Members of the Kennewick City Council had a lot of questions after getting a first look at draft proposals for a future of City Hall and that may push out when a final recommendation is finally presented to them. 

Representatives from Couer d’Alene-based Architects West and Portland-based Opsis presented preliminary findings from their study looking at the potential replacement of city hall in May. Those findings looked at either renovating the current building or building a new facility in one of two configurations on the city’s civic center campus on Sixth Avenue between Auburn and Dayton streets. 

Council members were split on their preferences, with some noting that they needed more information on how a future City Hall fits into a larger plan for the civic center before moving forward.  

And most panned an element of one proposal that called for demolishing the nearby Museum at Keewaydin to provide room, with the provision of setting aside 500 square feet in a public space in the new City Hall for the museum. 

“That museum, it gets a lot of traffic, it has community outreach. They do have the (public) speakers there – that is something to be cognizant of as a community space,” Mayor Pro Tem Chuck Torelli said during a workshop meeting. “Five hundred square feet is a closet.” 

The collective rejection of that idea by the council hasn’t stopped leaders from the East Benton County Historical Society and museum supporters from immediately pushing back on the concept. 

“While the city has assured us they are in the early planning stages, we must act now to ensure the museum remains a negative force against demolition and a positive voice for preservation,” according to its post on social media. 

Top priority 

Kennewick City Hall was built about 60 years ago and is a top priority for replacement by the city. City staffing has reached a point where workers are running out of room in the building, along with needed storage space for files and equipment. 

More urgently, the current building has millions of dollars’ worth of needed repairs, from a leaky roof to failing and outdated heating, ventilation and air conditioning, and information technology. The city’s data center in particular is facing multiple component replacements and needs updated infrastructure within the next few years. 

Architects West and Opsis were chosen to conduct the study after the city issued a request for proposals to look at options for City Hall. Marcus Valentine, principal with Architects West, said the firms are looking at multiple factors in developing the proposals, within and outside City Hall operations. 

“Using the City Hall and the development of the City Hall as an opportunity to make an attraction, to bring people downtown, to revitalize the core is a huge element to this,” he said. 

Both new-build options envision a roughly 40,000-square-foot facility. Option 1 would involve tearing down the current City Hall, with much of that footprint turned into a civic lawn or greenspace in front of the new building. Moving the building footprint further north would require removal of the museum building at 205 W. Keewaydin Drive. 

Option 2 would place City Hall at the corner of Sixth and Auburn on a city-owned commercial-zoned lot that was last the location of Kennewick School District’s administrative offices. Renderings show the museum structure remaining in place. 

Museum’s home  

Council members who liked Option 1 balked at the removal of the museum building. Torelli noted that the floor in the building, made of petrified wood, is estimated to be worth $1 million alone.  

“I love this option except I don’t see the museum,” said councilman Jim Milbauer. “Five hundred square feet is not going to cover that, so what are your thoughts on replacing the museum and the cost of that?” 

Historical society leadership has encouraged community members to reach out to the council and urge them to leave the museum in place. A change.org petition launched to defend the building had more than 600 of 1,000 hoped for signatures as of June 4. 

“The Historical Society turned the museum building over to the city of Kennewick in 1981 with the understanding it would be our long-term home,” said museum administrator Misty Ayers in a blog post. 

Architect representatives said they have had deeper conversations with community members about the museum since drafting the proposal and that further conversation is needed to assess what the museum would need if it did not remain in its current facility.  

The council praised Option 2 for potentially creating more flexibility for future facilities on the civic center campus, but there were also concerns about removing commercial property from private development. 

But Mayor Jason McShane and Councilman John Trumbo said they weren’t ready to settle on a preference yet, with McShane saying he wants to see some more planning on the future of the entire civic campus and its existing facilities. 

“I don’t like any of the options until we understand the whole picture,” McShane said. “If we don’t do that now, we are shortchanging a huge decision for our city, and I think if it takes an extra month or extra six weeks or extra two months to figure that out, I think that’s time well spent.” 

The council is scheduled to hear recommendations from city staff and the architects based on the study findings at its June 23 meeting.