Should Seattleites get a say in what happens to The Showbox?

Say what you will about Seattle City Councilwoman Kshama Sawant, but she definitely knows how to keep herself in the action.

RELATED: Save The Showbox? Should have saved Arena, too

Her latest move came last night at a meeting where she proposed that the council expand the boundaries of the Pike Place Market to include The Showbox for a two-year review. She introduced the bill by saying, “This is a question of whether the people in Seattle will have any democratic say in what is saved and what will be demolished.”

That raises a very interesting concept. Who gets the say in a
democracy about what is saved or what is demolished?

Let’s look at this first from the perspective of the current building owner. The music conglomerate AEG bought The Showbox from Jeff Steichen in 2007 with the idea of running a profitable music venue in downtown Seattle. Little did they know that market forces would take their piece of real estate and make it incredibly valuable. From a business perspective, they bought low and now they get to sell high.

If you take the sentimentality out of it, it’s kind of a no-brainer. It became clear that it was more profitable to sell the building than to host music shows.

From the city’s perspective, I get that it could be a popular move among middle-aged voters if you “Save The Showbox.” That could help you get re-elected. But I would like to point out that The Showbox has been sitting in plain sight for decades. Seems to me like there has been ample opportunity to nominate it as a historic site over the years. Maybe it’s one of those “don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone” type things?

Back to the underlying premise of Sawant’s proposal. Should the people in Seattle have a democratic say in what is saved? By “democratic say” does she mean a vote? Are we going to start holding elections as to which buildings get torn down? That seems a bit ridiculous. Why should the people of Seattle get to vote in a matter of a private real estate deal? I don’t want someone else having a say so in what I buy or sell. That’s just crazy.

And yet, the city council seems poised to fast-track this proposal.

If you want to designate it a historic site after the sale, I guess you can do that. But then does the city owe AEG some money? They had a signed contract on the table worth millions of dollars that suddenly evaporates by no fault of their own.

Listen, I think there’s a way to preserve some semblance of the music venue downstairs and still build a building upstairs. But I have a real problem with doing it this way. Sit down at the table with all the parties involved and work out a deal, don’t just do a political end around that denies the seller his right to sell something he owns.

That’s not how the free market works — except in Seattle.

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