It’s a good time to be attentive about what is gained, and also what is lost, in the process.

For example, Fort Worden State Park is on the cusp of tremendous change. Years of work have gone into convincing the landowner – the Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission – to allow a Port Townsend-based vision to be sketched out in bold ink and implemented on those 434 acres of forest, embattlements, barracks, performance halls and officers’ housing.

The vision was first housed in Centrum, then in the Fort Worden Collaborative, and now in the Public Development Authority (PDA) enacted by the Port Townsend City Council. It is far from coincidence that Thatcher Bailey has been in the midst of all three entities as they performed their role toward a new governing structure and new priorities for Fort Worden. Bailey and the vision have many other supporters, including Cindy Finnie, John Begley, Kate Burke and Rodger Schmitt. They are more recently joined by Dave Robison and Rick Sepler.

Now comes the part where vision becomes tangible. New nonprofits are being recruited to base themselves at Fort Worden and to build up programs that draw people to residential learning experiences along the model of Centrum. The vision of the “lifelong learning center” for the fort, in fact, is that one day there will be half a dozen entities like Centrum based at the fort and offering programs that fill the barracks, the housing and the dining hall with paying customers. Those customers would not only be transformed by the program – be it the arts or historical restoration work – but also transform the town economically as they eat out, make visits, buy stuff and perhaps choose never to leave.

What could be lost?

Sounds good. But what could be lost?

It’s possible that Centrum, the cornerstone on which this vision is built, or at least some Centrum programs, faces risks. The organization will have more competition for venues and housing, and certainly higher expense as the entire “heads in beds, forks in mouths” economic model triggers increasing fees for housing and food, and mandated links between the two. While Centrum is on solid footing and has reliable leadership under John MacElwee, the recession – together with higher prices and more rules – has already had an impact on attendance at long-standing programs such as Fiddle Tunes and Country Blues, whose adherents are often not wealthy.

Making music and doing art for the sake of expression may be slipping underneath the new economic model of the fort.

Many of the longtime fort tenants focused on history, such as the Commanding Officer’s Quarters or the Coast Artillery Museum, have benefited over the years from their close relationship to the fort, and perhaps from inexpensive rent. The same may be true for Copper Canyon Press, the nation’s best poetry publishing house. Increased competition for building space may cost them more in the future.

This impacts not only the affected organization but also the link between the fort and the surrounding community represented by that organization. There has already been diminishment of the community’s connection to Fort Worden, as higher food and rental fees forced several local groups – Rotary, Kiwanis, Chamber of Commerce – to move their weekly luncheon meetings out of the fort’s Commons and into other venues. The dining hall and its connected coffee shop sit dark and empty most days today. Students at the fort-based Peninsula College branch, once heavy users of the Commons coffee shop, had better remember to pack a lunch and a coffee thermos.

In a sense, Fort Worden now has the same challenges as other Port Townsend cultural and economic landmarks that, through a certain level of benign neglect, had provided birthing space to important organizations or developments. Run-down Point Hudson with cheap waterfront rent gave birth to the wooden boat renaissance. The “funky boat yard” at the Boat Haven allowed shipwrights room to grow. Artists lived in the unfinished upper floors of Victorian buildings. An unused basement in the Mount Baker Block was renovated to launch the Boiler Room.

In most of those cases, someone saw opportunity or felt obligated to upgrade and, in time, to boost the rent. Many of the activities remain – building boats, serving coffee at the Boiler Room – but under the decidedly different circumstances that accompany gentrification and rent increases, wherever and however they seep ahead.

To these risks at Fort Worden we must be attentive. Whether we can preserve the best of the current fort through this time of change is yet to be seen.