No city plans for INS building

Seattle city officials have suspended efforts to turn the old U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Services building into a cultural and business center after an offer to buy it was rejected by the federal General Services Administration.

As a result, the five-story brick building — built in the early 1930s and listed on the National Register of Historic Places — remains in limbo while the GSA decides whether to put the building up for sale or once again to offer it to qualified entities under a public-conveyance option for historic monuments.

"If we were able to move forward with this, we would," says Julie Moore of the city housing office. "Everybody was happy with the proposal."

For some time, Moore says, the city has been working with Urban Visions, a downtown development firm, and the Seattle Chinatown International District Preservation and Development Authority on a plan to transform the building's first floor into an interpretive historical center and the upper floors into offices.

In its proposal to the GSA, the city offered to buy the approximately 75,000-square-foot building for $1 million — which it says was the GSA's original appraisal — and resell it for the same price to Urban Visions for such a plan.

Additionally, Moore says, the proposal called for Urban Visions to give the Chinatown development authority $1 million to build affordable housing elsewhere. Rehabilitation costs essentially prohibit that option at the INS building site.

"It's a very old, brittle building," says City Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, who chairs the council's housing, human-services and health committee. The building's basement is being used as a homeless shelter.

Price rose

The city had another option: It could have claimed the building free of charge under a public-conveyance option as a historic monument. But taking the building under that option mandated long-term commitment and assumption of associated rehabilitation costs, which the city estimates at about $20 million for asbestos abatement and seismic upgrades.

"There are significant costs involved," says Lori Patrick, of the city's arts and cultural office. "Is this really a great deal? That's the question. With $20 million in upgrades just to get in the door, is that really the best investment?"

Instead, the city chose to negotiate a purchase option, submitting the proposal from Urban Visions and the Chinatown development authority. But by the time the city submitted its proposal, Moore says, the GSA had reappraised the building at $2 million.

"It's a disappointment, definitely," she says. "We did what was asked of us. Then they changed the price."

At least one person fears the city has blown a chance to set aside a historic landmark. "It could really be great with the proper purpose," says Scott Lawrimore, who runs Lawrimore Project, an art gallery adjacent to the old building. "And I'd hate to see a bunch of offices open up in there."

But Patrick says parking is limited at the site and notes the city has included $2.7 million in the current budget to convert a city-owned building at Magnuson Park into a multipurpose arts facility.

"Seattle has a track record of turning surplus buildings into public assets," she says. "It's critical that we look for viable opportunities."

Square one?

Bill Lesh, of the GSA's Region 10 office in Portland, says the city never previously submitted a formal offer. The GSA, he says, is required to present a current appraisal at the time of sale.

"We were just talking, back and forth," he says. "We needed to go to formal negotiations. And the city decided it didn't want to. It's a very formal process ... We never got that far."

In an Oct. 22 letter to GSA administrator Lurita Alexis Doan, Mayor Greg Nickels wrote: "Upon further discussions with my staff, it is clear that this new process will simply be repetitive of the previous discussions and ... will almost certainly result in a similar outcome. Therefore, this letter serves as my formal termination of the City of Seattle's interest in the acquisition of the INS Building."

Lesh said the GSA will decide within the next week whether to go to public sale or to once again offer the building under public-conveyance conditions. "There's a possibility we may go back to square one," he says.

Marc Ramirez: 206-464-8102 or mramirez@seattletimes.com