NDC’s Michelle Morlan and Con Vong on the job site at the new White Square Center. NDC put the pieces of the financing puzzle together using NMTCs and HUD Section 108. Photo Courtesy of White Center Now.

The economic fortunes of White Center, WA, an unincorporated community of 32,000 adjacent to Seattle, will be receiving a much-needed boost with the recently begun development of White Center Square. A project of local businessman, Con Vong and his family, White Center Square will be a commercial retail center on an infill site in the community’s commercial business hub, now home to nearly 140 businesses whose ownership reflects the great ethnic diversity of White Center itself.  

Although the community suffers from both unemployment and poverty rates exceeding national averages and median household income significantly below that of its neighbors, it is a busy urban area whose strength lies in that ethnic and socioeconomic diversity.  The economic downturn stalled White Center’s development and made business financing more difficult even for established companies. Con Vong and his family searched for a year without success for conventional financing to relocate and expand their grocery business, a neighborhood institution for more than ten years,
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