SEQUIM – The Port of Port Angeles is looking for a tenant for the restaurant at the John Wayne Marina.
Although port commissioners previously had set out to find a chain restaurant to fill the slot, no agreement has been reached, so they will begin advertising for a tenant, they decided at their Monday meeting in Port Angeles.
Richard White ran the John Wayne Marina Restaurant for about 10 years before shutting it down in March 2006.
The building sits at Sequim Bay’s Pitship Point, overlooking 22 acres donated to the port agency by the family of the late actor John Wayne.
There are two options for remodeling the marina for a restaurant.
The first would add about 400 square feet to the building’s lower level and remodel its kitchen to create cafe seating for 50 at a cost of about $196,000, according to a 2006 feasibility study .by Gary Parkinson Architects of Everett.
“We are not sure where this is going to go, but we are just opening it up at this stage,” Port Commissioner Bill Hannan said.
A cafe model would be the most feasible in the short term, but the commissioners said they would take into consideration long-term feasibility as well as how long a lease would have to be written to recapture renovation costs.
The previous tenant paid $839 per month for the space.
The other plan would move the Sequim Bay Yacht Club, now on the upper level, down to where White’s restaurant used to be.
A large restaurant with seating for as many as 140 would go upstairs, and the building would be expanded to create a 1,276-square-foot space at a cost of about $564,300, according to Parkinson’s report.
The commissioners will review potential renter interest before deciding which option – upstairs or downstairs – is best.
