Payne Redesigns $15M Office Proposal

SPOKANE, WA-Local developer Al Payne wants to develop the first new class A office building in the CBD here in 15 years. All he needs is an anchor tenant.

The owner of Payne Properties tells GlobeSt.com he acquired half of the former Newberry’s department store out of bankruptcy in 1996. Last year, he optioned the other half. Payne says an earlier design for transforming the three-story retail building into a class A office development met with disappointment, but his new design is catching people’s eyes in a good way.

“The primary tenant we were pursuing wasn’t pleased with it and we weren’t either; there was a lot of wasted space,” says Payne. “People said polite things about the first design, while this second one was genuinely well received; the reaction was completely different.”