Angel Muñoz was 21 years old when he first visited Out and About in Pasco.

“I still remember that I parked like three blocks away and ran there because I was afraid someone would see me,” he recently told the Tri-Cities Area Journal of Business.

Muñoz said he had his first encounter with a drag queen that night at the gay-friendly bar. At the time, he said he was “weirded out” by the experience. Twenty-three years later, though, he’s the longest reigning queen at Out and About, having organized and run shows under the drag name, Vida Amoré.

Out and About has served as a place for the queer community to discover, connect and find refuge for nearly 30 years. That made its closure in fall 2024 that much harder for the LGBTQIA+ community, according to the bar’s new owners, patrons and other community members.

But the longtime sanctuary is debuting its sweet new name – Azúcar at Out and About – along with dedicated dance and social spaces for Latino patrons while retaining its “same inclusive heart.”

“Azúcar,” which means “sugar” in Spanish, is also a nod to Cuban musician Celia Cruz who turned the word into her catchphrase as part of her fast-paced guarachas.

The night club’s grand reopening is June 21, just in time for local Pride events, including the Tri-Cities’ first dedicated Latino Pride celebration.

Muñoz is excited to be headlining the first drag show that day at the newly reopened nightclub at 327 W. Lewis St.

“I love it. I think it’s very necessary,” A’isha Martin, president of Tri-Cities Pride, told the Journal. “There has been a Latinx community that needs that space, especially in Pasco.”

Azúcar at Out and About’s renovation retains some well-known but revamped features such as the primary dance floor. And those walking up to the bar can still enjoy the exotic fish swimming in the large aquarium installed behind it as they wait for their drinks.

Changing hands

Out and About, at the corner of Lewis Street and Third Avenue in downtown Pasco, originally opened in 1996 and included the storefront where the bar is located as well as a large outdoor patio that was later incorporated to the building to create a dance floor and other interior spaces.

Since then, the bar has served as a refuge for the LGBTQIA+ community in the predominantly politically and socially conservative Tri-Cities.

The property and operations changed hands among its original three owners – Jack Graham, Geraldine Graham and Callie Ann Gies – until 2023 when The Guys LLC, owned by Michael Larsen and John Thomas, bought the business.

The bar was put on the market again in 2024 and a purchase seemed imminent until there was an outcry from the bar’s longtime patrons upon hearing that the prospective new owner planned to no longer operate it as a gay bar. The sale never went through.

The new owners bought the property for $375,000 in the late fall of 2024.

They have kept a low profile using Nopaleros LLC on publicly available property and government records connected to the bar. The LLC is registered in Wyoming, which shields the owners of companies that incorporate there. Richland-based Gravis Law is listed as the company’s agent. The LLC is listed as the applicant for all permits and licenses connected to the bar.

The owners, a gay Latino couple with ties to the Tri-Cities, told the Journal that they are concerned about their privacy and asked not to be named in this story. They are excited, though, to welcome the community and provide a space that supports and celebrates it.

Drag queen Vida Amoré greets newly hired staff for Azúcar at Out and About while visiting to shoot promotional videos for the Pasco bar’s grand reopening on June 21. The bar has been closed and undergoing renovation since the fall of 2024 after being purchased by new owners.

| Photo by Ty Beaver

Old and new features

The new owners hired HDG Architecture of Spokane to bring their ideas for Azúcar at Out and About to life.

HDG has designed a number of other prominent dining spaces in the Tri-Cities, including Perch Cantina at Columbia Point in Richland, Nomad Kitchen & Lounge at the Red Lion Columbia Center and the two towers located near the intersection of Columbia Center Boulevard and Okanogan Place in front of Lowe’s that are home to Porter’s Real Barbecue and Proof Gastropub.

“They reached out to us and it worked out where we had some time to go down and walk the space,” Josh Hissong, HDG’s founder, told the Journal. Though a much smaller project than the firm typically works with, the owners’ “excitement to work with us and with what they are doing and creating, made it easy for us to decide to work with these guys.”

