Diana Painter: An unnecessary end for an icon

As Spokane’s most prominent organization dedicated to the preservation of historic buildings, Spokane Preservation Advocates is dismayed to learn that the Cowles Company plans to demolish the historic Chancery Building, a contributor to the National Register-listed West Riverside Historic District and a Spokane icon. SPA has worked diligently behind the scenes for years to prevent this irreparable damage to our community and to what is widely considered Spokane’s most beautiful street, from expressing our concerns to the property owner in 2019, to grassroots organizing, to successfully getting the building listed on the Washington Trust for Historic Preservation’s “Most Endangered Places” list, and most recently, to a significant effort to locate a potential buyer who would approach the building with a preservation mindset. Sadly, it appears this work has not been successful.

We have three primary issues with the Cowles Company’s proposal:

First, the project application shows complete disregard for the building’s status as a contributing building to a National Register Historic District – a district that has been in place since 1976. In response to widespread destruction of historic buildings during the mid-20th century, communities around the country came together and decided – with significant public engagement – that it was of civic importance to retain certain historic structures and districts, and to preserve them for future generations. This was the genesis of the National Register program. The current proposal makes no mention of the National Register-listed West Riverside Historic District, nor the Chancery Building’s status as a contributor to that district, its design quality, or its association with two of Spokane’s most famous architects – Kirtland Cutter and Gustav Pehrson. Ignoring a designation that had been in place for several decades prior to the Cowles Company’s tenure amounts to an abdication of the civic responsibility that comes with ownership of landmark structures and sets a dangerous precedent that will imperil other historic properties in the region.

Second, SPA remains steadfast in our assertion that alternative project designs that retain the Chancery Building and its historic character exist and are financially viable. Over the decades there have been multitudes of successful projects that preserve and repurpose historic buildings – many of which ultimately become some of the most valuable real estate in their respective cities. These projects are more challenging, can be more expensive, and require a good deal more creativity than does a project planned for a vacant site, but those extra efforts are typically rewarded handsomely. Should such an approach be taken, there are numerous incentives at the federal and state levels that can provide millions of dollars to a project, defraying much of the additional cost. In addition, there are many tools in the city’s land use and economic development toolkit that can further incentivize the preservation of the Chancery Building. The current proposal to demolish the building turns a blind eye to those incentives in favor of an easy and unimaginative solution.

Finally, the notion that we need to trade our scarce historic resources for the production of badly needed housing represents something of a false choice given that there are approximately 300 acres of undeveloped surface parking lots in the downtown core alone – nearly one-quarter of the total land area. A number of those lots are owned by the Cowles Company and have the potential to provide many times more housing than does the current proposal. SPA is acutely aware of the ongoing housing crisis in Spokane and around the country, and the urgent need for policy action to provide additional housing units for a growing population. We look forward to participating actively in the coming conversations around housing policy and to working in good faith to find solutions. Furthermore, we acknowledge that compromises will need to be made to arrive at those solutions. However, in an environment of abundant developable property with the capacity to hold many thousands of housing units, we find the assertion that producing a mere 39 additional housing units justifies the demolition of a landmark structure to be spurious at very best. We urge city leaders to take substantive action to reduce the stress on the housing market in Spokane so that in the future this justification may never again be used.

While we are dismayed by this proposal, we remain optimistic that a preservation-minded solution can be found, whether through a different proposal by the Cowles Company that acknowledges the civic responsibility inherent in owning a landmark structure, or by the sale of the property to a new owner with a more creative approach to preservation and real estate. SPA will continue to work tirelessly to find a solution that preserves this landmark structure for future generations of Spokanites so that they may be better connected to our shared history.

Diana Painter is a historic preservation expert and the current SPA board chair.