by Jake Goldstein-Street, Washington State Standard
May 19, 2026
Let there be light.
When Washington state lawmakers return to Olympia for the 2027 legislative session, natural light will again shine on the House and Senate chambers.
Construction to restore skylights in the state Capitol begins in June and is slated to end in December, according to the state Department of Enterprise Services. It’ll cost the state roughly $8.6 million.
Built in 1928, the Legislative Building initially featured skylights and laylights over the chambers, but they were removed in the 1970s and roofed over due to seismic risk. It’s now impossible to tell they were ever there.
This left the chambers, where bills are debated and voted on for a few months per year, lit by electric lighting, instead of the “soft ambient glow of the filtered daylight,” according to a 2017 feasibility study. Most legislating in Olympia happens in the winter and spring, when the days are short, and the weather tends to be rainy.
Lt. Gov. Denny Heck believes it’s appropriate to restore the skylights as the Capitol approaches its centennial.
It should’ve been done a long time ago, he said.
“It’s been there 100 years, and it’s gonna be there another 500 years,” Heck said. “That’s how we ought to treat this place.”
He has his fingers crossed that it’ll be beneficial, “maybe even improve some behavior, who knows?” Heck laughed at the idea of putting some “sunshine” back on legislators as a symbol of transparency in government.
Sen. Mark Schoesler, R-Ritzville, sees it as restoring the Capitol to its “historic elegance.”
“It’s really important historical preservation,” said Schoesler, the Republican lead on the capital budget. “I think when people see it, they’ll wonder why we waited so long.”
The difficulty of restoring the skylights while still meeting building codes and improving acoustics and security presented an obstacle.
Schoesler said House lawmakers long “despised” the project, while the Senate was more receptive. Heck noted that spending money on the Capitol is always politically fraught, seen by some as lawmakers indulging in upgrades to their workplace over other priorities.
The work this year will include the skylights and electric shades, as well as updating audio-visual equipment for the chambers, replacing existing lights with energy-efficient LEDs and upgrading fire alert systems. The 2017 study called the project “very complex.”
It’s just the latest way the state has tried to return the Capitol to its prior self. The state has reopened some access to the Capitol dome, which had long been restricted. Now, some legislators will get a guided tour of the building’s upper reaches each year.
Schoesler, who had long been pushing to ease the dome restrictions, said his colleagues were excited to see the Capitol’s inner workings.
“It’s all our Capitol,” Schoesler said.
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