Article and Photo by Todd Matthews

Laura Hanan remembers quite vividly the night she heard gunfire. It was shortly after 1:00 a.m. when Hanan and her boyfriend, Marty Fehl, awoke to successive popping sounds outside. The couple raced to their balcony to survey the scene below -- a street lit by red and blue police lights; the area outside her building cordoned with police tape; one person dead, another paralyzed, in a July 8 gun battle between rival gangs outside an all-ages nightclub on Pacific Avenue.

While the shooting put media attention on her neighborhood, Hanan says trouble in this part of downtown is an old story. Hanan, who moved to Tacoma from Gig Harbor in 2002, owns the Rowland Building just across the street from Club Friday nightclub. "I saw this building and fell in love with it," she recalls from the living room of her spacious, third-floor live/work space. Seeing potential, she spent two years and $500,000 renovating the building, which was eventually placed on the city's register of historic places. She opened an art gallery, Brick and Mortar, and has since leased space to a wine shop, spa, and four residents. The building was a catalyst for other business people to set up shop in the neighborhood.

Downtown merchant and property owner Laura Hanan monitors the scene from her balcony overlooking Pacific Avenue.

Fast-forward four years, and Hanan says the neighborhood has changed. She points to a stack of letters she's written to City Hall, Tacoma Police Department, and local newspapers trying to bring attention to the issue -- namely, her concern that downtown's north end is neglected, the area a threat to public safety. She tries to recount the number of times she has seen drug dealing, fighting, and prostitution on Pacific Avenue and a section of Commerce Street, visible from her balcony, but they are too many.

"It's really sad because I think this is the focal point of downtown," says Hanan. "The city's historic neighborhood."

Other merchants along Broadway and Pacific Avenue, near Ninth Street, echo Hanan's concerns.

"Any new retail that opens up down here, it just doesn't last," says Dawn Cutts, owner of Trouve on Broadway. Cutts says she has seen 18 to 20 businesses shut down in the past 18 months. Three months ago, she posted homemade signs on street poles near Ninth and Commerce urging people not to give money to panhandlers. And she frequently asks shoplifters to leave; one person was booted after growling at the soaps Cutts sells in her store. "People just do not come down here," she adds. "It's worse now than it was five years ago. I love my store, but I just can't have more people shoplifting during the day than I sell during the day."

Kris Blondin, owner of Vin Grotto, one of Hanan's tenants, has similar concerns. She used to stay open late, catering to theater crowds that made their way down to her cafe. Now -- citing public safety concerns related to the nightclub across the screet and the neighborhood's concentration of high-risk, low-income housing -- she rarely stays open past 9:00 p.m. "A wine bar should be open at least until 10:00 p.m.," says Blondin. "But not since the club opened. I used to have theater people come down after a show for wine or dessert, but not anymore. And I haven't had anyone call and ask, 'How come you weren't open?'"

At the north end of the block, Meconi's Pub owner David Meconi is trying to figure out how to draw more people in light of recent violence.

"Right now, my main focus is the shooting," says Meconi. "Since the shooting, my nightlife [business] has gone down a lot. People are afraid to come down at night."

This grim, collective view of downtown's north end is consistent with a report released earlier this year by the New Tacoma Neighborhood Council, which includes downtown stakeholders. The report, prepared March 30 after a community meeting with residents, merchants, property owners, and city leaders, outlines recommendations for improving the area around Ninth and Commerce -- and identifies many of the problems that plague the neighborhood.

"This neighborhood has great potential for development, but it currently struggles," the neighborhood council report reads. "Small businesses have a hard time and empty storefronts linger . . . . Some people who do visit are wary of the presence of panhandlers, drug activity, and other nuisance behaviors."

Ride Link Light Rail from the Dome District to the Theater District, and you get an idea of what merchants and the community council report detail: downtown changes dramatically in a distance of less than two miles.

As the train leaves Tacoma Dome station and makes a turn north onto Pacific Avenue, many of the city's revitalization landmarks come into view: Union Station, UW Tacoma, and the Washington State History Museum. Disembark at Union Station, cross a pedestrian bridge over Interstate 705, and you wind up at the shimmering Museum of Glass and the Foss Waterway and Esplanade.

But continue on Link Light Rail, past the Tacoma Art Museum and Pacific Plaza and up to Commerce Street, and the environment changes. The abandoned, paint-flaked Luzon Building collects dust (and pigeon droppings) at the corner of 13th and Commerce; two decades-old concrete parking garages -- Park Plaza North and Park Plaza South -- appear as though they might collapse under their own weight; and the Theater District light rail station drops passengers off in a part of town surrounded by two convenience stores, low-income housing, and a row of sagging buildings.