Coincidentally, a month later, HDG went on a retreat to Mexico City, which provided an opportunity for Hissong and designer Olivia Handel to visit bars and restaurants that echoed the atmosphere the owners wanted.

“It was great to connect with the vision on such an intimate level,” Handel said.

Out and About’s main entrance now opens into a long corridor. Toward the end of it, visitors can either go straight into the bar or go left or right into one of the two main social spaces.

The bar features a more industrial feel, with new fixtures and furniture. The bathrooms were gutted and boast black subway tile in the one closest to the bar and white tile in the larger one further back. Another room has been dedicated as a dressing area for drag performers.

The main dance floor the bar has long been known for is more open with the removal of the cages for go-go dancers and the DJ booth. The owners plan to decorate the dance floor area with acrylic wall panels and other modern fixtures.

The small space that separates the bar from the dance floor is now Callejón del Besos, or “The Alley of the Kiss.” The name is a reference to an alley in the Mexican city of Guanajuato known for the tragic tale of a man who secured a room across a narrow alley from the woman he loved. This area offers more private seating for patrons.

The room that once served as overflow space with random tables and chairs and a pool table has been reimagined as a ranchero, complete with a western theme and nonstop Latin music.

Building the community

The new owners have worked to do more than improve the interior of Azúcar at Out and About to welcome the Latino community.

They’ve welcomed the only all-female mariachi band in the region to practice in their space through the renovation.

The new owners also threw their support behind a new grassroots queer Latino group, CALOR Tri-Cities, to ensure the queer Latino culture has an advocate. Muñoz is among its organizers, and he said there’s long been a need for greater visibility for this LGBTQIA+ community.

While the bar’s original owners were welcoming and provided a great environment, Muñoz said that in his first years at Out and About, Latin music was never played and when it was, it tended to be songs that had gone mainstream among English speakers, such as the “Macarena.”

“You’d hear pop and disco but never a banda,” Muñoz said, referring to a brass-forward style of regional Mexican music. “Sometimes, if you have a significant other, you want to dance to a slow song.”

While there are nightclubs in the area that do play this kind of music, the establishments or their patrons are not necessarily queer-friendly, the new owners said.

Martin said the bar’s owners contacted Tri-Cities Pride about how they could work together. A transplant to the Tri-Cities, Martin’s experience at Out and About was limited to two drag shows before it closed, but she said she knows how important the bar is to the community as a whole.

“I feel like in the Tri-Cities the queer community is lacking in the aspect of having places to go or knowing there are other people,” she said.

The bar’s reopening, accompanied by the Latino Pride event that same day, has energized the community, Muñoz said. Tri-Cities Pride will be celebrated in Pasco’s Memorial Park the next day on June 22, and its organizers will be attending Latino Pride to personally invite everyone to also turn out for its event.

Newly hired staff for Azúcar at Out and About consider swatches of pink paint on a wall of the Pasco bar’s patio during an initial orientation. The bar’s new owners are still working to get it ready for a grand reopening on June 21 during Latino Pride.

| Photo by Ty Beaver

Continuing the legacy

The owners acknowledge there is more work to do on the building, and plan a series of rolling debuts in the coming months. The outside patio that faces Third Avenue, in particular, won’t be fully remodeled for some time. However, they have big plans for it as a larger and more open space, encased with a concrete breeze block partition and possibly space for a food truck to park inside.

“Everyone has to have a place where they feel good and comfortable,” said Hissong, the architect. “If it gets built out the way we designed, it may not just be the best queer bar but the best bar in the area.”

Beyond the bar

Azúcar will not offer all the events that the original Out and About once did, at least at first. No all-ages nights are planned, which some say have been crucial to helping queer youth find support and connections. The owners cited insurance and liability considerations and want to make sure they have operations running smoothly before potentially bringing those events back.

For now, though, many are happy such an important haven for the Tri-Cities LGBTQIA+ community will once again welcome everyone under the rainbow.

“I personally am just super excited to be back and see all the people who used to come to our shows,” Muñoz said. “Now I feel so good, now there’s a club that’s focused on us.”