We just checked, and this meeting is still on: For those who’ve been following the saga of townhouse design – which traces back more than two years – the City Council Committee on the Built Environment has a public hearing tonight on the proposed changes to the Multi-Family Code. The hearing is at the Wing Luke Museum downtown at 5:30 pm (following a hearing on an unrelated item) – scroll down this page for details. The proposal originally went to the council in January 2009 (WSB coverage here), but it’s been in the works even longer – almost 2 1/2 years. Someone who’s been involved all along the way is West Seattle architect/developer/Design Review Board member Brandon Nicholson – he was at then-Mayor Nickels’ original announcement in summer 2008 (WSB coverage here). He sent around information about tonight’s hearing, on behalf of CORA (Congress of Residential Architects) NW, with this concern:

The word on the street is that business groups will be coming out in force to oppose a specific portion of the bill that creates a new streamlined design review (SDR) process & mandates that all new townhouse projects must participate. They are asking for a set of prescriptive design standards to be used in lieu of SDR.

SDR is a process that provides citizens early notice and an opportunity for meaningful input into development in their neighborhoods. It has been carefully designed to streamline the inefficiencies inherent in the current design review process. Every attempt has been made to balance the needs of developers for speed and predictability against the needs to provide citizens with notice and a forum for input. SDR is the gate-keeping mechanism that allows designers the flexibility needed to design buildings that are sensitive to context, address the needs of the marketplace, and provide a multiplicity of housing types, while at the same time serves to check that this flexibility is not abused.

The prescriptive design standards provide no mechanism for public input, no way to account for context, and no ability to depart from the code when site-specific conditions warrant. They are a cookie cutter formulation that establishes a set of prescriptions that can be copied from one project to the next. Projects that are well designed, sensitive to context, but don’t comply with the prescriptive standards go to the back of the line, while indifferent proposals get an automatic green light.

If these issues are important to you, I encourage you to come to the meeting, write to the council, & let your thoughts be known.

After tonight’s hearing – likely within the next few weeks – the committee and then the full council will vote on the proposal, which you can read along with lots of other information linked here. If you want to go to tonight’s hearing, which starts at 5:30 pm with a hearing on South Downtown Neighborhoods, it’s at 719 South King Street (map).

(Aerial view of The Hole, September 2009)
“The Hole” – the excavated Fauntleroy Place site at Alaska/Fauntleroy/39th – has been sitting there for two years, through the snowy winter of 2008-2009, the not-too-bad winter of 2009-2010, and the rainy-so-far fall of 2010, with no likelihood of any change in its status soon. That was addressed by King County Superior Court Judge Susan Craighead this past Monday when she issued her decision in the first major trial related to the stalled development (WSB coverage here). By the way, the full 53-page decision is now online; we’ve downloaded a copy and re-uploaded it so you can read it – go here. A judgment ordering foreclosure sale – a document that was not available while we were in court on Monday – is also online now; read it here. Meantime, we’ve looked into the safety issues she raised. As noted in our Monday report, Judge Craighead wrote:

… The ongoing viability of that excavation is in doubt. The shoring system that supports the excavation is by design a temporary system. It was neither designed nor intended to be in place for longterm suspension of the Project, and it has already been in place two years, well beyond its intended life span. The City of Seattle is the governing jurisdiction, and can at any time order that it be decommissioned and the excavation filled in, and if the owner fails to perform such an order, the City holds a $1 million cash deposit in pay for that work to be performed. … In the meantime, the shored excavation is subject to potential failure. Even a minor failure, where one of the shored walls shifted inward by just a matter of inches would result in substantial displacement and settlement of soils supporting adjacent streets, houses and other structures.

So, how specifically is it being “governed” by the city? We took the question to two city agencies. First, the Department of Planning and Development, which issues permits for projects. Spokesperson Bryan Stevens told WSB, “Both DPD and SDOT receive a monthly summary report of the shoring monitoring from the private geotechnical special inspector that was hired by the owner (The Riley Group took over from the shoring designer, Kleinfelder). The survey readings are taken twice a week. SDOT also has their inspectors visit the site periodically. To date, things have looked good.”

