Spokane is losing a valuable partner
Mike Edwards shuffled out of Buffalo six years ago. He hasn’t shuffled much since.
As president of the Downtown Spokane Partnership, he has been hustling many of the initiatives — from housing to retail to recreation — that have transformed the core area physically as well as psychologically.
Unfortunately for the community, Edwards must leave his work here. This week, he will head for Pittsburgh, closer to family roots, where he takes over as executive director of that city’s Downtown Partnership.
He says he found out about the Spokane job on the Internet. Just 38 years old at the time, Edwards and his wife decided coming West would be something of an adventure. When they arrived, Edwards recalls, “Nordstrom was a hole in the ground.”
Community enthusiasm for River Park Square was blunted first by controversy over funding of the parking garage, then by the one-two punch of the 9/11 attacks and implosion of the telecommunications industry.
“It wasn’t a particularly good time for any downtown to be successful,” Edwards says.
But the project was the beginning of downtown’s renaissance, which he takes as all but a given.
“We wouldn’t be sitting down in this lobby,” he says from a Davenport Hotel armchair.
Many, Edwards says, questioned whether retail development like that under way at River Park Square would be sufficient to jumpstart downtown. It did. The DSP contributed by keeping the sidewalks clean and safe, and sponsoring street events that attracted families and shoppers. The events helped create a positive experience.
When Susie Luby and Steve Thosath began talking about Blue Chip Lofts, their pioneering condominium project, Edwards said the partnership “wrapped itself” around the pair, reassuring them the market was ready. More than ready, as it turned out. All the units were pre-sold.
“That was a seminal project” that showed there was a demand for upscale, loft-like living even where the traffic noise was freight trains, not trucks. Downtown, Edwards says, is lucky to have a group of risk-takers — Jim Kolva, Ron and Julie Wells, and Rob Brewster among them — willing to invest downtown.
Sterling Financial Corp. Chairman Harold Gilkey headed the search committee that hired Edwards based on his communication skills and ability to bring together people who could get things done, not necessarily do them himself.
His fingerprints may not show up on any particular project, he says, but Edwards had a hand in everything.
“His job was to create and environment where others could create things,” Gilkey says. “I absolutely believe he did an excellent job.”
OneEighty Networks Chairman Greg Green owns several properties, including the company’s headquarters on Wall Street. Values have increased substantially in recent years.
“You’ve got to have a spark before you have a fire,” Green says. “Mike helped create that spark.”
Edwards fears that downtown could be a victim of its own success. Enthusiasm for the University District to the east and anticipated development of the Summit property to the west could divert attention and resources from the core. The City of Spokane has reduced its support.
“Sometimes you get concerned that people think downtown has been completed,” Edwards says. “Downtowns are never completed.”
Pittsburgh, for example, successfully shed its image as the Steel City, but progress has bogged down. The vacancy rate for downtown office space is 20 percent, and parking costs are high. Its advantages include the presence of seven Fortune 500 corporations and more than 70 major charitable foundations, resources Spokane cannot match.
Edwards says he hopes to marshal those assets for a second surge in growth.
For Spokane’s downtown, the major to-do project is renovation of the Fox Theater, which will complete the realization of an arts and entertainment district envisioned by Edwards’ predecessor Karen Valvano when the area around the Davenport was less than vital.
Now, he says, “there’s a lot of flashing lights down there.”
The Spokane River is another under-utilized resource, says Edwards, who has been deeply involved in development of a master plan for the gorge below the Monroe Street Bridge. Just-approved state funding for a whitewater park will start making that plan a reality.
Edwards says the partnership’s next step should be revision of the downtown master plan that dates to 1998. Much has happened since then.
If there have been disappointments during his Spokane tenure, Edwards does not recall them, only the successes.
“Spokane is a place you can come and have an impact,” he says. “If you want to effect change, you can effect change.
“It’s been a great ride.”
For Edwards, and for the Spokane community.