Newcomers Enter Commission Race Six Candidates To Compete For Post Now Held By Marlton
A pair of political newcomers have made the District 1 race for the Spokane County Commission a crowded affair.
Republicans Art Meikel and Mike Davis are the fifth and sixth candidates to announce for the post now held by lawyer George Marlton.
Marlton was appointed to the $55,000-a-year job in June after Commissioner Skip Chilberg resigned to take a state job on a growth management appeals board.
Meikel, 50, could not be reached for comment Friday. But in campaign literature, he describes himself as a firm believer in conservatism and “sound economic principles.”
The retired Air Force pilot is married and has two daughters.
“You don’t need a degree in economics to know that you shouldn’t tax businessmen or large industry out of existence simply because they are a minority voice,” Meikel wrote. “Taxation shouldn’t be a struggle of one group over another.”
Meikel’s press release takes a poke at Marlton, who has been labeled a carpetbagger for recently moving to District 1 after spending virtually his entire life in the Medical Lake area. District 1 includes north Spokane all the way to the Pend Oreille County line.
“Art actually lives in District 1!” he wrote.
Marlton’s response: “Well, I live in District 1, too. I don’t know what he’s doing.”
Davis, 32, a Deer Park wheat and alfalfa farmer and sporting goods store owner, also is making his first bid for public office.
His campaign flier features a picture of a German shepherd next to the headline: “Elect Mike Davis. The County Watchdog.”
“I am not a lawyer or a professional politician,” he writes. “I am an ordinary man who believes that county government should be closer to the people to be effective.
“I am burdened about an attitude that creating more programs and spending more dollars will solve our problems.”
Davis’ other hot button is runaway crime caused by society’s “rapid moral decline.”
Davis is married and has four children. He graduated from Rogers High School.
Meikel and Davis join Republican candidate Martin Burnette, a financial adviser; Democrats Marlton and John Roskelley, a mountaineer and author; and independent candidate Chris Anderson, a Spokane city councilman.
The primary is Sept. 19.
, DataTimes