General Services Building Extension of Comment Period

12 comments

• J Jesse February 12, 2015

  Thanks for the share, E133. My comments about parking were sent long ago. The problem here is that professional opinion about practically every aspect of this project is dismissed under the assumption that this is a "done deal." I reject that notion. It's a great phrase for a politician to use instead of just coming out and saying that you're too lazy to even try to do the right thing. Remember, this has not been voted on yet, so how could it possibly be so far in process that it's irreversible? Bottom line? McCarthy and Phelps don't care about placement of this project or public/professional opinion because it would stall the project enough to have the ribbon cutting happen after they're out of office.

• P paolo February 12, 2015

  As the project as proposed is reviewed by the county council, the county's executive leadership should also discuss means to possibly link the project with new mass-transit infrastructure (i.e., Sounder) serving Pierce County suburbs, like Lakewood and Puyallup/Sumner. Are there plans for a small free circulator bus running on a regular schedule to link the facility with Sound Transit's Tacoma Dome Station? Even Amazon.com helped establish the South Lake Union Streetcar in Seattle to link its headquarters complex to Sound Transit's light rail station at Westlake Center in downtown Seattle. The question is whether Pierce County has thoroughly addressed transit issues in tandem with its decision to build an $18 million parking structure at the county government headquarters now proposed for a mostly-residential area south of downtown Tacoma--Puget Sound government agencies certainly challenge private businesses to be thoughtful about ride-reduction issues (look how much the I-5 carpool lanes and the Sounder cost). Likewise, while it is a worthy goal for some to promote economic activity in the Lincoln District such as developing a new county headquarters (project advocates cite the revenue expected from a restaurant and deli planned for operations inside of the proposed county buiding), is city government also planning for neighborhood economic growth there that might come with the people-magnet of that building? Will zoning in that neighborhood intensify to support new high-rise building construction to generate private-sector jobs, if the economic climate of that neighborhood justifies such risk-taking? Such jobs will benefit all Pierce County residents if they stimulate new tax revenues. These are questions county council members should ponder. They are a suburban/rural check and review on executive decisions and not just a rubberstamp for an unstoppable Tacoma political machine. Transparency and debate matter, as does public comment on this project--President Thomas Jefferson wisely declared long ago: "Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate for a moment to prefer the latter".

  • J Jesse February 12, 2015

    The Lincoln District MUC will be hard pressed to get much economic activity from this project. The County employees have a half hour lunch each day and the MUC is 0.5 to 0.7 miles (depending on who you talk to) away from the site. At 2-3 mph walking rate, it would take at least 15 minutes just to walk to the MUC, allowing no time to eat lunch. But hey, they might get their Taco Time back at 38th and Pacific... All I hear when shuttles and new transit are mentioned, is more dollars needed to support this site when every infrastructure item needed for it already exists downtown.

    • J JDHasty February 12, 2015

      Just exactly what percentage of County employees are eating lunch in restaurants? Maybe I should be asking: What percentage of people in your world, Jesse, are eating lunch in restaurants? I have made the case here innumerable times that certain individuals who post here are "out of touch with the real world." Either they are as negligent and irresponsible in their familial obligations as they are with public monies, or they are not responsible for paying a mortgage and raising a family. Quite simply, they are "out of touch with the real world." Thank you, Jesse, for validating that point. When, like Jesse, you have money to eat lunch, and I presume dinner three or four nights/week minimum, like ol' Jesse here I suppose that pissing away money on every pie in the sky proposal that comes along isn't a big deal. It is a big deal to those of us who are working middle class with responsibilities.

      • J Jesse February 12, 2015

        I love personal attacks on the blogosphere. It means you have no real counter argument.

        • J JDHasty February 12, 2015

          I'll go you one better: You impress me as a "know it all" and you have a documented history right here in this forum of being one who is ever ready to suggest that all and sundry pony up to fund whatever the latest scheme to come out of The American Leadership Forum happens to be. You have no consideration for working middle class taxpaying residents and my inclination is that this stems from your lack of familiarity with what it means to be a working to provide for a family and maintain a home. Choke on that.

