OUR VOICE: ‘Grand Bargain’ is a grand idea with problems

Adam Brault’s enthusiasm for his proposed public market in Richland is contagious and many in the community have jumped on his bandwagon. He is a man on a mission and is trying any avenue he can to get the market built. We support the market idea and encourage him to continue his efforts.

But his idea to use the Tri-Cities Regional Public Facilities District to ask voters to approve one “Grand Bargain” that would raise sales taxes across the three cities to fund a project in each, is flawed.

It appears the regional PFD cannot, under the legislation that created it, ask voters to approve a sales tax increase to fund projects and then transfer the revenue to the individual PFDs that would then be responsible to build and manage the facilities.

And the leaders of the cities are not onboard.

They say the individual cities are best suited to build and manage public facilities and expect future projects like an aquatics park or the expansion of the convention center to be built by the individual facilities districts. They also point out that proposed projects are not at the same stage of planning. Kennewick needs to move quickly on another attempt to gain voter approval for the convention center expansion; Pasco hasn’t formally begun investigating the aquatics facility project and Richland has not yet adopted a project other than management of the Reach Center.

The Tri-Cities is unique in that it has three public facilities districts — Kennewick, Pasco and Richland — as well as the state’s only regional public facilities district. Through certain public citizens can vote to increase their sales tax rate to pay for construction and maintenance of facilities.

Since its inception five years ago, the regional district has taken just one project to voters, an aquatics center to be built in Pasco. Pasco voters supported the measure, but it failed bercause not enough of Richland and Kennewick voters did.

Talk of parochialism is always to blame when regional efforts here fail. But we can also point to the fact that the marketing work hasn’t been great in recent campaigns for public projects. The vision for the aquatics center was murky. Was it a water park or a training facility or some hybrid of both?

Also, Kennewick voters said no to a sales tax increase that would have provided a much needed expansion of the Three Rivers Convention Center. The campaign failed to do an adequate job of educating the public on the fact that sales tax generated by those conventions help pay for city services and amenities they do use.

When the cities or regional public facilities districts do decide to put a project before the voters, we hope they remember the sales pitch. Marketing is key.

So while the “Grand Bargain” appears to be little more than a grand dream it has gotten the community talking about the value of these amenities and looking at them from a regional perspective.

City leaders assure us we will eventually see great projects of regional scope and significance proposed. They say, unlike five years ago, sales in their communities are or will soon be at the level where one community could build a regional facility if voters approved a sales tax increase. We hope that’s the case, but we’re glad to hear the cities appear committed to continuing the Regional Public Facilities District. It’s likely to play an important role in the decades to come.

As for Brault and his partners, they’ll need to find another way to fill the pit in Richland with their market, a project we’d very much like to see built. Given Brault’s energy and tenacity, we fully expect he’ll find another path.

There’s a good reason he wears a t-shirt that says: Do Cities. There is no “Tri.”

This story was originally published February 6, 2016 at 11:02 PM with the headline "OUR VOICE: ‘Grand Bargain’ is a grand idea with problems."