Editor’s note: This is the second story in a continuing series on West Hill’s efforts to cope with crime, a struggling economy and social issues. Someday, West Hill could become a part of Renton. The first article covered how West Hill is fighting back against crime.

When the Skyway Model Shop opened its doors in 1994, Renton Avenue had several restaurants, a grocery store and the beloved A&H Drugs.

The regional economy was strong, but still one by one businesses were shuttered and many residents left with them, said shop owner Emil Minerich.

“We used to have a really nice business community here,” he said. “I’ve been really saddened to see some of the businesses go.”

Many blame Walmart and Fred Meyer for opening so close in Renton, but city officials are finding West Hill residents want local businesses again and hope to reveal the potential of the community’s barren business community.

Unlike the grocers, Minerich’s model kit store held on strong, because its clientele are willing to travel from Tacoma to Canada for the store’s selection.

The kits neatly line the walls from floor to ceiling. Some of them are vintage, opened but never assembled.

Don’t expect to find other hobby supplies in Skyway Model, just paint and tools. Minerich will tell you it’s his addiction turned into a job.

“There is no one else who does what we do,” Minerich said.

His store is one of the few family businesses left on the block, he said.

The change he’s seen has been disheartening.

Two people have been murdered within 100 feet of the storefront, he said. At night carousers gather outside for drinking and other illegal activities. The sheriff’s storefront is only a few hundred feet away, and the deputies often drive by too busy to stop, he said.

Minerich and other businesses on West Hill are considering the possible annexation to the City of Renton in a 2012 vote.

“The era of doing nothing and being unincorporated is leaving,” he said, but he still hasn’t decided if Renton is the right choice.

For him the solution for revitalizing the district is as simple as more youth programs and a successful supermarket.

“You need some type of unifying retail,” he said, pointing out a window to an old grocery store building that’s now a food bank.

The whole thing should just be flattened and re-developed, he said.

The decline

When Ron Minter purchased the Minter Earlington Nursery in 1996, the business was focused on wholesaling quality plants.

But just as box stores began knocking mom and pop grocers out of business with cheap goods, big nurseries in Canada and Mexico began underselling the local nurseries at hardware stores.

Minter laid off several workers and refocused on the storefront on Renton Avenue South.

“We have cut back considerably,” he said.

Minter’s plight was similar to the three West Hill/Skyway grocery stores that closed or moved from the area, said Cheryl Scheuerman, president of the West Hill Business Association and manager of the Skyway Water and Sewer District.

Fred Meyer and Walmart opened stores on Rainier Avenue South, drawing residents from West Hill, she said.

“I really believed the local consumer was looking for cheaper prices and didn’t understand the need to shop local,” Minter said. “If you talk to the average person up there now, they’ll say they probably should have supported the local grocery stores.”

Scheuerman joined a group of business owners to restart the WHBA as a support system in 2001, but stores continued to close.

“It’s very discouraging,” she said. “It’s almost a grief process.”

The last grocer to test the waters in West Hill was the Greenfresh Market, which opened along Rainier Avenue North in 2007.

The impressive new store, which had an emphasis on quality produce, closed in early 2009, after a power outage destroyed many of its goods.

Many Skyway businesses are like the Greenfresh building is now, empty.

Scheuerman drove along Renton Avenue pointing out places she missed and businesses still hanging on with a history in hand.

“It’s kind of a skeleton of its former self now,” she said.

She misses Greenfresh, but disagrees with the notion that West Hill simply needs a market.

“A grocery store isn’t going to cut it anymore,” she said.

Great potential

There are a few signs that residents are becoming disenchanted with box stores in favor of shopping local, said Renton’s Economic Development chief, Suzanne Dale Estey. “I think the pendulum is swinging back.”

Walmart is beginning to introduce Neighborhood Markets, which are about a quarter of the superstore size, she said.

The new stores focus solely on groceries, and Renton has begun its own efforts to recruit one.

The fact that Walmart is scaling down is a good sign for West Hill, she said.

The West Hill community, like many others, wants a walkable business district, she said. “People want to be able to walk to their grocery store and their post office and to bike down the street to grab some milk.”

The change in resident attitude coupled with the abundant opportunities for development on Renton Avenue give West Hill a high potential for growth.

That potential is the best dowry West Hill can hope to offer the City of Renton, as the City Council still debates annexation.

As finances are now, an annexation would cost the city about $1.7 million each year to make up the difference between West Hill’s tax revenue and how much the area costs to serve.

That gap could grow to as large as $5.5 million in 10 years, said Marty Wine, the city’s assistant chief administrative officer.

The numbers aren’t optimistic, and assume the West Hill won’t see any new business or revitalization. West Hill still has the potential to excel, Wine said.

City Council charged city administrators to leave “no rock unturned” in finding ways to close the funding shortfall for the first few years of annexation, she said.

If the city can’t come up with the money, the council still has the opportunity to reject a positive annexation vote.

The city already received a $25 million agreement from the state, and it continues to talk with King County.

The next step is to cut expenses, Wine said. “If we can keep our costs in check, we don’t need as much revenue.”

What Renton offers

Since Minter purchased the Earlington nursery 12 years ago, he’s had about 15 break-ins, he said.

He suspects local teens and drug users were responsible for prying open the empty cash register and raiding the refrigerators.

Two years ago he decided that he had enough. He pushed for annexing the Earlington neighborhood.

He wanted police protection, but he also wanted to tell people the nursery was in Renton instead of in the Skyway area.

The greenhouse’s West Hill location is a turnoff for potential new customers, because of area’s reputation for being unsafe, he said. “(Annexation) would change the perception of Skyway.”

The Earlington neighborhood annexed in August 2009. Now Minter, along with the West Hill Business Association, is spreading a good word about annexation.

In addition to safety, the city’s economic development team promises a slew of resources to help revitalize the business districts.

While the West Hill annexation is far from decided, Renton already went to bat for the hill in Olympia, winning a $250,000 grant for sidewalks in the business district.

King County matched the effort, wining an additional $190,000 federal grant.

“We’re going to work together to help build sidewalks and create a safer place where people would want to shop,” Dale Estey said.

Unlike the county, Renton has the resources to be tougher on code compliance.

When residents began to complain about the abandoned Chinook Motel, the county’s response was to fence the property, Wine said.

While the fences discouraged camping and illegal activity, the property is still an eyesore. The city could do more, she said.

“We would aggressively pursue the take-down and redevelopment of that property,” Dale Estey said.

West Hill would get its own master plan and more organized zoning laws.

Today, the area is poorly organized, said Scheuerman. “It’s just potpourri.”

The city also recruits new businesses with self-promotion and by offering tax breaks and new roads for larger developments.

The economic development team has a great track record with areas its focused on, such as The Landing, she said.

“We really believe in the opportunity of this area,” Dale Estey said. “It will be a tremendous challenge, but the residents of West Hill/Skyway deserve the opportunity to thrive.”