State Representative, Pos. 2
Election Results
| Candidate | Votes | Pct |
|---|---|---|
| Matt Shea (R) | 16,857 | 59.65% |
| Amy Biviano (D) | 11,404 | 40.35% |
* Race percentages are calculated with data from the Secretary of State's Office, which omits write-in votes from its calculations when there are too few to affect the outcome. The Spokane County Auditor's Office may have slightly different percentages than are reflected here because its figures include any write-in votes.
About The Race
Legislators are paid $42,106 annually, plus healthcare benefits. House terms are two years.
The Candidates
Matt Shea
- Party:
- Republican
- Age:
- 50
- City:
- Spokane Valley, WA
- Occupation:
- Lawyer
Education: Graduated from high school in Bellingham. Earned bachelor’s degree in history and political science from Gonzaga University in 1996. Earned law degree from Gonzaga in 2006.
Political experience: Elected to state House every two years since 2008. Serves as assistant ranking minority member on the House’s Labor and Workforce and Judiciary committees.
Work experience: Attorney at M. Casey Law since 2013. Formerly handled personal injury cases at Keith S. Douglass and Associates. Co-founded the Washington Family Foundation. Served 4 ½ years in the army, entering as a lieutenant in 1996, including eight months in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Later served 11 months in Iraq as a captain in the Army and Army National Guard.
Family: Divorced and remarried. No children.
Amy Biviano
- Party:
- Democrat
- Age:
- 49
- City:
- Spokane Valley, WA
- Occupation:
- Certified public accountant
AMY BIVIANO
Education: Graduate from Pauls Valley High School in Pauls Valley, Oklahoma. Earned bachelor’s degree in anthropology, Yale University, 1997. Earned master’s in business administration from Gonzaga University, 2007
Work experience: Self-employed CPA and accounting consultant, 2009-present. Accountant, Spokane County United Way, 2008.
Political experience: Ran unsuccessfully for state representative in the Fourth Legislative District in 2012. Former chairwoman of the Spokane County Democratic Party. Member, Spokane Valley Chamber of Commerce government affairs committee, 2010-present.
Complete Coverage
Biviano vs Shea, Taxes
Amy Biviano, a Democrat, talks about her stance on the requirement for two-thirds votes to approve tax increases. She is running for state House in the 4th Legislative District against incumbent Republican state Rep. Matt Shea, who declined to be interviewed.
Ad Watch: Mix-up in Shea mailer
State Rep. Matt Shea, R-Spokane, mailed a new ad to voters late last week that sharply criticizes media coverage of him and misrepresents his and his opponent’s positions on key issues. The race between Shea and Democrat Amy Biviano has become one of the most watched in the region, in part because of Shea’s misdemeanor gun charge for possessing a gun in his car without a valid concealed weapons permit and Biviano’s appearance in the “Women of the Ivy League” edition of Playboy magazine when she was a student at Yale University 17 years ago.
Biviano vs. Shea, Abortion
Amy Biviano, a Democrat, talks about her stance on abortion policy. She is running for state House in the 4th Legislative District against incumbent Republican state Rep. Matt Shea, who declined to be interviewed.
Biviano vs. Shea, Energy
Amy Biviano, a Democrat, gives her stance on a state law approved by voters that requires larger power companies to get 15 percent of their energy supplies from renewable sources, not including existing dam infrastructure, by 2020. She is running for state House in the 4th Legislative District against incumbent Republican state Rep. Matt Shea, who declined to be interviewed.
Biviano vs. Shea, Freeway and Sullivan Bridge
Amy Biviano, a Democrat, talks about her stance on the North Spokane Corridor and the Sullivan Road bridge. She is running for state House in the 4th Legislative District against incumbent Republican state Rep. Matt Shea, who declined to be interviewed.
Doug Clark: Amy Biviano vs. Matt Shea, the race that keeps on giving
The tipster called me midday Friday with two eye-popping political developments, namely that 4th District state legislative candidate Amy Biviano appeared topless in a 1995 Playboy magazine spread. Five words immediately came to mind.
Legislative candidate Amy Biviano unfazed by Playboy pic
Amy Biviano, the Democratic challenger in a high-profile battle for a legislative seat representing Spokane Valley, is defending a 1995 topless photo shoot with Playboy magazine as a confidence-building experience while she attended Yale University. In an interview Friday, following a conservative website’s disclosure that Biviano appeared in a “Women of the Ivy League” edition of the popular men’s magazine, Biviano said she doesn’t regret the photo shoot but wouldn’t do it again as a mother.
Biviano vs. Shea, Education: Are higher taxes needed?
Amy Biviano, a Democrat, talks about her position on education funding and taxes. She is running for state House in the 4th Legislative District against incumbent Republican state Rep. Matt Shea, who declined to be interviewed.
Legislative hopeful Amy Biviano posed topless in Playboy
Amy Biviano, the Democratic challenger in a high-profile battle for a legislative seat representing Spokane Valley, is defending a 1995 topless photo shoot with Playboy magazine as a confidence-building experience while attending Yale University.
Biviano vs. Shea, Introduction
Amy Biviano, a Democrat, makes her case about why she feels that she’s the best choice to represent the state House in the 4th Legislative District. Incumbent Republican state Rep. Matt Shea declined interview requests.
Solidly GOP district seeing spirited race between Matt Shea, Amy Biviano
To Republican state Rep. Matt Shea, Americans are on the verge of becoming slaves, and he has a plan to stop it. Among his proposals: The federal government should make its payments to states only in gold or silver. The FBI and other federal officers must get permission from county sheriffs to arrest people. Guns made and sold in Washington should not be restricted by federal law.
Doug Clark: Stunt Shea pulled far from clean campaigning
Matt Shea – the Road Rage Republican running for re-election in Spokane Valley – has his knickers in a knot over his opponent’s supposedly dirty campaign tactics. Or in other words …
Anti-Shea mailer features pointing gun
Democratic challenger Amy Biviano is turning incumbent Republican state Rep. Matt Shea’s road rage case into a campaign issue. But the mailer that began arriving in Spokane Valley mailboxes over the weekend includes embellished details of the lawmaker’s armed Nov. 23 encounter in downtown Spokane. Complicating matters, Shea includes some misrepresentations of his own in his denouncement of the Biviano attack ad and in other efforts he’s taken to downplay the severity of the encounter.
GOP chief asks Shea to pull photo
It may have started as a joke, but the controversial photo of state Rep. Matt Shea standing on his Democratic challenger’s property has become a political hot potato for Republicans. The chairman of the Spokane County Republican Party, who was characterized in The Spokesman-Review and other media last week as backing Shea’s decision to post the photo to his Facebook page, now says his position was misunderstood and that he’d actually been trying to persuade Shea to remove the photo.
Shea’s picture backed by GOP
The chairman of the Spokane County Republican Party is standing behind state Rep. Matt Shea’s decision to post a picture of himself on the Internet standing on his Democratic challenger’s property despite public outcry that cuts across partisan lines. “This looks like a fabricated issue following a poor primary performance,” county GOP Chair Matthew Pederson said of complaints by state House hopeful Amy Biviano and others that Shea went too far with the photo, which was posted to the incumbent lawmaker’s Facebook page along with the location of a nearby intersection. Shea explained in the Facebook post that he had been door-belling the neighborhood, which was just added to the 4th Legislative District this year.