Turco’s Last Stand on 3rd Avenue and Pike Street survived nearly the entire 20th century, a fire in 2006, several burglaries, and the ongoing demise of print journalism, but it may not survive the profit motive of the guy who partly owns the old Woolworth’s building next door, which currently houses a Ross Dress for Less.
On Sunday the City removed the kiosk, risking the deletion of over a century of labor and journalism history, plus a slew of harm-reduction services that the current operator, Ben Gant, provides for people who live and hang around the block.
“They removed the stand without giving me an exact date beforehand, and they impounded it. They must have taken all my things in there, too,” said Gant, who has operated the newsstand on the sidewalk for the last 22 years.
In a November 2021, Art Wahl, who partly owns the corner lot, wrote a letter to Gant saying he wanted the stand removed and would pay $7,500 for the courtesy. If the two parties couldn’t reach an agreement, then he and his partners would “do everything we can to have it removed without compensation to you,” Wahl wrote.
After hearing no response from Gant, in the spring of 2022 Wahl asked the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) to revoke Gant’s permit, claiming that Gant had “never lived up to lease provisions with regards to being open, nor what is being sold.” The permit requires its holder to keep regular hours and only to vend publications.
In March of 2023, SDOT sent Gant a notice revoking the permit and ordering him to remove the stand by April 17 of that year. The notice gave no explanation for the revocation, apart from describing the temporary nature of permits.
Gant quickly filed an appeal, arguing that earlier permits procured from King County by former newsstand owners still apply today.
After a review of its decision, SDOT decided it had made the correct one and “determined [the permit for the newsstand] is not an appropriate use to continue at that location” and informed him that they’d be removing the structure. After some more bureaucratic back and forth, on Friday Gant filed a preliminary injunction to stop the City from dismantling the stand. He plans to represent himself in the matter but said he “could use a paralegal.”
But that filing apparently did not bother the City, who removed the kiosk Sunday.
In a 2022 phone interview, Wahl reiterated his complaints about Gant not using the newsstand for its intended purpose and then quit dancing around the issue. “It’s an absolute eyesore,” he said of the stand. An “eyesore” sitting on the sidewalk outside gives the building’s current tenant, Ross, the ability to credibly bargain for less rent or else to leave the spot entirely, and that’s a problem for Wahl.
Wahl acknowledged the block’s long and troubled history, but he argued that the stand was an “eyesore” before the pandemic and would continue to be one.
Gant acknowledged that Turco’s Last Stand, named after a storied union activist, hasn’t sold periodicals since the pandemic. But as the block has changed, the newsstand has changed to try to serve the block.
In a letter to the Seattle City Council, Gant said he’s “given away over 1,200 copies of the Emerald City Resource Guides provided by the Real Change Newspaper,” which helps connect people in need with City resources.
In December of 2022, Gant and Piroshky Piroshky owner Olga Sagan teamed up to hand out leftover pastries to the people who try to live and make a living down on 3rd Ave. Around this time last year, the City’s We Deliver Care Team took over that duty, he and Sagan said.
That year, Gant said he started working with King County to provide naloxone to help save people from overdosing. “I have distributed more than 2,800 of those doses to people in need, and we have resuscitated 33 people on the sidewalk,” he said.
Gant also said he picks up King County’s condom cubes and distributes them in the area. By his count, he’s handed out “over 10,000 free condoms to people.”
Finally, he’s been working with the Affordable Connectivity Program and Lifeline to hand out more than 1,000 “federally funded cell phones to low-income and homeless people” to help them navigate the byzantine systems entrapping them. Gant said the City’s removal of the stand means some people won’t get their phones as scheduled on Monday.
To Wahl’s point about the “eyesore,” Gant admits that people tag and bust up the shop a lot, but he said repeated burglaries slow repairs, and services keep falling through on graffiti clean-up, but he works on it tirelessly. “I’ve spent thousands of dollars and given my blood sweat and tears repairing and cleaning the newsstand,” he wrote in an email to the City that lays out his case for keeping his permit active.
He’s also risked his own mental health. Back in 2019, a “mosquito” device installed outside of the Kress IGA tormented him for months. And since December of last year, he’s dealt with loud music blaring from Ross.
Despite all the hassle, the history of the newsstand keeps Gant in the fight.
Frank Turco opened the newsstand back in 1919. (Check out the photo here.) The one-legged labor activist founded the Newsboys Union and sold papers out of the place for nearly half a century. He unsuccessfully ran for City Council in the 1940s, and helped organize the Seattle General Strike.
