Monroe seeks local input for future community center downtown

MONROE — For 35 years, people would flock to the old Avalon Theatre to catch a movie or attend a Christmas party.

After the theater’s closure in February 1966 and demolition two years later, a bank was built on the lot at 209 West Main St.

A few years after, planning began for a new gathering place.

More than 60 years later, a new public space downtown is nearing reality. What that will look like is yet to be decided.

The city last month bought half an acre of land in the northwest corner of West Main Street and Blakeley Street, where the Avalon once stood. The site includes the Union Bank building, bought for $1.8 million; the smaller adjacent chiropractor’s office, bought for $500,000; and a parking lot. It took decades because there isn’t much space downtown for a project like this one, City Administrator Deborah Knight said.

Short-term plans include using the space for public bathrooms or more parking, Knight said.

At the moment, she said, the city has no money to develop the site. Eventual funding options include grants from the state Recreation and Conservation Office, park impact fees and excise taxes.

“It’ll be exciting when it finally gets build out,” she said.

Both short- and long-term plans will be decided by locals.

Lance Bailey, the city’s community development director, said the city plans to host a series of meetings to get public input.

“I don’t want what I say to seem like we have a predetermined outcome, because we really don’t know,” Bailey said. “Ultimately, what the idea that comes up, we may not even have thought on that yet.”

Janelle Drews, the executive director of the Monroe Chamber of Commerce, is enthusiastic about the plans for downtown.

“The restrooms will bring people into Monroe and downtown,” she said. “Few businesses downtown offer bathrooms.”

In the longer term, Drews said an indoor events space would be great, given Washington weather.

That sounds great to Carol Cole, who has run her at-home baking venture Cocoa Grammy since 2019. She tried to take advantage of farmers markets, but setting up a tent can be a lot when her husband can’t help due to work. Cole sees Bothell’s Pop Shops on Main as a model for what could be in Monroe.

“They are offering little closed rental places to set up little shops,” she said via message Thursday, as she baked sugar cookies decorated like onesies for a baby shower. “I’d like to see something like that or even a pavilion where each shop could set up undercover.”

Lilly Goering, the Helping Hands Thrift Store supervisor, said she’d welcome more places to connect with the community. The store has public bathrooms, but Goering would like customers to have more options.

Across the lot bought by the city, Shannon Muse, a hairdresser at aj’s salon, was skeptical of some proposals.

“Public restrooms will bring the wrong crowd,” Muse said. “It’s not going to be for the customer base around here. I’ll tell you that.”

She thinks a park would work but there isn’t enough parking for it. If she owned the lot she’d make it into a medium-rise building with apartments on top and businesses at street level.

At Wednesday’s meeting of the Monroe Historical Society, City Council member Tami Beaumont said bathrooms would be good for businesses.

“We want to put public bathrooms so that there are places for people to go while they’re downtown shopping, which most communities have,” she said. “But I think we really are open to any ideas that people have.”

Beaumont noted Monroe used to have a community gathering place at Lewis Street and West Main Street. That space hosted tree lightings and high school band performances. Now, the lighting happens at Travelers Park, right next to U.S. 2.

“We’ve moved away from that now,” she said, “and we need to move back downtown.”

Aina de Lapparent Alvarez: 425-339-3449; aina.delapparentalvarez@heraldnet.com; Twitter: @Ainadla.