PORT TOWNSEND — One of the advantages of a public development authority, or PDA, is that it can be nimble when necessary.
For the Port Townsend PDA, it’s necessary. Now.
Authority board members Tuesday unanimously approved a plan for the year-old PDA to turn from the historic district and take the lead in plans to manage and operate Fort Worden State Park.
The action means the PDA would take the position that Centrum once held in a long-term plan to change the form of governance for Fort Worden.
The plan recently became urgent with the state’s estimated $5.1 billion deficit, with budget woes haunting future prospects for all state parks.
Gov. Chris Gregoire’s proposed budget before the Legislature calls for a two-year phaseout of about half the funding that parks currently receive from the general fund.
“She’s not really trying to cut parks off; she’s just got the idea that [State] Parks is better placed to raise money other ways,” said Rodger Schmitt, a state parks commissioner who also sits on the Port Townsend PDA board.
Centrum, which operates a full lineup of arts festivals, workshops and other events at the fort, has budget woes of its own.
Under Gregoire’s plan, its budget would take a $400,000 hit from cuts in state arts funding.
Centrum needs to step away from the original terms of a memorandum of understanding that gave it lead status for Fort Worden redevelopment and management, the PDA board was told.
Officially, the board’s Tuesday action only authorizes its technical team to explore an actual takeover by the PDA, compile financial and other data, and begin discussing strategy with state officials.
But it was clear from discussion that the ultimate goal will be final approval for PDA management of the park, assuming the numbers can be made to work with solid support from state legislators, the Governor’s Office and state parks and recreation commissioners.
“Really, it comes down to the viability of the financial model,” said Dave Robison, a consultant to the PDA.
State Parks will have to restore cut funds for renovation of Building 202 at Fort Worden, the site where Goddard College and Peninsula College will create a four-year degree program.
Or the Legislature will have to insert it into relevant legislation.
The technical team has only a month to accomplish any needed legislation — a Feb. 15 deadline looms for new bills.
But meetings with state leaders have already been scheduled for later this month, said Rick Sepler, Port Townsend’s development director and one of the team members.
If everything goes well, Fort Worden will look a whole lot different in a few years and will run differently as well, all according to a master plan devised among the players two years ago.
In addition to the higher education anchor, there would be renovations to house students for residency.
And two other buildings on the World War I-era grounds would be renovated to be used as hotels by students, conference attendees and the general public, generating some of the much-needed income to make the facility self-supporting.
“You’re talking about an economic anchor to the community,” said Port Townsend City Manager David Timmons.
“It’s a whole community almost like a business park.”
The underlying property will always be under state ownership, but the facility would be operated by the Port Townsend authority, which has bonding authority to raise money.
In short, it would be operated much as the Pike Place Market in Seattle, Sepler said.
The PDA originated as a means to save historic buildings, and its priority project was the old Customs House, Port Townsend’s main post office, overlooking downtown from the uptown bluff on Washington Street.
Plans to negotiate some sort of exchange with the U.S. Postal Service, which is taking the building out of service and making it available for private use, have been “limping along,” Timmons said, but are still going forward with prospects for a successful operation of the old gray stone building as a commercial space.
On Tuesday, the PDA board approved a preliminary exchange agreement with the Postal Service.
Property to be developed for a distribution annex has not yet been identified.
And further outside grants and other revenue resources still need to be found for the retrofitting work needed for the Customs House.
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Julie McCormick is a freelance writer and photographer living in Port Townsend. Phone her at 360-385-4645 or e-mail juliemccormick10@gmail.com.
