Workforce housing gets boost

A $10.25 million project that will transform a historic warehouse in downtown Spokane into 50 workforce housing apartments is getting under way after two years of planning.

Construction has begun on the Borning Building, a four-story, 42,600-square-foot building at 151 S. Adams St. When completed, Cornerstone Courtyard will have apartments that rent on a sliding scale based on income and eligibility, said Art Noll, facilities manager for Northeast Washington Housing Solutions, formerly known as Spokane Housing Authority.

Noll said one-bedroom units will rent for $364 to $466 a month, two-bedrooms for $432 to $554 and three-bedrooms for $488 to $630 a month.

Providing workforce housing is increasingly important as the downtown Spokane core develops, he explained.

“If we don’t provide affordable housing for the people who are the waiters and waitresses downtown we aren’t going to have a viable downtown,” Noll said.

The warehouse, just south of the railroad viaduct, was purchased for $1.3 million two years ago, by Northeast Washington Housing Solutions. The project is being financed by a partnership that includes the government, lending institutions and the state housing trust fund.

Although the building is currently a four-story rectangle, a section will be removed to create a U-shaped complex with windows allowing for light. Features will include some underground parking, exercise and laundry rooms and a community area.

Parts of the building date back to the early 1900s, when H.S. Harman & Co., a furniture wholesaler, did business there.

The design will incorporate some of the former warehouse’s more unique features, said Barry Hoyne of Tonkin/Hoyne/Lokan Architecture and Urban Design, the Seattle-based company designing the project.

“It has some interesting concrete work. It’s got these mushroom-shaped columns,” Hoyne said.

Walker Construction is doing the construction, which could be completed by the end of 2007.