Candidates for five Lewis County offices participated in a lineup of quick-hitter political debates this week with limited opportunities to present their platform, answer questions and quickly respond to their opponents' claims.
The Centralia-Chehalis Chamber of Commerce hosted its annual political debates at O’Blarney’s Irish Pub at the Gibson House starting at 11:30 a.m. Thursday morning.
The event offered tightly structured one-on-one debates requiring candidates to make their points and make them quickly.
Candidates were allowed three minutes for opening statements and one minute for closing statements. Between the two, the candidates each got two minutes to respond to each of three questions specific to their office and two chances to offer a minute-long rebuttal to their opponent.
The event was also the first of the chamber’s debates to be run by its newly announced executive director, Chehalis City Councilor Kevin Carns.
See video from the debates along with this article at chronline.com.
Included in this report are some of the moments where tension rose and opponents offered rebuttals, retorts or corrections to one another.
Lewis County auditor
Nowhere was the difference between two candidates more stark than in the debate between auditor candidates Mitchell Merrill and Mitch Townsend, both Republicans.
The two candidates displayed opposite perceptions of the record of the Lewis County Auditor’s Office and its history, mainly concerning the administration of local elections.
The height of the debate came as the two candidates traded rebuttals over the right of the public to observe ballot counting and how the office already approaches making space for residents to watch the process.
Both candidates agreed the public should have a right to observation.
However, Townsend alleged the county was not doing enough to make observation accessible, referring to “just a computer screen in the lobby of the auditor’s office.”
Merrill responded, “it is more than just a computer screen,” adding that the screen is used as overflow to direct viewing and that the county is also regularly in search of volunteers to be observers and help guarantee the reliability of the ballot counting process.
With his rebuttal, Townsend painted Merrill’s response as an excuse, asking why there were not more accessible options for overflow.
“Again, overflow,” he said in an exasperated tone.
With the final words in the exchange, Merrill addressed his opponent’s framing directly, calling out Townsend’s description of the auditor’s office as a “passive” organization reliant on the phrase “we’re doing the best we can.”
“It sounds to me like the narrative that's being floated is that for the last 12 years the auditor has been doing nothing,” Merrill said. “I respectfully disagree. I think that our auditor's office, under the leadership of our current auditor, has fought for the people.”
Lewis County District 3 commissioner
Incumbent Lewis County Commissioner Scott Brummer and his challenger, current Lewis County Public Utility District Commissioner Michael Hadaller, appeared across the table from each other for just the second time so far this election cycle. Both men are Republicans.
It might also be the last before the general election.
During the debate, Brummer attempted to lean on his incumbency and pointed to his record of avoiding property tax hikes while Hadaller sought to link the incumbent to a string of difficult budget years for the county, with more on the horizon.
The first question of the session asked candidates about their top priorities and offered an immediate showcase for one of Hadaller’s mainstay criticisms of the incumbent: an annual $1 million or larger transfer out of the Lewis County Roads Fund and into the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office budget.
Brummer championed public safety, referring to law enforcement and the local criminal justice system.
Hadaller opened by saying he agreed with Brummer’s statements, but immediately shifted to discussing the dwindling end-of-year fund balance for the roads fund.
“What got us into this position is a road fund that had almost $9 million in it and now we have $1.34 million in it,” Hadaller accused.
Brummer struck back, pointing out that a transfer from roads to the sheriff’s office to pay for traffic enforcement has been in place since Hadaller’s father, Dennis Hadaller, served as a Lewis County commissioner.
“That transfer is allowed by state law,” Brummer said. “Part of that money, the $1.4 million that was that it grew to in the transfer, was for the sheriff's office to supply to support the roads for traffic safety.”
For recent reporting about the Lewis County Roads Fund, visit https://tinyurl.com/2z88ya43.
Lewis County Public Utility District commissioner for District 1
The debate between the two PUD candidates — Steve Grega and Jeff Baine — was the most friendly of the faceoffs, with both candidates leaning on decades of experience working as employees of the local utility and deep connections to the area.
In this debate, rebuttals were used more as opportunities for more time to talk about a subject than to offer a retort against an opponent.
The chief disagreement between the candidates, if one came up at all, was around concerns over grant funding for the PUD’s ongoing broadband expansion.
While discussing the PUD’s growing budget, Grega shared his shock at its size, as it is expected to come out to around $138 million in 2027. Baine, who is the current leader of the Lewis County Broadband Action Team (BAT), a group formed to help plan and guide broadband expansion in Lewis County, chimed in to remind the audience that that budget includes a significant amount of grant funding, especially concerning the utility’s significant broadband expansion projects in all corners of the county.
Grega maintained his budget concerns, adding that he is concerned about the utility’s reliance on grants for broadband expansion, asking, “what happens if that funding goes away?”
“But I think we need to look at some contingencies with the budget if these things don't come into fruition,” he said.
Both candidates are Republicans.
Lewis County coroner
The biggest differences between incumbent Lewis County Coroner Warren McLeod and his challenger Jessica Stickley were subtle.
Both candidates are experienced, but McLeod emphasized the depth of his experience and involvement in the coroner profession constantly, referring to his 16 years as Lewis County coroner and collectively more than 40 years responding to medical issues, first as an EMT in Boston and then with a coroner’s office in Las Vegas.
McLeod, a Republican, also touched on his many qualifications and certifications and steps to ensure thorough training for employees of the coroner’s office.
Stickley, an independent, also boasted significant training certifications and experience as a deputy coroner or medical death investigator simply with a shorter career and less involvement with national associations.
She also touched on her qualifications in psychological autopsy.
Stickley at times emphasized a need to improve communication between the coroner’s office and other county departments or local groups. She said there is a need to “rebuild” relationships and offered other subtle critiques of existing coroner’s office practices, which McLeod shrugged off with short rebuttals, adding that he believed the referenced relationships or systems were already in place.
“I agree with Jessica. We have that in place,” McLeod said.
Lewis County sheriff
Finally, perhaps the most anticipated debates of the event between former Centralia Police Officer Tracy Murphy and Lewis County Sheriff’s Office Special Services Chief Gabriel Frase was focused largely on how to address drug trafficking and use in Lewis County.
The candidates traded rebuttals while responding to the first of three questions, which asked candidates to identify the most serious public safety problem in the county. Both candidates identified drugs as the major issue, but identified different approaches to addressing the issue
Murphy argued the sheriff’s office should be less concerned with enforcement against small-time users of controlled substances and more concerned with arresting manufacturers and dealers who bring the substance to the area.
“If we can go after them wherever they are and shut off that pipeline, then hopefully our community, our family members, our friends will have the ability to get clean, and then we can get them the help they need,” Murphy said.
Frase argued the sheriff’s office should opt instead to develop relationships with other enforcement agencies and leave the larger drug dealing operations and exterior enforcement to them while focusing local law enforcement on local violators.
“There's all sorts of federal resources already out there looking for the people that are selling drugs or transporting them across state lines,” Frase said. “That's great. Let them focus on their job.”
Murphy offered a rebuttal, arguing the sheriff’s enforcement shouldn’t stop at the county line.
“The job of the sheriff is to keep us safe. Borders and jurisdiction shouldn't stop that,” Murphy said.
“We can share our information without personally being the ones that go up into Seattle and try to do a sting up in Seattle when they have plenty of resources of their own, and we have very finite, limited resources,” Frase responded.
