Five Guys comes to Lacey, new clothing shop opens at mall, EPA reviews Tumwater Superfund site
Five Guys, the popular burger joint that already has a location in west Olympia, will open a new site at 4022 Pacific Ave. SE., just down the street from a 7-Eleven and next to a recently opened Chipotle Mexican Grill.
The projected opening for the Lacey location is Sept. 15, a spokeswoman said. Once it opens, the store will operate 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily.
This will be the second Five Guys in Thurston County after the first opened at 1200 Cooper Point Road SW in early 2014.
Other business happenings
Windsor Fashions, which describes itself as a “special occasion and fast-fashion retailer,” has opened a new store at Capital Mall. The store opened Thursday and can be found near Kay Jewelers, according to a news release.
“Whether it’s school-based occasions like prom and graduation, seasonal events like Halloween, New Year’s Eve, or everyday occasions like date night and brunch with the girls, Windsor provides a broad and inspiring assortment of the latest trends,” a news release reads.
Bruce Cramer has been named the interim chief executive of O Bee Credit Union after the former CEO, James Collins, resigned on Aug. 21, the credit union announced this week.
Bryan Thomas, chief human resources officer for O Bee, said Thursday he didn’t know the specific reason for Collins’ resignation, calling it a personal decision.
Thomas expects the hiring process for the next CEO to take five to six months. To help, the board of directors has engaged the services of Stacy Augustine and CU Strategic Services to lead the search.
Cramer is no stranger to O Bee Credit Union. He served as CEO for 24 years until he retired in 2010.
“During that time, he guided the credit union from a select employee group membership model (the credit union was once open only to Olympia brewery employees and their families) to an open charter membership, which made O Bee membership available to anyone living or working in Washington state,” O Bee officials said in a news release.
Cramer has spent the last decade on the O Bee supervisory committee.
“We thank James Collins for his leadership over the past 12 years and wish him well,” said Cramer in a statement. “O Bee is well situated with its current leadership to move forward with initiatives to reshape our local communities through investing in our members and businesses.”
Collins began his career with O Bee in 2002 and served as senior vice president and chief financial officer until his promotion to CEO in 2010. Assets grew by nearly 600 percent during his tenure and branch locations increased from two to seven, including two in Pierce County, according to the credit union.
Government action at mall site
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is nearing completion of its fifth, five-year review of the Palermo Superfund Site in Tumwater, the agency announced.
Five-year reviews help ensure the selected cleanup actions protect people’s health and the environment effectively, agency officials said.
Never heard of this federal Superfund site? That’s because the environmental problems were first detected 30 years ago on the 150-acre site, which includes Southgate Mall on Capitol Boulevard and about 50 residences.
According to the EPA, the city of Tumwater first detected trichloroethylene, an industrial solvent, in three of the city’s drinking water supply wells in 1993. The city removed the impacted wells from service, but later restored them to service after the problem was addressed.
Studies determined the source of the TCE was industrial operations from former and current state Department of Transportation facilities. A dry-cleaning facility also contaminated groundwater with tetrachloroethylene, a solvent used in dry-cleaning solutions.
Several remedies have taken place or are in place at the site:
▪ A treatment system removes contaminants from the water at the Palermo wellfield.
▪ The EPA installed a sub-drain west of the residences in the Palermo neighborhood to lower the groundwater table so that water and vapors containing volatile contaminants will not collect in the crawlspaces below residences.
▪ The EPA conducted source cleanup at the dry cleaners.
▪ WSDOT and EPA continue to monitor air and groundwater at the site, businesses in the Southgate Mall and homes in the Palermo neighborhood.
The EPA expects to complete the five-year review in September; however, WSDOT and EPA expect to complete additional studies by 2025. The studies will help determine if additional cleanup actions are needed.
Residents who have questions about the site or the cleanup process are asked to contact EPA remedial project manager Stephen Lukas at lukas.stephen@epa.gov.
For more about the Superfund site, go to: https://www.epa.gov/superfund/palermo.
If you know of a retailer, restaurant, coffee shop or other business that is opening, closing, expanding, remodeling, or changing its focus, send an email to reporter Rolf Boone at rboone@theolympian.com.
