Thursday's meeting began with a lineup of men gushing about how delighted they were with AlphaGraphics Inc.'s plans to transform the Brooks Arcade. But harmony turned to tension before the session ended as historic preservation became an issue.
"Let me just say I love the look of this," said Roger Thompson, speaking for most of his fellow Salt Lake City Redevelopment Agency members. Big-D Construction and AlphaGraphics president Michael Witte had just unveiled renderings of a scrubbed-clean Brooks facade at 300 South and State Street, alongside a glassed addition that will encase upscale condominiums, shopping, dining and AlphaGraphics' U.S. headquarters.
But after nearly an hour of discussing the roof garden, parking garage and pedestrian walkways, the RDA wasn't quite ready to approve the design.
"The (Utah) Heritage Foundation has provided us with a letter today," said RDA member Tom Rogan. The letter reiterated that group's bitter opposition to what it calls "facadism" — the shaving and retention of the front of a building before demolition of its body. AlphaGraphics plans to keep only the face of the Brooks Arcade while erecting a modern structure behind it.
"It's become the trend in Salt Lake City," said foundation member Don Mahoney, "to change the meaning of the word 'preservation' to 'pretense.' " AlphaGraphics says this is a preservation of the historic building, he added, "but that's not what this is. It's Disneyland."
The Heritage Foundation organized a protest of the AlphaGraphics plan last week in front of the Brooks Arcade on State Street. City officials, who had been relieved to find a developer to renovate the crumbling building, said that was the first they'd heard of the foundation's objections.
At Thursday's RDA meeting, Rogan asked AlphaGraphics chief Witte if he had spoken to anyone from the foundation. "We're willing to consider any information they send us," Witte replied. "We have not received any to date."
Rogan requested that a "friendly amendment" be added to the imminent RDA approval of AlphaGraphics' design plan: If Witte will be open to Heritage Foundation input as the project moves ahead, Rogan said he would vote in favor of the plan.
"We'd be glad to sit down with them," Witte said, but he added that he's unwilling to submit any part of the design to Heritage Foundation approval. "We're under a schedule that's crushing," Witte said, referring to his plan to finish construction and have his retail and restaurant tenants before the 2002 Winter Games arrive.
The RDA ultimately unanimously approved AlphaGraphics' plan for the Brooks Arcade. Next week, the city's deal, which includes $5.2 million in incentives for the company, will be complete and Witte said groundbreaking will follow soon afterward. He said he's already talking with prospective tenants for the 25,000-square-foot ground level and hopes they will include "an upscale restaurant, some sort of club and some smaller retail shops."
Though both Witte and Mahoney said they would welcome the chance to talk to each other about the project, the men didn't approach each other at Thursday's meeting. Mahoney said the Brooks Arcade may be "lost," but he'll turn his focus to another downtown historic building: Oddfellows Hall. That Market Street structure could be the next historic building to be demolished. "It's back in the sights" of the federal government as it seeks a place to expand the Moss Courthouse.
"Our hope is to make people understand that Oddfellows isn't a lost cause," Mahoney said. "We don't want to be falsely accused again of not trying" to save a historic landmark.
E-MAIL: durbani@desnews.com