‘s complete and comprehensive coverage of the Winthrop Hotel, click on the following links:

In 2009, the Tacoma Daily Index published a series of interviews with many residents of the Winthrop Hotel. To read the complete series, click on the following links:

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