As for the question of the $1 million bond, and what it would take to order that an excavation like this be filled, Stevens referred us to SDOT, whose communications director Rick Sheridan provided answers to our questions. Read on for that part of the story:Read More

(Aerial view of The Hole, September 2009)
We’re in King County Superior Court Judge Susan Craighead‘s courtroom downtown, where she has just announced her findings in the first trial over the two-years-stalled West Seattle project known as “The Hole” (or “Hole Foods,” before Whole Foods Market announced in July it was no longer part of the project). Among Judge Craighead’s opening remarks this morning: “This case has been my window on the collapse of the financial system and the real estate market. … It seems that all the ‘suits’ were to varying degrees in complicity in a sort of a game that constituted construction financing during this period.” What she was deciding here is whose lien has priority – and she has decided it’s the general contractor, Ledcor Construction, and their subcontractor, Aero Construction (which dug The Hole).

(Photo published on WSB April 30, 2008, courtesy John Cashill)
Various parties argued that what had been done to the site before a certain key point in summer 2008 – including the April ’08 hole-digging to which the above photo is related – did not amount to “work” and therefore Ledcor and Aero were not first in line with their liens – but the judge disagreed with that. She said that former financier Seattle Capital, when trying to make the claim during a potential sale of the site that no work had been done, “should have known and did know (that contention) was false.”

One big loser in her ruling: 3922 SW Alaska LLC, the company related to Madison Development that agreed to buy the note for what remained of the project and its excavated site, then (to boil it way, way down) sought “judicial foreclosure” more than a year ago in hopes of moving on with the site without the burden of millions of dollars in liens to be fulfilled. We are now reading our copy of the 53-page ruling (while about 10 lawyers in the courtroom do the same thing – they have a short window here to ask the judge for clarification before she moves on to an unrelated criminal trial at 10 am) and are going through it – though we didn’t cover the entirety of the 2-plus weeks of testimony in the trial, they are summarized in the ruling, and it affords quite the view into never-before-publicized specifics of how the whole project fell apart. So, what does this all mean for the future of “The Hole”? Depends first on whether the decision is appealed, and what happens with other pending legal action. More to come.

ADDED 11:05 AM: We will transcribe some of this later – since the document itself is not likely to be available online immediately – but one note summarizing the last few pages of the ruling: The judge says that the site should be sold at foreclosure as soon as possible, because The Hole itself was never meant to be permanent, and could either fail or be ordered by the city to be filled in, in which case millions of dollars in work, representing part of the value of the property at sale, would be lost.

ADDED 3:24 PM: The exact language from the judge’s ruling regarding that section is the first transcription we’re adding – read on:Read More

Tomorrow morning, a judge’s announcement is scheduled to be the next step toward the future of The Hole – the excavation (behind the green-screened fence in our photo) for the stalled West Seattle project originally known as Fauntleroy Place, once slated for a new Whole Foods (they’ve since pulled out) and Hancock Fabrics (they haven’t answered requests for comment), plus apartments. The decision is in the first major trial in the tangle of lawsuits over what went awry; what’s scheduled to be decided is who has “lien priority” – the entity that holds the site’s note, 3922 SW Alaska LLC, is arguing against the claims of Ledcor Construction, among other components of the complicated case. If you’re interested in the fine print, here are documents summing up the points made in closing statements (which we covered a week and a half ago) – one from 3922 SW Alaska here, one from Ledcor here.

But The Hole’s future isn’t entirely a matter for a judge and development company to decide.

