Centralia: Alderhouse Stands in One Route to Centralia Station; Representative Wants More Than Market Value From Sale

Sept. 01--A group of disabled adults has been living together for a number of years on Alder Street, but the house sits in a possible route to the future Centralia Station development, and that's raised the hackles of an organization looking to buy the property.

Michael Pollowitz, a consultant working on contract for the Foundation for the Challenged, the organization looking to buy a group home, has accused the Port of Centralia of threatening to force the disabled residents out via a forced sale.

The port denies the allegation, saying they have politicized the issue before real discussions have even started.

"I think it's a power struggle," said Brent Taylor, the board chairman for Alderhouse, the group home in question.

Alderhouse is home to six disabled adults. It'srunby a nonprofit board. The board was looking for another organization to take over and manage the home, so they approached the Foundation for the Challenged.

Foundation for the Challenged is a nonprofit that owns and manages about 90 group homes around the country for people with disabilities. Shortly after Alderhouse and the foundation met, someone on behalf of the Port of Centralia approached the Alderhouse board about buying the home.

Now the Port and Pollowitz are at odds.

Pollowitz is a consultant based out of Shoreline working on contract with the foundation to handle the purchase. When Pollowitz found out the Port was also interested, he told Taylor to sell Alderhouse to the foundation and he'd handle the negotiations with the port.

Pollowitz went before the Centralia City Council last Tuesday to plead Alderhouse's case. The city isn't involved in the situation, but he told them the port is looking to either purchase Alderhouse or acquire it by eminent domain to build a route to Centralia Station and "take this resource away from the people who live there."

If the residents do have to move, he said, Alderhouse will need much more than the property's market rate to build a house suited to the needs of the disabled.

Port of Centralia Director Kyle Heaton said there isn't a pressing timeline to complete the purchase, nor has the port suggested using eminent domain to acquire Alderhouse. He also doesn't understand why Pollowitz brought the matter to the city council.

"We're confused by the tactic," Heaton said. "... The Port Commission has no intention of doing anything adverse to residents of Alderhouse."

Heaton said the Port has done nothing to suggest exercising eminent domain against Alderhouse. But to buy it, normally the Port wouldn't offer more than fair market value because the law won't allow it, Heaton said.

The Port has purchased about 20 other properties around Alderhouse. He said the route along Alder Street to Centralia Station "makes the most sense" but there are at least two other possible options to entering the development. However, the Port hasn't yet done a route study to determine the best solution, he said.

The problem, Pollowitz says, is if the Port buys the property at the market rate of about $315,000, the money won't cover the costs of moving the residents. The foundation would need close to $1 million to retrofit a three-bedroom house and build a fourth bedroom to accommodate people with special needs. But Pollowitz doesn't want them to have to move at all. If they have to, he believes the Port should be paying much more to accommodate the move.

"This is economic development. They're taking this property so a Walmart or a Home Depot can move on the other side," Pollowitz said. "They're not taking for what we used to think about the public good; they're taking so for-profit businesses can make money."

The two sides met once in late July at Centralia City Hall where Pollowitz and Heaton explained their situations.

"I'd say we spent 90 percent of the time trying to figure out what kind of facility these folks need to have so we could leave that meeting to find something that would work for them," Centralia City Manager Rob Hill said.

They discussed how much the foundation would need out of a sale, but Pollowitz said Heaton wouldn't budge on the sale price of Alderhouse.

"He wasn't volunteering one nickle above market value," Pollowitz said.

Heaton said he didn't because he can't.

The port is a public entity, and because of that, he's prohibited by state law from spending more taxpayer money than necessary when acquiring property.

"The Port has a process it has to follow. It can't give more than it's allowed no matter how fine the organization is," he said. "If we do acquire Alderhouse, they'll be taken care of, but within the bounds of the statute."

But Heaton said there are other possibilities, such as physically moving the Alderhouse onto a different piece of property, but those options haven't been fully explored.

Pollowitz said the Foundation for the Challenged isn't contributing any of its own money to buy Alderhouse or to complete the remodel.

On behalf of Foundation for the Challenged, Pollowtiz applied for a $490,000 grant from the Department of Commerce House Trust Fund to buy off Alderhouse's mortgage and upgrade the property. The entire project is funded by public grants. According to GuideStar, an organization dedicated to the transparency of nonprofit organizations, Foundation for the Challenged revenues were $1 million more than its expenses for 2013. Calls to the foundation's headquarters in Dublin, Ohio, were deferred to Pollowitz.

Alderhouse has had some financial problems in recent years. Taylor said at one point the county threatened them with foreclosure because they were three years behind on property taxes, because an accountant who was volunteering with the group mishandled its nonprofit paperwork. Some parents of the people living in Alderhouse paid part of the debt to remove the foreclosure threat, but some back taxes remain.

There's an account in Alderhouse's name on the fundraising website Kickstarter that says the house is 2 1/2 years behind on its taxes, but Taylor says whoever administers it hasn't updated it because the situation isn't so bad anymore. Either way, Alderhouse's situation remains.

"The port wants the dirt really bad for Centralia Station, but we need sufficient amount of funds to find or build a new facility -- plain and simple -- or the residents are out on the street," Taylor said.

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