EPHRATA – Not all of the construction near the intersection of Nat Washington Way and State Highway 282 is related to the Grant County Jail. The Grant Public Utility District broke ground on its upcoming Ephrata Service Center Tuesday afternoon, a new facility intended to address the growing demands on the district’s resources.  

“This is a huge milestone for the PUD to be able to continue serving our customers more efficiently,” said Fallon Long, Grant PUD’s vice president of shared services.  

Long highlighted the growing need for a modern facility as the county’s population and infrastructure both grow. In 1975, she said, the district had 16,170 active electric meters; that number has since grown to more than 55,000. Fifty years ago, the PUD only had 19 substations to maintain – that number has ballooned to 56. Electrical lines in 1975 included about 2,600 miles of wire. Now, the PUD manages a network of more than 4,400 miles of line. It has also added about 3,100 miles of fiber-optic cabling.  

Customer demand has also grown, she said, with the district selling about 919 million kilowatt hours of electricity in 1975 but selling about 6.1 billion kilowatt hours in 2023. Additionally, demand over the next 30 years is expected to grow by about 3% annually.  

Grant PUD purchased the 34-acre site, located directly adjacent to the new jail site, from Grant County for $455,000. It will contain 316,822 square feet of buildings, parking structures, a fuel island and storage. Construction will continue through 2027, though a specific date wasn’t immediately available. The total project cost will be finalized in October. 

Planning and development were completed last year, according to PUD documents, with design being completed this year.  

Documentation from the district also indicates that the current Ephrata Service Center is crowded due to more staffing than when it was built and has safety concerns. The structure does not meet current building codes.  

“Probably the most important part of this is going to improve our safety considerably. Being in new and more modern facilities, better spaces, proper places and spaces for proper things. There's a lot of great things or purposes for this, but that safety may be the greatest, most important part,” said PUD Commission President Terry Pyle during opening remarks at the event.  

The new facility will consolidate a lot of the PUD’s resources into one campus. The district’s Line, Transportation, and Power Delivery Engineering departments will be housed there. Its Dispatch & Control Center, mail room and copy center and a fuel station for vehicles will also be on the site.  

Generally, Fallon and Pyle said, the facility will provide efficiency, convenience and cost savings for the PUD, and thus the district’s rate payers.  

“We as a commission are excited for this,” Pyle said. “It will provide great work environments, both physically and for team building. This will be a more modern, state-of-the-art facility, with better spaces and places.” 

    This map shows the location of the site of the Grant Public Utility District’s new Ephrata Service Center.
  

    Concept art for the Grant Public Utility District’s new service center shows a campus with administrative buildings, but the campus will also include a variety of facilities for storage and vehicle fleet maintenance and dispatching.