Read More

Following up on our earlier report: The three lawyers arguing for key interests in the legal fight over lien priorities in West Seattle’s stalled Fauntleroy Place project, aka “The Hole,” have just wrapped up their closing statements before King County Superior Court Judge Susan Craighead. She then said she will deliver her findings in the case at 9 am Monday, November 15th; rather than just sending out paperwork, she will read them aloud, in order to answer any questions. We’ll add toplines here from the closing statements – during which, at one point, the judge observed to a lawyer that it seemed much of the project and its financing had been “a charade” (she also acknowledged, when setting the date for announcing her decision, that she knows this is “important to the community” as well as to the individual parties involved). ADDED 11 PM: Click ahead for toplines from the closing arguments:Read More

As the end nears for the trial involving lawsuits over who gets paid what/when in relation to “The Hole” (June 2009 photo at right) – the project once known as Fauntleroy Place, once slated for Whole Foods, Hancock Fabrics and apartments, now a massive excavation idle for 2 years – we’re covering what happens in King County Superior Court Judge Susan Craighead‘s courtroom. WSB contributor Katie Meyer sat in on the trial again Tuesday, and reported that closing statements are expected today after one last round of witness testimony. Right now, we’re in court, where the witness on the stand was with Chicago Title when it evaluated title insurance for a sale of the project in summer 2008. Yesterday, Seattle Capital’s Robert Story, Jr., was among the witnesses, and said on the stand, “The day before the transaction fell apart [to sell to another lender], everyone felt it would close. It was a quite shocking and horrible day when we found out the deal wouldn’t close.” He was questioned about signing the “Owner’s Affidavit” document that was required (by Chicago Title) to receive title insurance, saying he signed it in the capacity of Seattle Capital Company, “acting on behalf of the lender,” on June 18, 2008. He testified that to his knowledge, there had been no real “work” done at the site prior to June 18th (in the key trial issue of whose lien/s take precedence for payment, that is a major question – what work was done, by whom, and when). Read on for other highlights from yesterday – including testimony from the developer who hopes to take over the site:Read More

This is the third week of the trial for the consolidated lawsuits filed over Fauntleroy Place, aka “The Hole,” also nicknamed “Hole Foods” before Whole Foods pulled out of the two-years-stalled West Seattle project (in which its role was only that as a tenant for the supposed-to-be-finished-by-now building). With the end of the trial drawing near, WSB contributor Katie Meyer is monitoring the courtroom action. She says the schedule that King County Superior Court Judge Susan Craighead and staff projected last week appears to be stretching out a bit – the judge said late today that the way things are going, closing statements are NOT likely tomorrow after all, Katie reports. Today’s witnesses included people from Seattle Capital, who had financed the project – John Huddleston and Robert Story, Jr. – as well as brief questioning of Nicholas Chase from Affordable Abatement, which worked on asbestos removal and interior demolition, regarding tens of thousands they say they had to write off that was owed to them for their work on the project. One of the main things the trial is supposed to determine is who owes who what and in what order; until that’s all settled, the site can’t move on to its next phase, which is prospective ownership by “3922 SW Alaska LLC,” related to Madison Development. Katie’s writing up more notes from court right now, to be added here later.

(View of The Hole, photographed last month from atop the unrelated Link project)
One week after we reported the start of the trial in the tangle of lawsuits over “The Hole,” aka Fauntleroy Place, aka the 39th/Alaska site once envisioned for Whole Foods Market, Hancock Fabrics, and apartments, till everything fell apart in fall 2008, AFTER the site was excavated for what was to be a big underground parking garage. Yesterday, we went back to court to see how the trial’s going. For WSB, Katie Meyer sat in on yesterday’s session in King County Superior Court, and reports that Judge Susan Craighead estimates there’s enough testimony and cross-examination remaining to continue till at least Tuesday, with closing statements expected that day, and “oral findings” next Thursday.

Witnesses yesterday included BlueStar Management executive Steve Hartley, geotechnical engineer David Cotton, and Bryce Bryan Campbell, who was executive vice president of financier Seattle Capital when it was dealing with various parts of the 2-years-stalled project. Most of what they’re all arguing about (we published the full list of parties involved, from atop the legal documents, here) is who has the right to what compensation and in which priority/order. Ultimately, however this gets settled will affect what happens at the site next – a new entity related to Madison Development has been trying to take over the site, seeking “judicial foreclosure,” but until all the liens are settled, that apparently cannot happen.

