With Election Day less than three weeks away and many people across Grays Harbor County starting to receive their ballots, candidates running for public office from the county to the state level are putting together their final pitches before the votes begin to be tabulated on Nov. 8.
While poll statistics have shown that many people have already decided who they will vote for in the upcoming election, an opportunity for undecided voters in East County to speak with public office incumbents and challengers was available this week.
The Elma Chamber of Commerce hosted a Meet the Candidates Forum on Wednesday, Oct. 20 in Elma. The event, which was sponsored by the Elma Eagles, featured 13 candidates vying for an elected office. Four candidates running for a state-level position featured Legislative District 24 (Position 1) incumbent Democrat Mike Chapman and Republican challenger Sue Forde, Legislative District 24 (Position 2) Republican challenger Brian Pruiett, and Legislative District 19 (Position 2) Democratic challenger Cara Cusack.
The other nine candidates ranged from a plethora of county-level races such as County Commissioner District 3 incumbent Vickie Raines and Republican challenger Lisa Zaborac, Coroner incumbent Democrat Bob Kegel and challenger George J. Kelly, Assessor incumbent Democrat Dan Lindgren and Republican challenger Rick Hole, District Court 1 candidates Andrea Vingo and Geoff Arnold, and Sheriff candidate Darrin Wallace.
The candidates, all of whom did not sit directly next to their opponent, apart from Chapman and Forde, began the nearly 90-minute candidate forum by giving an opening statement to more than 50 voters seated in the crowd. Most of the candidates talked about their previous accomplishments in public offices and why they would best be fit for the office.
After the candidates concluded their opening statements, the floor was opened for attendees to ask questions to the candidates since there were no moderated questions put together in advance.
Nearly all the questions were directed at the candidates running for positions in Legislative Districts 19 and 24 and focused primarily on concerns with parental rights and gas prices.
While parental rights have been a hot-button issue for candidates running for office across the country, the topic has reached new concerns in East County following the 2021 disappearance of Oakley Carlson, a 5-year-old girl from Oakville.
“What do you plan to do about the troubles in DCYF (Department of Children, Youth, and Families) in the way the route is going for children who are left in homes that are unsafe,” asked a voter from the crowd.
While Cusack, Forde and Pruiett each agreed that oversight of agencies overseeing the safety of the children is needed, Chapman took a different approach citing the goal of agencies like DCYF should be to reunite children with biological parents as Washington state law currently mandates.
“It’s not a perfect world and parents aren’t perfect, but you don’t want the government not working to reunite children with parents,” Chapman said.
Chapman said there is a pilot program installed for Grays Harbor County to have independent oversight of agencies involving children’s housing placement so that DCYF is not solely conducting it. Although Chapman’s response was met with some opposition from the crowd, he reaffirmed his commitment that the current law regarding parent/child reunification is good law.
Although the discussion of gas prices stemmed mostly from whether each of the legislative candidates supported a gas tax relief, all the candidates acknowledged that the price of gas is not helping the American consumer. While gas taxes are typically used to repair roads and bridges, Pruiett said if he is elected, he would advocate that a gas tax reduction goes into effect and money can be diverted from other areas to help repair infrastructure in rural areas such as Grays Harbor County.
“I would make sure that the budget is directed to (rural areas) instead of Highway 405, Interstate 5, Highway 520 Bridge and the Columbia River Bridge that the majority of the funding is going to now,” Pruiett said. “The prioritization is not going to come here until we make an effort to change what’s going on in the Department of Transportation.”
Pruiett also made claims that incumbent candidates like Chapman and Democrat Steve Tharinger voted to increase the gas tax for Washington. Chapman refuted the claim as false saying that the only tax raise proposals on the ballot this election cycle “have nothing to do with raising your gas tax.”
Although many of the candidates did not have questions directed to them, voters will be able to find information on most of the candidates in the Grays Harbor version and state-wide version voter pamphlets that were delivered by mail. Voters will have until 7:59 p.m. on Nov. 8 to submit their ballot to an official designated drop box or postmarked by Nov. 8 to have their vote counted.
