Another historic landmark is on the block. This time the offer is for the 270,621-square-foot Power & Light building, which when completed in 1928 was the tallest downtown building.
Designed by the architectural firm of A. E. Doyle with the help of a young apprentice, Pietro Beluschi, in an Italian Renaissance Revival style, it was the home of both Pacific Power & Light and Portland Gas & Coke Company.
It was completed in less than two years just before the beginning of the Great Depression and at the peak of Laissez faire capitalism to house the growth engines of the time. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996 and was carefully updated in 2017-18 to current seismic code and contemporary office standards. It received an LEED Gold Certification this year.
But the current owner, who is local, can’t manage the debt with today’s market conditions and is forced to sell. The market will pick the value today, but expect a serious discount from the last sales price, selling well below “replacement cost.”
I have been in the building. It is lovely. Ironically, one of the few current tenants is ECOnorthwest, the city’s consultant that warned against the current “doom loop” we are experiencing (though still being poo-pooed by the most “progressive” on the City Council).
The building would also be a potential candidate for residential conversion due to its H-shaped floor plate, allowing light into “interior” units. But the apartment and housing market in Oregon is also suffering from the doom loop.
This is a true shame. A beautiful building inside and out, but economically infeasible for any use today. If downtown does not come back, it is likely functionally obsolete and will sit vacant.
The government can’t afford to maintain the city and certainly not this building. Public employees want to work at home. Visitors don’t come to downtown hotels anymore due to the surrounding livability issues. Yes, occupancy at some downtown hotels has ticked up, but at room rates insufficient to operate the building and make the capital investments needed. That’s why the hotels are in receivership and waiting for things to get better. That’s why downtown apartment buildings are selling at a discount.
That means shops and restaurants have too few visitors to stay profitable after paying the higher insurance and security costs required to ensure safety for workers and guests and to deal with the inevitable vandalism and theft.
Entertainment and cultural venues are trying to draw visitors downtown, but car break-ins, transit safety, parking limitations and costs yield negative publicity and resistance to coming into the city after dark. That’s why the Portland Five are struggling and would be losing money, were it not for the Keller Auditorium. We all know that story.
Our doom loop gains momentum from the failure of our Portland and Multnomah County governments to take seriously the behavioral health (addiction and psychosis) crisis and the lack of new housing stock. Who builds new housing when the people who can afford it and are paying the bulk of the taxes are leaving the area?
And the people who can’t afford the housing are coming to Portland at the invitation of the Democratic Socialists of America-inspired bloc of votes on Portland’s City Council—who make up half of the council and have paralyzed the city’s ability to respond to safety and livability problems.
This economic and political doom loop grips our proudly liberal city and state because we seem oddly incapable of compromising to help the very workers and disadvantaged people the City Council DSA bloc professes to care about.
One would be hard pressed to find a climate denier in Portland or Multnomah County. Most of us aspire to universal health care. I for one do not believe that capitalism, as it is being practiced today in this country, is the solution for healing our economic and climate future, certainly long term.
If there are Trump supporters in Portland, they are hiding or rapidly moving through. As a state, we have one billionaire, who is also a big philanthropist. We have some wealthy people, most of whom have given generously to good causes and things that enrich the community. We are certainly not the hotbed of capitalistic growth. I do not know anyone who supports the Trump Administration’s immigration policies and tactics.
As former addict and an ex-con, I have plenty of strong opinions about and compassion for those living on our streets with addiction and psychosis. I want these problems fixed now and have been volunteering my time to that end.
The vast majority of us want a safe livable city with some economic vitality, one that produces living-wage jobs in a city with sports activity, cultural opportunities and diversity, housing we can afford and with racial and ethnic diversity. The current City Council and County Board are doing little to produce this. They are focused on building power.
The most important thing we can do in District 4 is to fire Mitch Green and stop the 6-6 stalemate on City Council. But that will not be enough unless we change the county chair, who acts as CEO for the county.
We can start by hiring Dr. Sharon Meieran to replace the departing Jessica Vega Pederson, who continued the ill-conceived policies of Debra Kafoury to the point where Multnomah County is dysfunctional in almost every area the county chair is responsible for.
The pandemic set the stage, but the decisions of the state, city and county made in response to it are responsible for the doom loop we are in. And yes, for the lack of sustainable economic use of the many historical buildings downtown and in District 4, including this landmark historic building.
We cannot change the current status quo with those active in sustaining it in office. Let’s do that in November and set the stage for improvement.
At an average daily room rate that is sustainable for an owner? Why are most hotels being run by lender’s Recievers?
We need foot traffic at night and weekdays during the day. What are the stats there. I have lived downtown 20 years. There is some “lying with statistics” going on here. I see the City 24/7 and those statistics don’t tell the whole truth.