A Seattle Housing Authority manager said last week that redevelopment plans for Yesler Terrace, a nearly 70-year-old public housing community that SHA owns on First Hill, may be moving east of Boren Avenue, beyond the boundary of today's Yesler Terrace.
The redevelopment is slated to replace the site's 561 low-income units with a 4,000- to 5,000-unit high-rise community of low-income, workforce and market-rate housing. The idea of expansion has been raised before, but it is the first time SHA has given any specifics.
SHA Development Director Stephanie Van Dyke said the agency owns several properties along Yesler Way east of Boren, including an old Pizza Time location at Yesler and 12th Avenue. The agency may use that site to start building replacements for some of Yesler Terrace's residents, Van Dyke said.
Between 12th and 14th avenues, SHA has emptied and may tear down an apartment building called the Baldwin to do the same, or it may try to strike deals with King County and the Urban League of Metropolitan Seattle to acquire a neighboring warehouse and office building. Any units built east of Boren, Van Dyke said, would count toward SHA's promise of one-for-one replacement for today's 561 low-income units.