Coalition talks reach deal on Goodwill site

Not long after a developer announced plans to transform the Goodwill property on South Dearborn Street into a huge shopping center, a community coalition formed with a goal in mind:

Make sure the development, to be anchored by Target and other chain stores, wouldn't overshadow the cultural identity of Seattle's Little Saigon business district or displace the business owners who make it tick.

Today, after three years of negotiations, the coalition is announcing a legally binding agreement that requires the developer to invest money in Little Saigon and the nearby Jackson Place neighborhood, and to include 200 affordable-housing units within the project.

In return, the coalition won't fight the developer in court or before the City Council.

"The community now has a commitment that certain things will take place, not just promises," said David West, executive director of Puget Sound SAGE, a leader of the coalition.

Community opposition can sway politicians and sink projects. The developer needs the City Council to approve a rezone and street vacation for the project, which could open as early as 2012.

"The community's objectives have been the same as ours," said developer Darrell Vange, of TRF Pacific LLC. "It's important to us that the Little Saigon commercial district remain intact and be strengthened through this process."

The "community-benefit agreement" is supposed to signify broad-based community support for the project. But over the summer, the coalition began to fracture, and a group may form to oppose the development.

Some suggest the coalition was stacked with labor interests, at the sacrifice of the community's. The deal requires the developer to pay union wages and offer health benefits to construction laborers. It also requires that the project's grocery tenant be a union shop or allow for union organizing.

Nearly 30 organizations within the coalition endorse the agreement. But a couple of key members — the Squire Park Community Council and InterIm — don't back the deal, contending it doesn't benefit the community or protect Little Saigon enough.

"The bar kept lowering and we felt like it was past the threshold, where it no longer made sense," said Tom Im, neighborhood planner for InterIm, an influential community-development association in the Chinatown International District.

Bill Bradburd, who once represented the Jackson Place Community Council on the coalition, has filed an administrative appeal with the city, challenging the project even though his neighborhood supports the agreement.

He believes the coalition got hijacked by organized labor through Puget Sound SAGE, and that after the unions got what they wanted, the coalition became too willing to compromise to get the deal signed and the project built.

"I feel like Little Saigon and the neighborhoods have been thrown under the bus by labor," Bradburd said.

West, whose group is supported by labor, said the unions didn't get everything they wanted. And they fought hard on behalf of the communities to the end.

$300 million project

Goodwill is exchanging its 10.3-acre parcel for a new store, headquarters and training center within the development. Vange's $300 million project would have 600,000 square feet of retail, topped with 500 units of housing, 200 of which would be for people with below-median incomes.

Target would be the retail anchor, with potential for a Lowe's, a full-service grocery and a drugstore.

"We've been serving the Seattle community since 1923, so community support of the project really is important to us," said Michael Jurich, Goodwill vice president and CFO.

The coalition formed when Quang Nguyen, of the Vietnamese American Economic Development Association, saw potential impacts to Little Saigon from the Goodwill redevelopment and reached out to other community groups for support.

"The mall can be both a threat and an opportunity," he said. "We have chosen to look at it as an opportunity rather than trying to stop development, which really is a runaway train. We looked at the reality of the situation and determined what's best in terms of mitigation to help Little Saigon businesses thrive."

The developer is contributing $200,000 toward a Vietnamese cultural center, an asset Nguyen believes would draw customers to the district.

An additional $600,000 from the developer, paid over 10 years, would fund a training program for Vietnamese entrepreneurs. Although not specified in the agreement, the program could be run through the Washington Vietnamese American Chamber of Commerce — another of Nguyen's organizations.

The developer also would offer cheap office rent within the project to four or five Vietnamese community nonprofits — the equivalent of a $1 million, 10-year subsidy.

"From the very beginning, we set out to get the best deal we could for Little Saigon," Nguyen said. "We made it clear to everyone during the negotiations that if we didn't get that, we'd pull out of the coalition."

The Vietnamese American Chamber, founded in January and with 20 members, endorses the agreement. But critics wonder whether the fledgling organization represents a true consensus in Little Saigon.

Other neighbors react

The agreement also requires small storefronts and signs along Rainier Avenue South, which faces the Jackson Place neighborhood.

Maura Deering, of the Jackson Place Community Council, said the developer's commitment of $200,000 for a neighborhood traffic-mitigation study also is welcome.

"This project wasn't going to go away," she said. "People continue to fight it, thinking they can kill it, but I'd be shocked, quite frankly."

Jackson Place resident Valentina Barei added: "I don't have any friends in the neighborhood who aren't looking forward to having a Target."

The coalition touts the community-benefit agreement as unprecedented — and precedent setting — in the Pacific Northwest, a new way for communities to extract commitments from developers without having to rely on politicians or courts to side in their favor.

But longtime community activist John Fox of the Seattle Displacement Coalition said the concept is not novel. His organization and neighborhood associations win commitments from developers all the time through tactics including direct negotiation, administrative appeal, legal challenge, political lobbying and street-level protest.

"We've made a living off of hammering out community-benefit agreements, we just don't give it that name," Fox said. "The difference is that their agreements are motivated first by labor interests — better wages, union jobs — with other issues secondary."

Nguyen of the Vietnamese American Chamber, however, believes the collegial approach taken during negotiations benefitted the community.

"Conflict has its place," he said. "But in this case, we wanted to have a constructive dialogue with the developer rather than bogging down to a shouting match."

The outcome of those negotiations, however, isn't enough to satisfy Stewart Perry, who represents Squire Park, a neighborhood abutting Little Saigon. The project, as designed, still is more appropriate to the suburbs and out of scale with the surrounding neighborhoods and Little Saigon, he said.

"Some coalition participants are realizing their aims — and they are perfectly valid aims — but they are partial and do not speak to the broader issue."

Stuart Eskenazi: 206-464-2293 or seskenazi@seattletimes.com