According to statistics from the Business Improvement Area (BIA), 20.8 percent of downtown incident reports compiled by BIA bike patrols from January through March of this year occurred in the area near Ninth and Commerce.

"Each area has its own problems," says Marty Campbell, president of the Downtown Merchants Group, and Vice Chair of the New Tacoma Neighborhood Council. He disagrees with the idea that one part of downtown is better off than another, though readily acknowledges that, as a business owner in the south end, his assessment could be critiqued. "I think there's a perception that the University District is booming. But I don't think it's doing significantly better than any other part of downtown."

Councilmember Jake Fey agrees.

"I hear from merchants [in the south part of downtown] that it's not a slam-dunk," says Fey, who represents downtown.

Campbell and Fey are familiar with the concerns of merchants on the north end. Campbell points to efforts earlier this year to improve conditions near Ninth and Commerce. On March 7, he sent a letter to Mayor Bill Baarsma outlining his concerns and requesting the City make nuisance behaviors a high priority. On March 30, the New Tacoma Neighborhood Council hosted a community meeting of 50 residents, merchants, property owners, and city employees to discuss possible solutions. According to Campbell, downtown merchants and city leaders started working together to replace 32 burned out street lights, install fencing around Fireman's Park (to curb instances of homeless encampments), and develop a plan that puts heavier restrictions on pay phones in the area (a common means of communication for drug dealers).

"We created an action plan, working through the city," says Campbell. "They respected us, and dialogue was started."

Still, Campbell admits key aspects of north and south downtown make the areas inherently different.

Whereas the north end is more tightly compacted with garages, office buildings, the Winthrop Hotel, City Hall, and Pantages Theater all towering over the neighborhood, the south end -- particularly the UW Tacoma campus -- is more spread out. "If you're at 17th and Pacific, you can glance and see if there's an issue at 21st and Pacific," says Campbell. "You can be visually aware. At Ninth and Pacific, you have a very small area that you can keep an eye on. It's a much smaller, more condensed area. It can be harder to maintain."

Another difference: low-income residential housing. While the north end of downtown is home to three high-density, low-income housing projects -- the Winthrop, Olympus Hotel, and Colonial Apartments -- the south end of downtown has none.

"Over here, you have challenges because of where people have chosen to kind of hang out -- where there is housing," adds Fey. "You don't have many people living at the other end. Along the Foss, you're talking about different income levels. Obviously, here at night and even in the daytime, it's a little bit of a challenge in terms of, if you're a consumer or purchaser, whether this is the place you want to go. There's some work that needs to be done to revitalize it."

But Fey argues work is already in progress. During an interview this week at Tully's on the corner of Ninth and Broadway, down the street from City Hall, he points out some of the revitalization projects underway. Across the street, contractors are working on a $5.1 million renovation to the Pantages Theater. The Mecca, an adult theater further north, closed earlier this summer. And two blocks away, the latest of a batch of market-rate condominiums on Market Street is under construction (with more slated just up the hill).

"We're getting closer," says Fey.

If there's one thing Campbell, Fey, and the north downtown merchants interviewed agree on, it's the issue of downtown policing. They point to budget cuts nearly two years ago that forced the Tacoma Police Department to remove two swing-shift bicycle patrol positions downtown. Moreover, adds Campbell, the District Four sector has now folded the Dome District into the District One (downtown) sector -- without adding any additional officers.

"That's definitely been cited as one of the first issues we need to address," says Campbell, referring to increased TPD presence downtown.

Councilmember Fey says he'll push for more officers. "I'm going to be supportive of adding more swing-shift police bicycle presence here," he says. "I think that's needed to support this area of downtown."

That might be easier said than done: currently, TPD is struggling to fill 16 positions (that number is 44, if you factor in officers in training, on military leave, or on extended sick leave, according to comments from Chief Don Ramsdell during Friday's city council meeting). "Obviously, there are going to be constraints," adds Fey. "But if I read things correctly, there was kind of a promise that was going to happen. If that is, in fact, the case, we need to live up to that promise."

Back at Hanan's live/work loft, she offers a folder packed with her work documenting her neighborhood's woes.

A photograph taken from her balcony depicts a young man outside Club Friday; he's spotted the camera and is lifting his jersey to reveal what appears to be a white bulletproof vest. In the next photograph, he raises his right middle finger while a nearby friend laughs. Another photograph depicts a parking stall stained with vomit. Hanan provides context: earlier, she had witnessed two teenagers drinking in a car parked next to the stall.

"It's bizarre that a downtown less than two miles long would even have a bad section," she says.

This article originally appeared in the 20 July 2006 edition of the Tacoma Daily Index