Vulnerable Elderly To Benefit Directly
A century ago, downtown housing filled Spokane with life.
Railroads brought streams of people to the city’s hotels and apartments. Upper floors in downtown buildings offered rooms to miners, loggers and farmers who had left the camps for winter or were on their way to someplace new. Years ago, those upper floors went dark.
Today, housing is again recognized as a component of a healthy downtown. It is not good for a city to empty every night. In recent years, renovation has begun to spread through the downtown area’s old apartments and hotels. The most recent project is renovation of the Carlyle Apartments, a seven-story building that has stood at 206 S. Post since 1890. The project is significant for several reasons:
It will serve the poorest of the poor, who need decent housing but have trouble finding it.
It came about as the result of a $3.8 million low-interest loan from U.S. Bank and two generous donations: $100,000 from the Rockwood Manor Retirement Community on the South Hill and $100,000 from Wells Fargo Bank. Also, the Washington state Housing Finance Commission arranged tax-exempt revenue bonds to make the project go.
The Carlyle’s owner, Ed Hoffman, is a for-profit businessman. He blends doing good with making money in a line of work more often performed by nonprofit corporations.
If Hoffman can make a successful business endeavor out of renovating old downtown housing into assisted-living units for the poor, other investors may consider the possibility as well.
We hope the for-profit sector can shine in this sector of the housing market because owners have a personal incentive to manage for the well-being of their tenants and their property.
When Hoffman’s project is done, he’ll have room for about 120 people who can choose among a range of settings and services, from a low-cost apartment to an assisted-living unit with prepared meals, laundry, cleaning and nursing care. Tenants will include the elderly, the disabled, the mentally ill - recipients of Medicaid and Medicare. Those cash-strapped programs like assisted living because it costs far less than nursing homes.
Spokane’s high poverty rate makes projects like the Carlyle important in the mix of downtown housing. All of us will get old and infirm some day. When poor folk reach this vulnerable stage of life, they find good housing scarce. Hoffman’s project is evidence that Spokane has the capacity to perform a compassionate service for which the need will only grow.
, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = John Webster For the editorial board