Demolition of Seattle’s Lake City Community Center now underway

The building that housed Seattle’s Lake City Community Center until April, when a fire badly damaged the structure, is now being demolished.

Seattle Parks and Recreation has issued an emergency contract to raze the building starting this week, the department announced Wednesday.

The demolition job by Diverse Earthworks should be completed by late February, as long as the weather cooperates, Seattle Parks said.

Officials in May said it wouldn’t make sense to repair and reopen the 1950s-era building.

Even before the fire, the city planned to redevelop the site with affordable housing above a new community center. Seattle Parks and the Seattle Office of Housing will soon seek proposals from developers for the project, Seattle Parks said.

Once a developer has been selected, early next year, the city and a community advisory team will solicit public input on the project, Seattle Parks said. The city hopes to break ground on the new development in 2025.

The old building was an aging structure with no gym, no air conditioning, a dilapidated kitchen and few windows. But it still served as a special place for many Northeast Seattle residents, including the seniors who visited the bare-bones community center to eat nutritious lunches, chat with friends, paint with watercolors, learn computer skills and practice tai chi.

The nonprofit Hunger Intervention Program served free lunches to older adults at the center three days each week, in conjunction with Lake City Seniors, reaching housed and unhoused clients. The groups offered activities like yoga, mahjong and bingo in English, Spanish, Mandarin and Cantonese. Seattle Parks hosted other activities, like karate for teens and soccer for toddlers.

That was disrupted on April 18, when 911 callers reported that a nearby tree was burning and spreading flames to the building around 3 a.m. Firefighters found no one inside, and there was insufficient evidence to determine whether the blaze was intentionally or accidentally set, but the damage was significant, with the fire melting parts of the building’s interior.

Lamb of God Lutheran Church, a congregation across the street from the community center, now hosts the lunches and activities for older adults.

The structure being demolished was originally built by the local Lions Club. It served Lake City residents as a social hub for decades under various operators until becoming an official Seattle community center in 2018.

This story contains information from Seattle Times archives.

This coverage is partially underwritten by Microsoft Philanthropies. The Seattle Times maintains editorial control over this and all its coverage.