If Gant finds a way to get the kiosk out of storage, he wants to wrap the it in old photos, showcasing the under-sung labor history of the place “in hopes of educating the public and encouraging people from all walks of life to get civically involved.”
Gant established a GoFundMe to pay for legal costs and to help save the place.
Not worth reducing overdose deaths, helping prevent spread of stds, and feeding hungry people while connecting them with services they need if it means we may lose that cornerstone of downtown Seattle’s history/culture and its economic powerhouse, the Ross Dress for Less.
LOL at “…the people who try to live and make a living down on 3rd Ave”.
I guess I’m sad to see it go though I can’t say I ever used it – there’s still a newsstand inside the post office at Union.
There are lots of things that need to be remove on 3rd… This was not in the top 100.
@1
Overdose deaths and STDs are Seattles culture.
So let me get this straight: this stand – which operates under a permit that states the stand must 1) sell periodicals and 2) keep regular hours – doesn’t sell periodicals anymore nor does it keep regular hours, and the owner is shocked that SDOT revoked the permit and took his shack away?
Like @3 said… there are lots of things that need to be removed on 3rd (can we nuke the whole street off the map?), but this seemed like a weird place to start. It’s not like Ross is gunning for high end clientele and this place was deterring people from shopping in-store. I lived downtown for 5 years and honestly can’t remember seeing this place once, so it doesn’t seem like much of a loss.
Lets be honest here that newsstand has not sold news in years and is a complete eyesore and blocks part of the sidewalk at a very busy bus stop. All the services Gant claims to have been providing are available elsewhere often in much more appropriate locations offering additional services. This block has become an open air drug market with people doing fentanyl yoga at all hours. At least now the sidewalk will have more room to navigate around the yoga practitioners.
How fucking sad is it that a space that was used for decades to distribute knowledge and entertainment is now used to keep humans from dying on the street?
Limiting 3rd Ave to bus traffic only has outlived its usefulness. There are many fewer bus routes now that the majority of commuters to downtown link up to Light Rail.
Maybe let regular vehicle traffic back? Eyes on the street…
I kind of like the idea of someone selling something besides fentanyl at 3d and Pike.
Of course it was torn down. In the U.S., the government, whether city state or federal is woned and controlled by soul-less profi9teers – and it shows especially well in the City of Seattle which has become pretty much two-dimensional. The #1 rule is the rentiers come first. In fact, in this country/city/state the rentiers come first, last and only.
Why doesn’t Gant erect his own structure – maybe one that could be taken down moved to different locations along 3rd Ave – and continue to do what he’s been doing? I fail to see why a specific piece of built environment such as this booth is crucial to his outreach.
The City was hell bent on breaking various laws and municipal codes in order to make this happen. Why else would the SDOT gentrification lackeys and the city attorney expedite the removal of his newsstand immediately after being served with a TRO hearing notice? What an absolutely disgraceful and grotesque way for city officials to conduct themselves as they abuse laws put in place for our protection from them, such as due process. The city’s Mafia like behavior needs to be investigated because this is very hostile and scary. The main theme seems to be that of the city continually harassing this man with audio torture and other methods of bullying instead of treating him with even a basic level of human decency. They are cowards because this is not leadership. I cannot even believe they hijacked Ben’s Piroshky connection when they are receiving millions for this. Pathetic.
The only people the city leaders are serving are themselves and predatory realtors like Art Wahl because no one wanted or even asked for the removal of our history. What a sad time for Seattle. The ray of hope here is knowing there are still many kind hearted people out there in the world like Ben. I wish him the best and hope he sues and gets some Justice. Excellent reporting.
This is a simple case. His permit is for a newstand. He is not operating a newstand and hasn’t in some time. Case closed. The fact TS and other commenters agree with his new purpose is irrelevant. If he wants to do that apply for a new permit.
The man offered multiple and diverse publications. There were U.S. Constitutions inside the Newsstand when the city unlawfully removed it. I wonder who got to hold the box of U.S Constitution’s as they ransacked his Newsstand or if they just threw them in the garbage. SDOT gave him no reason at all for the revocation of any of his permits. The city may now try to give poor excuses as to why they violated Gant’s Civil Right’s which would inevitably be completely dishonest. They are just looking like straight up villains with a total disdain for the people they are looking and punching down upon.