Pacific Raceways and King County square off

Jason Fiorito is fighting a war where victory means keeping his business, Pacific Raceways, operating.

It’s a war which has multiple fronts.

First, there’s the impacts of a down economy.

Second, there’s the fact King County’s Department of Design and Environmental Services considers Pacific Raceways out of compliance when it comes to the “quiet days” portion of its conditional use permit.

Finally, Fiorito is still working to make the vision of a master plan for his property to become reality with the help of King County Councilman Pete von Reichbauer, who has proposed legislation that would make the redevelopment of Pacific Raceways a demonstration project.

“All we’re asking for is a green light to self finance this while mitigating our current conditions,” Fiorito said. “We’ve done as much as King County will allow us to do.”

War with Department of Design

Pacific Raceways is located off the 312th/314th exit of state Route 18, five minutes west of downtown Covington, 15 minutes east of Kent and 15 minutes northeast of Auburn.

Construction was completed on Pacific Raceways in 1960. Fiorito’s grandfather build the track. For a quarter century the property was leased to a group that ran it as Seattle International Raceways. In 2002 Fiorito, who is president of Pacific Raceways, took back operation of the property and reverted it to the original name.

Since then Fiorito has spent countless hours and millions of dollars to operate the business, which has a drag strip, a road course, a paved area for race teams to set up pits with room for a midway and a shifter kart track, which opened in 2009. He also put in $2.1 million grandstands on the south side of the drag strip which hosts bracket races, the National Hot Rod Association’s Northwest Nationals event annually as well as Division 6’s Lucas Oil Series points event.

Fiorito unveiled his master plan in 2006. He had hoped to make more progress on it by now, but stumbling blocks such as the economy, the time it takes to get permits and other issues have slowed things down.

“The fact that it’s not done by now is just as frustrating for me as the fans who thought it would be done by now,” Fiorito said.

In 2008, Fiorito felt like he had made progress with neighbors, who were unhappy with the track, the noise it generated, the traffic it created and the overall impact it had on them six years earlier — something they talked about during annual community meetings.

“In 2002 when I took over the track, the community meetings were packed with 100 people and they were mad,” Fiorito said. “By 2006, the meetings were me, one or two racers and county staff.”

During the past two years, something has changed, and neighbors again are angry with him.

DDES, the county’s development branch which falls under the authority of King County Executive Dow Constantine, sent two letters of noncompliance to Fiorito this year.

John Starbard, director of DDES, explained in a phone interview on Aug. 17 that the county is preparing to enforce the rules laid out in Pacific Raceways’ conditional use permit.

This will take the county and Pacific Raceways before the King County hearing examiner in January.

“It has to do with failure to provide five quiet weekend days during the racing season and the unallowed operation on Monday and Tuesday quiet days,” Starbard said. “There are zoning conditions that apply to the raceway site and among them are the track is to be quiet on Mondays and Tuesdays except for public safety training.”

Additionally, Starbard said, Pacific Raceways must have five quiet days on weekends during the summer “to provide the neighbors the opportunity to enjoy their backyards.”

“The neighbors have asked us very assertively to enforce the terms of the conditional use permit and we have tried to do that,” Starbard said. “We began the code enforcement process last year with a letter, then a more strongly worded letter and now we’ve moved onto the hearing examiner process.”

Fiorito argues the track has been allowed to operate on Mondays and Tuesdays with very specific direction provided by previous DDES staff members that as long as cars on the property were “muffled and street legal” then it met the intent of the CUP, which was issued in 1984.

Each believe the language of the conditional use permit is plain and supports their individual arguments, which are diametrically opposed.

“That’s a fundamental disagreement,” Starbard said.

Fiorito argues DDES is not interpreting the language of the CUP correctly.

On Mondays and Tuesdays Proformance Racing School operates. Fiorito explains this has been approved repeatedly by previous DDES staff members and directors.

The language in the CUP documentation states:

“The hours of tract operation shall be limited to 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., for both testing and racing, with the following exceptions:

“SIR will be closed to all race testing and racing on Monday and Tuesday year-round, provided that these days may be used for racing when a rained out event could not be scheduled for the following weekend, or when a holiday which has a major event associated within it falls on a Monday or Tuesday. Race testing is not meant to exclude police and emergency vehicle testing and training or other non-race related testing functions that are quiet, non-impacting.”

Starbard said Proformance Racing School should not be operating on Mondays and Tuesdays.

“To me it seems like you have a permit for a book store and somewhere along the line you decide to open up a martini bar in the back and it’s extremely profitable,” Starbard said “You were never permitted to have that and you need to shut that down. Mr. Fiorito has come to enjoy the income he has from Proformance Racing School, but it’s income that he’s never been entitled to.”

Instead, Starbard suggested Proformance switch its days of operation to Wednesdays and Thursdays, and “that would go a considerable distance to Mr. Fiorito being in conformance with the laws applying to his property.”

“My response is to say, ‘Go back and look at the language of the gentlemen who drafted it,'” Fiorito said. “As long as the noise we’re creating doesn’t spike above the noise that doesn’t already occur in the neighborhood that means it meets the definition of non-ambient noise.”

To move the racing school to different days will have multiple negative impacts, Fiorito added.

“He’s essentially putting Don Kitsch and the Proformance Racing School out of business,” Fiorito said. “The suggestion that I just take Don and relocate him to Wednesdays and Thursdays is not fair to the clubs who do run unmuffled on those days.”

