Yakima's welcoming billboard will stay

YAKIMA — A billboard outside of town here on Interstate 82 beckons travelers to stay awhile.

"Welcome to Yakima," it says, "The Palm Springs of Washington."

Kathy Coffey, president of the Yakima Valley Visitors and Convention Bureau, credits Gary Lukehart of the bureau's board of directors with posting the sign on his 32-acre property that includes the Gateway Shopping Center.

"The most natural thing would be the fruit capital or apple capital," Lukehart explains, "but I thought I'd do something different."

So, without any springs and only the stray landscaped palm, Yakima's nickname is a reference to sunshine. Palm Springs sees sun about 350 days a year. Yakima boasts nearly 300 days of sun a year with 8 inches of precipitation, about half of which is snow.

"Yakima's come into its own right now, mainly because of the wine industry," Lukehart says.

Wine tourism is bringing some of the state's most affluent tourists to the Yakima Valley, Coffey says, and she likens the Yakima Valley to California's Sonoma Valley rather than Palm Springs.

She's asked Lukehart to consider taking down the Palm Springs sign and replacing it with a sign welcoming visitors to "Washington Wine Country."

"I told her 'No way,' " Lukehart asserts. He has other plans.

"On Interstate 10 [near Palm Springs], there's a big sign down there, and we've looked into how much it would cost to put up a sign that says 'Welcome to the Yakima of California.' "