Regional Report Friday, April 11, 2008 Tri-Cities: It's hot over in the desert

By: Bryan Corliss

The greater Tri-Cities (Benton and Franklin counties) have had the fastest-growing labor markets in the state in the past couple quarters, as well some of the biggest population and wage gains.

Is it all for real, or just a mirage? After all, we've seen boom-and-bust cycles in the Tri-Cities before. In the early '90s, the Mid-Columbia had the hottest housing market in the nation, as workers poured in to fill high-wage SuperFund cleanup jobs at Hanford. Then came Newt Gingrich and the Contract With America, and those jobs evaporated faster than dew on the sagebrush.

So if you're a bear, you'll look inside the employment numbers and see that increased Hanford hiring is one of the factors behind the current run. After all, the vitrification plant, where they're trying to turn nuclear waste into glass, added 1,000 workers last year.

But - unlike previous Tri-Cities booms - this time it's not just Hanford.

The Tri-Cities have become the center of food processing in Washington, with one out of every 10 industry jobs in the state. The sexiest part of the food processing industry, of course, is wine. Walla Walla and Yakima get more buzz, but Prosser and the Tri-Cities are getting more of the jobs. Schau counts some 1,600 wine-related jobs in the two counties, with more to come as Red Mountain develops.

The Tri-Cities also are becoming a transportation hub. Rail links (some actually in Walla Walla County) take Washington produce to markets on the East Coast, and trucking companies have set up shop around the region, taking advantage of its location in the center of the Northwest, and that fact traffic is far lighter than Puget Sound's.

And it appears that the Tri-Cities are becoming a retirement haven. Schau has a theory, that Baby Boomers are fleeing California for the Northwest. They cashed out their massive equities during the housing boom, and moved up to Bellingham or Duval or Port Townsend, charmed by the summertime scenery. Then the rain comes, and by their second winter, those Californians are desperate for sunshine. They look at the Tri-Cities, see semi-arid hills that remind them of home and discover that a $2,000 monthly mortgage that buys them a modest condo west of the Cascades will buy them a modest mansion east of it, and before they can learn to spell Kennewick, they've moved there.

All this is creating strong job growth, and prompting Schau to predict that the Tri-Cities won't feel the current national downturn.

That's not to say all is sunny and bright. With few cultural amenities - and no coherent downtown - it's going to be hard for Tri-Cities companies to compete for young talent, respected urban economist Angelos Angelou warns, and governments also must do more to cooperate.

We'll talk more about all this in the magazine's June issue. But for now, there's gold in the Tri-Cities' sagebrush-covered hills. Best take your sunscreen.