War with the economy

The money the racing school brings in helps keep Pacific Raceways operating. The school attracts about 20 students typically according to Fiorito. There is more revenue in allowing car clubs to use the tracks on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

And given the current state of the economy, Fiorito said, he can’t afford to lose any revenue.

“Not only do I lose my revenue on Mondays and Tuesdays I have to lower my revenue on Wednesdays and Thursdays on a lower impact,” he said. “Essentially it’s a double hit.”

While Fiorito is spending on average $30,000 a month in attorney’s fees to defend the track against the CUP non-compliance issue, he is working with von Reichbauer on a different tactic for his redevelopment plan, which envisions significant redevelopment of Pacific Raceways.

“The goal behind the master plan is to use other resources besides the racing surfaces to upgrade and maintain the facility,” Fiorito said. “Racing surfaces struggle to maintain profitibality. Operating, maintenance and upgrades of racing surfaces is a very expensive prospect. Every track in the country is going to struggle to keep up with the demands of the cars, the requirements of the sanctioning bodies… so we’ve looked at two models which are sustainable.”

One option is to persuade NASCAR to add a third road race to its high profile, high profit generating Sprint Cup Series, but Fiorito said given the difficulty of that prospect he couldn’t base a business model on that.

“The second business model would be based off a commercial, industrial retail complex,” he said. “That commercial space commands a premium because of its proximity to the racing surface. Businesses that survive because of the racing industry have an advantage if they are located within a race park.”

And those tenants would pay enough rent to support the racing surfaces and the facility which still needs more work.

For example the road course, which was built for 1960s and 1970s era cars, needs to be updated to meet the higher standards of car clubs as well as current road racing vehicles. It needs to be widened, it needs more safety zones and it needs better run off in order to obtain Federal Internacional de Automobile or FIA2 sanctioning. That stamp of approval would allow for more high profile events to come to the road course.

A new drag strip for club racers has been permitted and construction should start early in 2012. Currently the site is being prepared for that work to begin.

Fiorito would like to add an oval race track.

In addition, he would like to see 1 million square feet of industrial space with room for retail allowed on the property.

Fiorito sees race related business, maybe 50 or so tenants, coming in to build car chassis, supply tires, distribute parts as well as possibly serve as home base for race teams.

Strategies have been developed to deal with additional noise and traffic that would be generated if the master plan becomes reality.

Fiorito said the industrial tenants would likely bring in about 1,000 cars a day, the same number of cars that park at the track then shuttle over to the campus of Green River Community College, something his property can easily handle given it has parking for more than 30,000 event spectators.

There are also plans to improve traffic flow going into and out of the race track.

And to mitigate noise, the racing surfaces will be lowered, as well as surrounded by industrial buildings or earthen berms to further reduce the sound of race cars on the track, Fiorito added.

Fiorito said the plan includes improvements to stormwater runoff and will make the property more environmentally friendly.

In addition to looking to the council councilman that represents him, Fiorito has plans to approach members of the Kent, Auburn and Covington city councils to gain their support.

Fiorito will give a full presentation to the Covington City Council on Sept. 13.

“I will be asking the Covington City Council to endorse the legislation proposed by Pete von Reichbauer as well as try to influence the King County DDES into adhering to the historic interpretation and enforcement of the conditional use permit,” Fiorito said. “Those Mondays and Tuesdays have an enormous impact on Covington. My attempt is going to be to convince the Covington City Council, the Kent City Council and the Auburn City Council that Pacific Raceways is a valuable economic and social benefit to their communities and I need their voice … as well as recognition that the development plan will have a positive impact on their communities.”

Starbard said he was not sure why the demonstration project legislation was being advanced.

“The county already has a process for the redevelopment of Pacific Raceways, that would be a special use permit,” Starbard said. “King County Councilman Pete von Reichbauer has introduced an ordinance that would make the redevelopment of Pacific Raceways a demonstration site of how large scale developments could occur in the rural area.”

Pacific Raceways, however, does not seem to be the appropriate place for such a development demonstration Starbard said given “that major developments in rural zoning are not allowed.”

“I think it should operate within the law and that’s the way it should be improved and operated,” Starbard said. “But, to make it into a mega-mall, it may be in Mr. Fiorito’s interest, I don’t see it as being in the neighbor’s interest or in the interest of preserving the rural character of that area.”

Fiorito said he believes the latest round of neighbor opposition to his plan is a result of a lack of trust based on what he describes as the county’s new interpretation of the CUP.

“I truly believe we are in conformance with the intended definition of the language in that CUP but because the county is pressing their new definition of that language it creates an opportunity for the community to say I am dishonest because I’ve chosen to disobey the language of the governing document,” Fiorito said. “This could be done in a different environment, all negotiated with the DDES.”

Instead, Fiorito said, the reaction he’s gotten from DDES has pushed him to pursue the legislation proposed by von Reichbauer.

Fiorito believes the plan is a win-win because it will increase what he describes as an already significant economic impact. He said Pacific Raceways generates tens of millions of dollars a year for the local economy due to the race-related businesses that have sprung up to support it and the racers.

“I kind of naively thought I could walk into any King County council member’s office and explain the benefits and they have to listen to both sides,” Fiorito said. “The opposition has done a good job of impugning my credibility and articulating their fears. I believe at the end of the day the King County Council is going to make the right choice but it’s not because I’m going to be the only one talking to them.”