Lewis County chief deputy assessor and former Chehalis city manager Dave Campbell, a steadfast public servant who devoted his life to serving his family, church and community, has died of complications from cancer.
He was 68 and just months away from joining his wife of 23 years, former United Way of Lewis County director Debbie Campbell, in retirement.
He died with his family by his side on Wednesday, Feb. 23.
"I was so blessed to be married to Dave Campbell and to continue to be surrounded by his three amazing adult children and the love of our precious eight grandchildren,” Debbie told The Chronicle on Tuesday.
Campbell is remembered as a grounded presence in the lives of those who knew him.
“He was the kind of person that left a mark, even people that knew him for only a few years like myself,” said JP Anderson, director of Lewis County Public Health & Social Services.
Campbell was an active Rotarian, served on the board of the United Way of Lewis County and was proud of the revitalization of Penny Playground, according to his obituary.
He served as Chehalis city manager for 17 years, 15 of which he spent working alongside former Lewis County commissioner Joanne Schwartz. Campbell hired Schwartz, who had decided not to run for a third term on the county commission, for a position at the City of Chehalis in 1990.
“I will be forever grateful to him for hiring me. He was my boss, my colleague, mentor and, most importantly, he was my friend,” Schwartz said. “He was a good, honorable, dedicated, caring man. He will be missed by all who knew him as family or friend.”
Schwartz recalled that Campbell was “a stickler for grammar” and made frequent corrections with his red pen to city council reports.
“I thought I was a pretty good writer, but I learned a lot from him,” Schwartz said.
“I’m very sad. This is a huge loss to everyone who knew him. My heart breaks for Debbie and his kids,” she said.
Campbell left the City of Chehalis in 2005 after he was hired as the assistant city manager for Longview, but Campbell’s family remained in Chehalis.
“They made it work. And that's not easy for couples to do. To be separate most of the time and still have a strong and faithful marriage. That's not easy, but they did it. They made it work. I admired them for that,” said Alta Smith, a retired United Methodist pastor who became good friends to both Dave and Debbie after officiating the couple’s wedding.
Campbell was the son of a Methodist pastor and remained a faithful United Methodist all of his life.
“I deeply admired his ability to remain true and faithful not only to his church, but to the communities in which he lived,” Smith said. “He was a community member that worked diligently to make the community a better place for all of us. He was a friend who was supportive and kind with a gentle humor. And he was a husband beyond merit.”
Campbell resigned as Longview city manager in November 2017. Months later, he was one of two finalists for the newly-created Lewis County manager position. While he wasn’t chosen for that position, he was soon hired as Lewis County chief deputy assessor.
Anderson said he relied on Campbell as a grounding presence during the early days of the pandemic.
“He had so much integrity and was just such a straight shooter that I really valued his position, really valued his relationship, his friendship,” Anderson said.
Anderson recalled several times when he was in his office, having a hard day or stressing about work he had to get done, until he saw Campbell walk by.
“You can tell a lot about a person by the way they walk, and Dave was someone who was so grounded, his head was not in the clouds. He didn't walk down the street like he was thinking about 100 different things and he was worried about what he was going to do when he got where he was going. He was really present … And I would just try to channel Dave,” he said.
Anderson specifically recalled one instance in the early days of the pandemic when he got an idea to put together garden buckets for people in the community and went so far as to get the buckets and seeds before his time was taken up by other COVID-19-related tasks, and the project was forgotten.
But not by Campbell.
One Saturday morning, Campbell showed up at Anderson’s house with a group of volunteers from Rotary to finish Anderson’s project.
“Dave really spearheaded that — Dave knew I had the buckets. They were just littering my front driveway,” he said. “He found a way to finish the project that I started. It was kind of along the lines of, you know, a type of father figure. Dave would do that without making you feel bad. He’d just kind of help you.”
Bill Brumsickle and his wife, Doris Wood Brumsickle, remember Dave as a caring and dedicated friend.
Wood Brumsickle recalled meeting Debbie through United Way, and over the years, the two couples became close friends.
Whenever they went anywhere together, Wood Brumsickle said Debbie drove and the two men sat happily in the back, chattering away.
“And I loved that friendship that they had because they truly enjoyed visiting with each other,” Brumsickle Wood said.
After one instance when the two accidentally wore the same sweater to an event, they continued the tradition of matching their outfits as a running joke.
The last time the four of them were all together was Dec. 4, Wood Brumsickle said.
“On the way home he said, ‘Well, we had a really good time, didn't we?’ And you know, that’s a memory that's going to help us,” said Brumsickle Wood.
Campbell is survived by his wife, Debbie; his daughter, Rebecca Duncan, and her children Max, Jojo and Michael; his daughter Lisa (Christopher) Draney, and their children, Hannah, Marshall and Ruby; Paul (Genève) Campbell and their children, Vera and Harriet; and his siblings, as well his extended family and dear friends.
A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. Thursday, March 10, at the Chehalis United Methodist Church.
In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Chehalis United Methodist Church, United Way of Lewis County or Penny Playground through the Chehalis Foundation.