    • S shawn February 13, 2015

      I will take a site that offers existing parking infrastructure (savings of million dollars) and expansion over a site that offers supposedly more transit options (savings of thousands of dollars) ALL day! It comes down to adding signage/bus stops vs a parking structure tell me which option is more cost effective? If we're really talking bout costs the pacific site wins hands down! But of course it isn't about cost/saving taxpayers money its bout north end trolls having personal interests/agendas always bout gimme gimme gimme. Tacoma is more than just the north end/downtown and this project will finally allow the shift of powers to include the south end/east side. Mentalities will begin to change and this is a start!

• T Terry February 12, 2015

  Let's look at this in a different way. There are more 800,000 residents in Pierce County and around one fourth of them live in Tacoma. The General Services Building belongs to all of them. As far a transit, walking and cycling, the site on Pacific Ave is well connected to South Tacoma, the East Side, Parkland and the South County beyond. The Pacific site has great freeway excess for everybody else, and most people drive everywhere here. We love free parking! Some of you live in world where everything nice and everything good gets built in your little Downtown/waterfront/North Tacoma playground..... with tax money from everybody. Does anybody living South of the Nalley Valley ever get anything in return? Maybe all the low income housing that's pushed out of the Hilltop when that silly LINK train is built and all the high end condos go up?

  • J JDHasty February 13, 2015

    You have that exactly right. The UW Urban Planning Dept and the American Leadership Forum drive this attitude and in their view the entire rest of Pierce County as a "funding mechanism" for Visualize Tacoma, or the Downtown Redevelopment Zone or whatever the name de jour is for that never ending revenue vacuum. They have absolutely no interest in anything except that one District and it shows. The answer is: No you will never get any return on your investment i.e. the taxes you pay to the City that will be manifest in your own neighborhoods. Not so long as the cabal that has controlled government here in Tacoma retains their grip on power.

• S shawn February 12, 2015

  Chalk it up for the east side we've waited long enough! Choke on it north end you got enough close minded people such as yourselves that want nothing but the best for your own neighborhoods all bout personal interest/agendas all you can say is transpo transpo transpo u've got nothin on this project give it up! Great utilization of an otherwise abandoned county building only makes sense thank god someone is clear minded! I'll be laughing when this thing erects and all the north end trolls are left with something else to gripe about ha!

  • J JDHasty February 13, 2015

    Shawn, I happen to live in the north end AND I am sympathetic to where you are coming from. In fact furring the Prop 1 series of "townhalls" I went to as many as I possibly could and did attend Fern Hill. Your representative, Lonnergan was there and I buttonholed City Staff and elected officials and ask if the City GIS department could produce a map showing block by block how much City money had been spent, or even if District by District such a graphical representation could be produced to illustrate to the population that transportation dollars have been and are being allocated in a "geographically equitable" manner. Lonnergan said that he would request just sip uh a graphic be produced and that was the end of it. Sound familiar? Now here is what is even more damnable about this, it is not only transportation dollars that are going predominantly to one small area of the City, at the expense of everyone else. I am a licensedcivil engineer and I have decades of experience in the transportation field and I could take the rhetoric being bandied about at the Prop 1 dog and pony shows and get to the bottom of what they were actually plotting I.e. more money poured into downtown with a pittance actually spent on pavement restoration and preservation. You are so right, YOU AND YOUR NEIGHBORS HAVE BEEN SCREWED. Royally screwed.

  • J Jesse February 13, 2015

    Actually, at the last meeting for us opposed to this location, there was a lengthy discussion about how to get this project INSIDE the Lincoln MUC so it actually does create economic activity for it. It was also suggested that if this were built INSIDE the Lincoln MUC, that it then makes Lincoln (at 38th and Yakima) a better contender for the next Link expansion.