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The Business Examiner Daily was gracious enough to quote me from an e-mail that I sent in response to one of their ‘Coffee Break’ questions. I hope they don’t mind me quoting them (quoting me):

The question was:

Officials from Port of Olympia and Port of Tacoma face a sticky situation with regard to the proposed logistics center that would serve as a distribution center for both operations, create jobs and streamline the flow of cargo through South Sound waterfronts. Some have called for a public vote.

The Business Examiner would like to know your thoughts on the rise of trade-related industries in the South Sound and how the good of the region might mean bad news for a few neighboring the site.

My response:
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The ‘Little Seattle’ pipe-dream

In the November 2007 issue of Seattle Business Monthly Todd Matthews begins by describing the stagnated high-rise (and mid-rise) office space construction market in Tacoma. He finishes by saying of Tacoma:

“In fact, this regional hub, military center and major port is a study in contradictions.”

I agree with his assessment, because in it he points to not only the reason for the failures of attracting commerce to Tacoma, but also the solution.
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In governor Gregoire’s State of the State address on Tuesday night she mentioned that Forbes magazine ranked Washington the forth best state in the U.S. in which to do business. (h/t Business Examiner Daily and AWB)

“Forbes magazine, the flagship of American business media, recently highlighted how we are breaking down barriers by cutting red tape and paperwork, starting one-stop licensing, and providing small business help.”

“That’s just one of the reasons Forbes now ranks us among the five best states to do business in the country!”

However, this doesn’t tell the whole story.
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Last week I read this in the Business Examiner Daily:

“This discussion arrives, ironically, on the heels of a year-long effort led by the Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber to create just such an environment using models popularized by economic pundit Richard Florida.”

Having never heard the name I decided to find out a little about this guy and his ‘models’. Since his ideas may be used in shaping our city government’s policies, it’s important to me to be an informed voter. I haven’t done thorough research (that would require reading his books and looking into his seminars) what I’m commenting on here is only the questions that came to mind as I looked into all of this.

Are his ideas based in sound scientific and statistical analysis of the subject?
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Losing Russell’s Corporate Offices: Impact to the downtown economy

There are several factors that I can see impacting downtown Tacoma. I’m not an economist nor do I know who Russell does business with, so this piece is not intended to be a thorough examination of the issue. What I’d like to do is to put the matter into a different perspective as an alternative to the ‘failure is not an option‘ mentality that seems to be prevalent in downtown Tacoma and city government.

Breaking the issue down:
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To understand the potential impact of Russell leaving we really have to break it up into two clearly separate parts:

• The impact of Russell employees pulling up stakes and moving away;
• The impact of the Russell corporate offices moving out of downtown Tacoma.

In this post we’ll look at the first issue:

Losing Russell Employees
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Update: Justice Department investigating Port of Seattle

In light of recent news about how the Port of Seattle is being run, I’m not optimistic about a move prompted by a legislator from Fall City (obviously an interested party) to merge the Port of Tacoma, the Port of Seattle and the Port of Everett.

The recent news I’m referring to is the release of an audit from the State Auditor’s Office in which he reports on serious spending problems by the Port of Seattle. Bear in mind that this audit only looks at construction management (the largest category in their budget, but not the only category). The bean counters in the auditor’s office came up with over $97 million in wasted spending. Here’s a link to a partial HTML version. It’s enough to get anyone’s blood boiling.
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Crosscut.com has an article about the unintended consequences of urban planning. Based on statistics released by Canada, the article contrasts the surveys of livability and the satisfaction of residents. The results aren’t really surprising for me.

“Cities that rank high in international surveys of livability, such as Vancouver and Victoria and Toronto, score poorly with their local residents, when ranked forsatisfication among residents.”

The reason it’s not surprising is that the ‘livability’ of a city is measured by things that outsiders look at, while satisfaction is measured by the people who actually live there.
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There’s a part of Tacoma that I like to refer to as “Little Seattle”. It covers most of downtown but has tentacles that jut out into a few surrounding areas. But that’s the subject of an upcoming post.

There’s an article about Seattle’s growth strategy on Crosscut.com (titled “As Goes San Francisco…“, h/t Orbusmax) that shows that San Francisco is taking a second look at it’s growth strategy. Apparently after the dot com bubble burst they decided to push for high priced condo to revitalize their ailing city. But it appears that it might backfire.

“Seattle has always modeled itself on San Francisco, and now both cities are having doubts about the model. The California city picked itself up after the dot-com bust by pursuing condos, fine restaurants, young residents, and the new trends in the economy such as biotechnology, green tech, and stem-cell research.”

Given downtown Tacoma’s propensity to follow Seattle, usually creating a vague copy of it’s mentor, it may be that Tacoma is headed down the same road (or will at least attempt to follow.)
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Another landmark business closes it’s doors in Tacoma. According to the News Tribune, after 74 years and at least a couple changes in ownership, the landmark next to the Old Town Dock is closing. The current owners, described as a ’seafood giant’, is probably just cutting the fat on an unprofitable operation. The employees will move to another of the company’s locations so no jobs appear to have been lost.

It was on TV news on a ‘local’ channel (in Seattle) and they interviewed a few passers-by who all seemed to say, “I never shopped there but it’s sad to see it close.” I think that probably explains why it closed.

I’ve noticed a trend in Tacoma where businesses move to other cities, though this clearly isn’t one of those. But I think it does point to another example of the reshaping of the city.
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