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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Two Washington races still too close to call

Public lands, schools incumbents are trailing

Richard Roesler Staff writer

OLYMPIA – Two statewide races remained up in the air Wednesday, leaving candidates and campaign staffs struggling to read the tea leaves in each new batch of ballots.

Well-funded challengers were beating Commissioner of Public Lands Doug Sutherland and state School Superintendent Terry Bergeson late Wednesday by tens of thousands of votes. But both campaigns said they see encouraging signs in how the later ballots are trending.

“Obviously, we’d prefer to be ahead,” said Todd Myers, a political consultant working for Sutherland. “But the new numbers are looking favorable for us.”

“I’m definitely keeping fingers and toes crossed,” said Danielle Westbrook, Bergeson’s campaign manager.

Sutherland’s challenger, Democrat Peter Goldmark, told supporters in an e-mail that he always knew it would be a close election. But he said he’s “cautiously optimistic” as large batches of ballots continue to roll in from urban counties.

A top staffer sounded more certain of victory at the campaign of Randy Dorn, a school-worker union official and former lawmaker who’s challenging Bergeson.

“I did a lot of number-crunching today,” said Dorn campaign director Robert Harkins, “and I honestly couldn’t come up with a scenario by which Terry could overcome Randy.”

He said that Dorn will wait for Bergeson to concede before he declares victory, but that Dorn is already making his transition plans.

The commissioner of Public Lands race has focused on Sutherland’s management of the millions of acres of land the state owns and millions more acres of private timberlands it regulates. Sutherland cited his kudos from sustainable forestry groups and his efforts to expand wind power on state land, among other things. Goldmark countered that Sutherland was too close to timber, mining and other companies that use state land, and blamed him for forest landslides and not being faster to get a firefighting plane to July’s Spokane Valley wildfire.

Myers attributes Goldmark’s strong showing to what he said was a 4 percentage point advantage for Democrats this year, presumably from voters eager to cast ballots for President-elect Barack Obama. Despite that boost, Myers said, he’s still hopeful that late ballots can turn around Goldmark’s 51 percent to 49 percent advantage as of Wednesday night. “It will be close,” Myers said.

The race for state school superintendent was seen largely as a referendum on the controversial Washington Assessment of Student Learning, which Dorn thinks has far outgrown lawmakers’ original intent. Many parents and teachers dislike the high-stakes WASL, saying “teaching to the test” is crowding out other critical learning.

Harkins said the fact that Bergeson was behind, 49 percent to Dorn’s 51 percent, is more than just unhappiness with the test.

“It’s more emblematic of the broader frustrations people have with the schools,” he said, including the state’s shrinking share of school funding and the dropout rate.

Hays, the consultant for Bergeson, said the race is less a judgment of the WASL and more about the $400,000 that the Service Employees International Union spent trying to oust Bergeson this year.

“More than the WASL,” he said, “I’d say this was about special interests.”

Late ballots will continue to be counted for nearly two weeks, although virtually all races are expected to be decided by Friday.

Richard Roesler can be reached at (360) 664-2598 or by e-mail at richr@spokesman.com.