Richland voters take resounding stand on $81M Mid-Columbia Performing Arts Center
Richland voters dashed dreams of a dedicated performing arts center in the Feb. 11 special election.
Updated results released Thursday showed 7,063 voters rejecting the measure and 4,456 favoring it, or 61% to 39%.
Results will be certified for the Richland request as well as school funding propositions by the Kiona-Benton City School District and Finley School District on Feb. 21. Voter turnout was nearly 27% of the 51,758 voters eligible to cast ballots in the three Benton County jurisidictions that held an election.
There were no elections in Franklin
The Richland Public Facilities District’s asked its voters for the modest sales tax increase to support a long-held vision of building an $81 million, state-of-the-art performing arts center near the Reach Museum at the Richland Wye. Had it passed, it would have been the permanent home for the Mid-Columbia Symphony and other local arts groups.
“I’m stunned. Every poll we did. Every public meeting we had. Every outreach we had with the community, we had overwhelming positive response from everybody,” said Steven Wiley, president of the Public Facilities District, a quasi-independent agency responsible for developing ad managing public facilities in the city.
The only negative reaction was around the request for higher taxes.
“This area won’t support taxes,” he said. “Where do you go?”
Wiley said supporters who gathered to watch results Tuesday night were equally startled by the sound rejection of an idea they’ve worked to bring to the public for more than a decade. He said there will be a postmortem to identify a possible path forward.
But Wiley said it’s unclear if that makes sense. “I wasn’t expecting a landslide against it.”
The proposed center would have provided an 800-seat permanent home for a variety of local organizations.
Sales tax revenue would have covered about 80% of the construction cost, with donations and revenue from selling naming rights covering the balance. Organizers expected it to turn a profit within three years and vowed that the tax would not be an eternal burden on those shopping in Richland. It would have ended after 30 years.
The failure ensures Richland will have the lowest sales tax rate of the three cities — 8.7%. Pasco’s sales tax rate is 8.9%. Kennewick’s sales tax rises to 8.8% on April 1 after the city council approved a new tax to support its transportation benefit district.
Tri-Cities voters have been hostile to sales tax requests from public facilities districts. The Tri-Cities Regional PFD asked voters to approve a sales tax to support an aquatics center, but it lost. Kennewick voters rejected three separate requests to upgrade the Three Rivers Convention Center.
Pasco voters alone have embraced the idea, approving a .2% tax in 2022 to build an aquatics center in the Broadmoor area.
This story was originally published February 11, 2025 at 9:02 PM.