Work to construct The Constellation Center begins soon

Construction is finally set to begin this summer on The Constellation Center, a new $37 million center of education and training and eight stories of affordable housing that will bring together young adult homelessness service provider YouthCare, affordable housing provider Community Roots Housing, Seattle Central College, FareStart, the King County Center for Education and Career Opportunities and more to create “a hub of workforce development services” in the heart of Capitol Hill at Broadway and Pine.

“This will be a valuable resource center, connecting youth to a wide range of opportunities and support, both on site and in the community. Through this effort, service providers, businesses, post-secondary education, and neighbors will come together to work towards empowering our future leaders and helping them achieve their full potential,” YouthCare says about the project.

“Investing in YouthCare will help us build a hub of hope, resilience, and purpose for young people as they gain skills, develop connections, and become ready for livable wage jobs to sustain their futures,” YouthCare CEO Degale Cooper said in a statement earlier this year.

Originally planned for a 2022 start of construction, the 80,000-square-foot center will be on track for a 2026 opening with a groundbreaking planned for this summer.

Community Roots Housing is leading the development to create the eight stories of affordable housing and the homeless youth “education and employment academy” in this core of Capitol Hill.

Plans call for an “adaptive reuse” project to overhaul and upgrade the existing structures including the historic Booth Building that will remain three stories along E Pine and Broadway. The affordable housing apartment building to the south will rise eight stories on the site of the current surface parking lot.

The large Booth Building at the corner and the smaller E.H. Hamlin Building had been part of Seattle Central’s South Annex facility. Community Roots purchased the property from the school to develop the project with YouthCare.

A rendering of a YouthCare classroom

Just before the wide outbreak of COVID-19, the city’s landmarks board declined to designate the two historic properties involved in the project for landmarks protections, allowing the center to move forward with clearer preservation goals for the more than 100-year-old buildings. A spokesperson told CHS then the developers were “committed to maintaining our plans to be a historic partner and respect both buildings as character structures.”

Part of the city’s efforts to speed up affordable development out of the pandemic, a 2022 administrative design review focused on the eight stories of new housing being added to Broadway with a design by Weinstein A+U that “separates the educational and residential programs to the greatest extent by shifting the added building mass to the south half of the site to create an eight-story structure.”

“Educational programs are centered on the Booth Building, while residential access is located along the south property line,” the architects write. “[T]his organizational approach diminishes the building as perceived from both Broadway and E Pine Street.”

The project is being funded by a mix of public sources, giving, and traditional financing. In 2021, the city announced $10 million for the project as part of a wave of affordable housing grants. A $1 million federal grant was announced this year.

The Constellation Center could be part of two major affordable housing developments opening on Broadway in coming years. The Broadway Urbaine project is also being planned as “100% Publicly-Funded Affordable Housing” and would rise seven stories with 95 new apartments, five ground floor live/work units, and retail space replacing the 118-year-old, two-story commercial building currently home to the Jai Thai restaurant, a collection of businesses including a Mud Bay pet supply store location, plus 14 upper floor apartment units.

Construction of major projects along Broadway are a special challenge as cranes, vehicles, and crews must navigate the area busy with people, businesses, and transit. For The Constellation Center, YouthCare and Community Roots Housing are working with Walsh Construction. The firm also handled the logistics of Community Roots Housing’s LGBTQIA+ focused senior center and affordable housing project Pride Place which opened along Broadway between Pike and Pine in late 2023.

The company wrote about handling the challenges on Broadway in this recent piece for the Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce. “Delivering a project at this dense, transit-rich location involved working around an active streetcar line, installation of complex utilities in the public right of way, and maintaining safe pedestrian access and use within a heavy-use multi-modal commuting corridor,” the Walsh article reads. “Successfully ensuring safe movement of people, streetcars and vehicles along Broadway involved early and frequent coordination with various public agencies including SDOT, King County Metro, SPU, SCL, and SDCI.”

The work will be worth the challenges.

YouthCare says The Constellation Center allow it to serve 250 to 300 individuals ages 18 to 24 per year at the training academy while increasing its capacity to help young people facing homelessness and partners with classrooms, offices, meeting rooms, a computer lab, an event center, and a café in addition to 84 new affordable apartment units. Fifteen of the new homes will be reserved for youth experiencing homelessness.

The Constellation Center will begin construction at Broadway and Pine in coming weeks. Learn more at youthcare.org/constellation-center.

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