Avista Corp. has decided against constructing a 36,000-square-foot office building near its Mission Avenue headquarters and instead will look to lease or buy office space that would be near enough to its main campus that staff members could go back and forth between the two locations conveniently.


To address overcrowding at its main office, the company had sought permits from the city of Spokane to build the 36,000-square-foot building at 1709 E. Upriver Drive, but told its employees May 30 it had decided not to move ahead with those plans.


It does not make good business sense to move ahead with the project at a time when both our company and our customers are facing increasing expenses, Avista said in an internal newsletter.


Laurine Jue, a company spokeswoman, says standards call for utility companies to have an average of 200 to 250 square feet of usable floor space per employee, but Avista, which hasnt expanded its headquarters campus since 1978, has 138 square feet of usable space per employee.


We still do need to address the office space challenge, Jue says, adding that the company will turn its attention to locating space to lease or buy.


Meanwhile, Avista began last month a $4 million upgrade of the heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning systems in its service building just north of its main building and in the auditorium and cafeteria of its Mission Avenue headquarters structure, Jue says. She says the companys big line trucks dock there and the building includes shops where personnel work on gas and electric meters, electrical relays, and other items. Finance, accounting, engineering, the companys executive leadership, and others are located in its main building. The two structures are connected by a tunnel.


The HVAC upgrade will save the company about $96,000 in energy costs and will conserve, Jue says. That much energy is enough to power approximately 130 homes, she says. The Spokane office of McKinstry Co., a Seattle-based mechanical engineering and construction concern, is handling the upgrade, she says.


In January, Avista will launch an upgrade of the HVAC systems in its main building, which Jue says have been on 24 hours a day, seven days a week, since 1957, when that structure was completed. Avista says planning is under way to determine the safest, most efficient, and cost-effective way to do that work.


The company says the two HVAC upgrades will position it to qualify for certification under the Leadership in Energy and Environment Design (LEED) program of the U.S. Green Building Council, a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit organization of more than 15,000 building owners and users, facility managers, real estate developers, architects, engineers, contractors, government agencies and others.


Contact Richard Ripley at (509) 344-1261 or via e-mail at editor@spokanejournal.com.