Slog - Comments on Odd Fellows Sale: The PR

Comment by flamingbanjo

flamingbanjo — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 10:32:08 -0800

The key phrase there is "market rate."

Comment by Cleve

Cleve — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 10:41:16 -0800

Will the market rate rents drive out Century Ballroom and other dance, music, arts and culture tenants, that benefit thousands of Seattleites every week?

If we can give millions of public dollars for sports stadiums, and opera houses, and museums, and parking garages downtown or in the zoo, why can't the City help out here?

Comment by kim

kim — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 11:01:33 -0800

ugh, goodbye shoe store and street-level dance studios. here's hoping century, etc., can afford their "market rate" rents.

Comment by genevieve

genevieve — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 12:07:02 -0800

Gee, I can't think of a more pedestrian-friendly business on the ground floor than a running shoe company, but I guess they're not enough of a boutique for the owners to be interested in keeping them. A huge part of the charm of entering and exiting OddFellows during the day is passing the runners trying out their shoes up and down the block on the Pine St side.

I believe this owner is as interested in maintaining Velocity, Century, and Freehold as tenants as Clay Bennett was in working with the City to keep the Sonics/Storm here. If they just pony up 3-4 times what they've been paying, sure they'll be allowed to stay, but the real interest is in drawing high end businesses to match the new Capitol Hill demographic, i.e. hipster yuppies.

Comment by DOUG.

DOUG. — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 12:46:09 -0800

I can't wait for $20 braised yak marrow at a gastro-pub named after some yuppie's kid.

Comment by COMTE

COMTE — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 12:50:43 -0800

Yeah, that one single phrase pretty much puts the lie to any other florid language about trying to "explore creative solutions to try to retain the arts culture at the Odd Fellows Lodge".

Unless of course, by "creative solutions" they mean, "let's see how much more we can squeeze out of a bunch of piddly little 501(c)3 non-profits - maybe they can go plead to the City to help them cover their looming three-fold rent increases."

Comment by movementintimeandspace

movementintimeandspace — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 12:52:42 -0800

I know both Freehold and Velocity both operate at a very small margin above the red. There is no way that they can survive a rent increase to 'market rate'. If you value the arts please contact the folk at Velocity, Century, and Freehold and ask what you can do. We need a thousand people willing to fight this tooth and nail in order to keep this building and the arts organizations that it houses intact.

Comment by Aimee

Aimee — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 13:26:23 -0800

Boutique retailers.

Surely they will preserve this historic creative vibrancy.

I'm scared to go to the Hill... I'm afraid I'll get Schrothed.

Comment by NapoleonXIV

NapoleonXIV — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 15:23:31 -0800

"the economic reality of having to raise rents to market levels in order to make retaining the building feasible from an investment standpoint."

Which means: We're in it to make money, and if weren't going to screw you, it wouldn't have made sense for us to buy it.

Hail, hail fair density!

Comment by Bob

Bob — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 15:51:27 -0800

Bedford Falls continues to morph into Potterville. "Let's evict the groups and people that make the building so vibrant, create a shallow "atmosphere" with an empty gesture toward art, jack the rents appropriately so we get an appropriate return on our investment, and move onto spread the love to the next available block!" Sorta reminds me of the nouveau riche Steve Martin in "The Jerk" dressing down a waiter- "Don't try to sell me that OLD wine- I want NEW wine!"

Comment by american airline coupon

american airline coupon — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 14:19:30 -0800

http://airline.websited.net/air/map.html >mexico airline tickets