One of the more iconic buildings on the Columbia Basin College campus in Pasco may have its days numbered if state lawmakers agree to fund its replacement.

The college recently submitted its request for $54 million for design and construction of the new building to the State Board of Community and Technical Colleges. Former Gov. Jay Inslee recommended funding the project at the full amount in the capital budget he proposed before leaving office in January.

“The next steps are waiting on the House and the Senate to release their individual budgets and then negotiate a final budget,” Elizabeth Burtner, CBC’s assistant vice president for marketing & outreach, told the Tri-Cities Area Journal of Business.

The request was submitted as a replacement project, meaning the college would have to demolish the current building once the new one was built.

Identified as the P Building on campus maps, the CBC Arts Building is actually made up of connected structures that appear as nearly fitted together pieces of an unadorned concrete block. Designed by Spokane architect Ken Brooks, it took 4,000 cubic yards of concrete to build for $1.8 million in 1971.

The 31,000-square-foot facility houses the college’s School of Arts, Humanities & Communication. Its features include Esvelt Gallery which hosts regular art shows and installations, a 292-seat indoor theater, a black box theater and an outdoor amphitheater that was added to the building’s west side about a decade ago.

CBC has added or replaced three facilities at the Pasco campus in the past decade. The new School of Social & Behavioral Sciences building on the north side of campus opened in 2017, as did Sunhawk Hall, the college’s first dormitory just across 20th Avenue from the campus. The new Student Recreation Center replaced an older facility in 2022. The Richland Medical Science Center at the satellite campus in Richland opened in 2020, built in partnership with Kadlec Regional Medical Center.

The college’s enrollment has grown significantly in recent years. For the 2024-25 school year, CBC has more than 8,500 students attending classes, up from its previous enrollment record of 7,900 students in the 2019-20 school year.

The Legislature greenlighting funding for the new building is not a guarantee. Community colleges, along with other state entities such as public universities and the corrections department, also make requests.

“The total dollar figure of the compromise capital budget will dictate how many projects on the State Board (of Community & Technical Colleges) capital list, including ours, get funded,” Burtner said.

And the state is facing a budget shortfall, possibly as high as $16 billion over the next four years. Gov. Bob Ferguson has already proposed $4 billion in cuts in his budget proposal.