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Marce Edwards is the business editor. She has been at The News Tribune for seven years and has written about technology and big businesses in the South Sound including Weyerhaeuser and Russell. Before moving to Tacoma, she worked at The Idaho Statesman in Boise. She is a Northwest native who likes to garden and refuses to use an umbrella. She lives in Tacoma with her husband and two kids.
C.R. Roberts is a Tacoma native. Before joining The News Tribune, he worked as a freelance writer and part-time cowhand on a cattle ranch in Northern Idaho. He writes about small business, personal finance and other business issues.
John Gillie writes about the aerospace and airline industries, commercial development and consumer issues. During his 30-year-tenure at The News Tribune he has covered issues as diverse as the Native American fishing rights disputes, crime and the courts, the wood products industry and energy. He lived in Tacoma with his family for 25 years, but now lives in Kent because his wife heads a five-state non-profit foundation headquartered in Ballard, and it only seemed a sensible compromise to make considering their workplaces are 40 miles apart.
Kelly Kearsley has been a business reporter at The News Tribune since 2005. She covers the Port of Tacoma and international trade. Being born and raised in Spokane she’s used to living in cities with inferiority complexes and, in fact, prefers it. Prior to working at The News Tribune, she spent three years as a reporter for The Bulletin in Bend, Oregon and another year working stints for The Associated Press and Seattle Times. She graduated from Pacific Lutheran University. She lives in Tacoma with her husband and miniature schnauzer.
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The News Tribune has confirmed that members of Tacoma Elks #174 last night approved the sale of its property at South 23rd and Union streets.
A few weeks ago, we reported that the lodge turned down Wal-Mart's bid to buy the 17-acre property but that the group was close to an agreement with another developer.
A member told us this morning that the developer is planning office space, a McDonald's and a Starbucks.
Check here for more details as we confirm them.
UPDATE: Lodge members on Wednesday night approved a contract with Opus, a Minneapolis-based real estate developer who in 2008 finished Federal Way Crossings, a 21-acre retail development on South 348th Street.
Gary Giambrone, the Elks' special representative who is in charge of the lodge, said Thursday that the contract comprises two phases of development, and that the Elks' Grand Lodge trustees still must approve both phases.
Opus has a four-month contingency on both phases, Giambrone said, which gives the developer and the Elks the flexibility to assess the market before breaking ground.
The contingency clock for Phase Two doesn't start ticking until Phase One is complete.
Last month, the Elks rejected an offer from Wal-Mart because the contingency period was too long.
Here's how Giambrone described the plan:
Phase One involves the property behind the Elks Lodge, on Cedar Street, where Opus plans to build two medical office buildings. One is 60,000 square feet, the other is 40,000 square feet. Tenants for those buildings were unclear Thursday.
Phase Two involves the rest of the land, where the current lodge sits.
"That's a whole new ball game," Giambrone said. "We can't start our new building until we get commitment on phase two."
Officials from Opus could not be reached for comment Thursday.
Since 1965, when the Elks moved to its Union Avenue lodge from its old quarters in downtown Tacoma across from the old City Hall, the fraternal group has sold off parts of the original lodge site. That property once stretched from South 19th Street to the Highway 16 freeway.
The lodge was once the nation's largest, with 10,000 members. But as membership declined, the Elks have been looking for ways first to enhance revenue, and now to downsize.
The Elks plan to build a new, smaller lodge for its 3,000 members at the Allenmore Golf Course.
"We're going to be improving the golf course, paving all the new cart paths," Giambrone said. Selling the current property "is allowing us to do all the improvements to make [the new one] a first class facility."
The two-phase contract allows the Elks to stay in their current lodge until development of the land under it is a sure thing.
Giambrone plans to present the contract to the Grand Lodge Trustees this weekend, and he hopes they'll look it over and make a decision next week.
"It's not a sure thing, but it's a 90 percent thing," he said. "I cannot sign a contract until they approve."
