GOP looks to oust trio of Dems from state’s 23rd district
Published 4:50 pm Friday, June 6, 2008
With the ballot now set for the 2008 general election, Republicans have rallied three candidates to challenge the three Democrats who represent the 23rd Legislative District in Olympia.
The question is, can they win?
“We would not run a candidate if we did not think they had a chance of winning,” Kitsap County Republican Party Chair Jack Hamilton said.
The most recent of those candidates to announce – the filing period ended yesterday at 4:30 p.m. – was Larry Cooney, who will face fellow Poulsbo resident Rep. Sherry Appleton.
Bainbridge Sen. Phil Rockefeller is being challenged by Connie Lord of Poulsbo, while Mark Lowe of Bremerton is running against Rep. Christine Rolfes, also of Bainbridge.
Fundraising is one challenge the Republican contenders will face out of the gate.
The Democrats have a jump-start in the money race having begun collecting funds last fall.
According to the state Public Disclosure Commission, Rockefeller’s campaign entered May having already scooped up $58,453.
Rolfes reported $64,022 at the end of May and had already spent $20,876 on her campaign while Sherry Appleton had raised $17,620 at the end of April.
With campaigns barely under way, Lord reported $3,221 at the the end of April, while Lowe and Cooney said they had about $1,000 in funds so far.
In the run up to the 2006 election Appleton and Rolfes raised a combined $359,378, and outspent Republican challengers two-to-one.
Rolfes said funds may be tight for all candidates this year with high rolling gubernatorial and presidential campaigns already eating up contributions.
Hamilton downplayed the impact of fundraising.
“It’s not how much money you raise, it’s how you spend it,” he said.
Most important, according to Hamilton, is getting supporters to actually turn out on election day. Another essential aspect is connecting with voters on key issues, something he said this election year’s crop of Republicans are prepared to do.
Hamilton noted that while the Republican candidates are very different personalities, they share common issues, including: keeping property taxes low, reforming the state transportation system and promoting business while using the private sector to tackle environmental problems.
“These are really, really well grounded, down to earth people who are not looking for a political career, but are looking to go to Olympia to solve problems,” Hamilton said.
In fact, Lord is the only Republican candidate who has a background in politics.
She is a Poulsbo City Council member and deputy mayor, as well as a former small business owner. She’s also no stranger to Bainbridge, having lived on the island for eight years in the 1980s, working for the City of Winslow in the Land Use Administration and later as deputy city clerk.
Lord said time spent in city government lent her perspective on a key point in her platform, the burden she sees placed on municipalities by policies of unwieldy and unresponsive state agencies.
A prime example she’s pointing to is flooding that took place along Poulsbo’s State Route 305 corridor.
Businesses along the highway were flooded out because the state had enlarged stormwater culverts to protect salmon without considering the local impacts, she said.
Lord said she wants to improve coordination between local governments and state agencies and make sure input from citizen advisory groups is heeded.
Of the three Republicans, Lord has been the most critical of the 23rd Legislative District’s current representatives, especially Rockefeller, whom she charges with supporting tax increases and overregulation.
“I believe that we don’t have enough conservative values down there to weigh all the issues affecting taxpayers,” Lord said.
Phil Rockefeller seeks his second term in state senate. In 2004 he left a seat in the House to vie for an open Senate position, which he won handily over a Republican opponent.
In the Senate, Rockefeller has put an emphasis on environmental initiatives, supporting the work of the Puget Sound Partnership and sponsoring a bill to begin preparing the state for large-scale emissions reductions in response to climate change.
Rockefeller was named 2007 Legislator of the Year by Washington Conservation Voters. He chairs the Senate Water, Energy and Telecommunications Committee as well as the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee. He also holds a seat on the Natural Resources, Ocean and Recreation Committee and the Ways and Means Committee.
Mark Lowe has never held an elected office, but the retired U.S. Navy Master Chief Petty Officer said attaining the Navy’s highest non-commissioned rank prepared him well for a run at a legislative seat.
“I’m in it to win,” he said. “If I was just getting into this race to get name recognition, then roll over and play dead, that’s not me. “People are going to say. ‘He’s retired Navy, what’s he doing?’ Well, when you get into a rank as high as mine, you experience a lot of politics.”
Lowe spent 24 years in the Navy, closing his career as a law enforcement and counter terrorism specialist. The Bellingham native has lived in Kitsap County for the last 10 years and now works as a security consultant.
Lowe said education will be one cornerstone of his campaign.
In higher education, Lowe said there needs to be better standardization throughout colleges and community colleges to make transfers easier, and he supports the creation of a four-year college in Kitsap County.
He also wants to see public schools shift focus away from expensive tests like the Washington Assessment of Student Learning, and back to producing well rounded students.
“The WASL needs to go away, and teachers need to get back to teaching the core subjects,” he said.
Lowe will face Rolfes, who was a newcomer to state politics in 2006, when she upset incumbent Republican legislator Beverly Woods.
The former Bainbridge City Council member said she consider her work to reform Washington State Ferries as one of the top accomplishments of her first term. Rolfes sponsored a WSF bill that froze fares through 2009, and in the 2008 session supported a bill to make WSF more accountable to the legislature.
“I was glad I was immediately able to go into Olympia and be productive in that conversation,” Rolfes said, noting that the system still needs plenty of work.
If re-elected, she wants to focus on improving health care and better managing of school funding. The need to address the lagging economy and rising cost of living has raised the stakes for all candidates seeking office in 2008, she said.
“It makes this opportunity to serve very exciting.”
Larry Cooney was the last legislative candidate in the district to file for office.
Cooney is an ordained Assembly of God minister, and executive director of Bread of Life, a mission for homeless men in Seattle. He said the presidential campaign of libertarian-leaning Ron Paul inspired him to get into politics as a Republican Precinct Committee Officer this year. When the Republican party approached him about a run against Appleton, he decided it would a good way to forward the Texas congressman’s platform.
“I came into the party through the Ron Paul movement,” Cooney said. “A big motivating factor for me is to keep that message alive.”
Personal responsibility and accountability was an aspect of Paul’s message that resounded well with Cooney.
He said state services, especially social services, would benefit from greater involvement from both for-profit and non-profit organizations, which he said have more incentive to run efficiently than state-run bureaucracies.
Cooney said he will keep his platform simple, and believes his pro-life stance and support of defense of marriage legislation will give him a voter base from which to work.
“If I can stay focused on those issues and build on that base, I think I have a good chance,” he said.
Cooney will need to overcome fellow Poulsbo resident and two-term representative Sherry Appleton.
Appleton won the House seat vacated by Rockefeller in 2004, a position she defended easily in 2006.
Appleton also pointed to WSF improvements, including the end to vehicle lockouts and the reinstatement of commuter-friendly fare language to law, as accomplishments from the last legislative session. She said ferries will be a focus again in the next session.
As for the 2008 election, Appleton said she, Rolfes and Rockefeller have the challenge of continuing their work as representatives while running their campaigns.
“I think the three of us have worked very hard for our district,” Appleton said. “I hope we have earned their trust and their vote, and I think we have. I’m confident we’ll be returned to legislature.”