Part of what’s being sorted out is how the whole thing fell apart, how BlueStar moved from being the developer to not being the developer (and some of that firm’s circumstances at the time were part of the questioning in court yesterday). BlueStar had told WSB this past spring that they still hoped somehow to be able to take over the project again; executive Hartley noted in court yesterday that they’d worked on it for seven years. Testifying later, former Seattle Capital executive Campbell said Fauntleroy Place had originally been seen as an investment for the firm, not a loan: “At the time, it wasn’t obvious the whole economy was going to come down.” He said SC had no intent to take the project through to completion, but rather to find a new buyer/sponsor for construction expenses, while retaining some ownership interest in the project. They had a choice between two such firms, and UDR won – but the path to finalizing that grew rocky, he testified. Whose fault it was that the project fell apart, is still at issue, as the different parties have different views, and that’s what the judge will have to sort out. Today is the last scheduled day of testimony for the week; we’ll go back to court when it resumes next week.

As demolition continues, the old Admiral Safeway is almost entirely rubble now, except for the brick pillars holding steel triangles, as part of its former facade. The wall along California SW came down about two hours ago, quite the lesson for the students across the street, as explained by Luckie, who shared the photos:

Most of Lafayette Elementary was standing on the sidewalk at 10:30 this morning. The construction company at Safeway contacted principal Virginia Turner to let her know the brick wall along California Ave. would be demolished today. Each “bite” of the excavator was met with cheers, shrieks, and enthusiastic jumping up and down.

Here’s our photo of how things currently look at the site:

If we get more demolition photos later, we’ll add them here. The new store is scheduled to be complete and open next summer; a residential/work-share building along 42nd SW is being built separately. 1:46 PM UPDATE: Just talked to Ron from the demolition crew. He says the twin pillar/triangle structures probably won’t come down till next week, after the debris are all cleared (they’ve been filling and taking away truckloads, just while we’ve been staked out).

As noisy and dusty as demolition can be, it can sometimes lead to fleeting scenes you might even consider beautiful. Diane shared these photos from the Admiral Safeway site, taken last night – note the old clock suddenly front and center:

Also revealed, curving framework:

And then the newer facade, still standing:

Another look:

As we’ve noted the past few days, you can now check in on a webcam focused on the site – see it here. P.S. Looking further back into the week, Christopher Boffoli got this video as the major demolition began a couple days ago – coverage of other stories got in the way of publishing it till now:

Thanks to Jessica (whose site Memoirs of a Weird Girl is one of the 100+ sites on the WSB Blogs page) for sharing that photo of demolition at the Admiral Safeway redevelopment site today – you can see the crews are proceeding toward the facade. As noted here yesterday, Safeway also now has a webcam you can check; we’ll add images later in the day as this proceeds. The new store – almost twice as big as the old one – is expected to be open by midsummer next year.

(Photo by Christopher Boffoli)
Another update on the Admiral Safeway redevelopment project, as the first week of demolition continues (here’s our report from Monday) – Sara Corn at Safeway regional HQ says demolition of the main building is beginning today, and the promised webcam is now up too. See it here; you can also find it from Safeway’s project website. (Nothing dramatic to see at the moment, but it’s intended to chronicle construction as it continues over the months ahead, with the new store expected to open next summer.) 11:49 PM NOTE: Our photo is from this afternoon; by nightfall, WSB’er Diane reports, the demolition appeared to be at least halfway done – we’ll check again tomorrow.

ORIGINAL 10:51 AM REPORT: Thanks to WSB’er Diane for pointing out that the fencing’s up all around the Admiral Safeway site. We checked in with Sara Corn at Safeway HQ – and she confirmed that demolition is starting this week. Here’s what we’ve found there this morning: A backhoe’s in place behind the 42nd/Lander house that’s being demolished (top photo) along with the main store building, and Seattle Fire Department crews are doing roof-ventilation training – here’s Ladder 11 on site:

As noted here last month, Safeway has set up a website with project details – the link’s here.

4:25 PM UPDATE: We checked again around 12:30, and the house was still standing – but in the ensuing few hours, it was torn down. Carrie Ann shares this photo:

She says it was quite the attraction for families from nearby Lafayette Elementary once school let out.