Legislature Run By Default Winners

Ever wonder why state legislators can say and do such odd things in Boise, and get away with it?

Like the southeastern Idaho lawmaker who told the state that we’d have no early-reading problems in schools if mothers were “in the home, where they belong?”

One possible reason: Many run unopposed when they seek their legislative seats, winning by default.

In this year’s legislature, 40 of the 105 lawmakers faced no election challenge in either the primary or general election. That’s way up from the 1996 number - 28 - but it’s about even with the 1994 figure of 41. There were 25 in 1992, and 34 in 1990.

When now-U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo made his first run for Congress in 1992, he faced his first-ever contested election in that year’s primary - even though he was coming off eight years in the Legislature. He’d never had an opponent, all those years.

A search back into the historical records in the Secretary of State’s office shows that two current members of the Legislature - House Speaker Bruce Newcomb, R-Burley, and two-term Rep. Lee Gagner, R-Idaho Falls - have never faced an election opponent.

Many more haven’t been challenged in years. Twelve-term Rep. Robert Geddes Sr., R-Preston, was last challenged in 1980. Fourteen-term Rep. Jim Stoicheff, D-Sandpoint, last faced an opponent in 1988.

The lack of opposition may mean the lawmakers are popular with their constituents and doing a good job. But it also seems to be a growing trend that is leaving voters with less choice about how they’re represented in Boise.

Once mostly an eastern Idaho phenomenon, it’s spreading into the north. This year, six North Idaho lawmakers ran unopposed.

Break out the resume

One of the more surprising messages federal Bureau of Land Management director Tom Fry brought to Boise this week: They’re going to have a lot of job openings. The average age of people at the BLM today is 47, Fry said. So young people should take note: “If you’re interested in urban sprawl, open space, endangered species, clean water, this is a place you can go.”

Careers in land management will open up as the BLM staff turns over in the next 10 years, Fry said. “I think federal service is a wonderful opportunity today.”

Depends on your perspective

Nez Perce tribal official Jaime Pinkham brought down the house at the Andrus Center’s public lands conference when he talked about the tribe’s involvement in activities marking the anniversary of the trek of explorers Lewis and Clark into the west.

“The tribe didn’t sign on until we stopped calling it a celebration,” he noted, adding that those controversial “tank traps” the Forest Service has used to block access to some forest roads might have come in handy back then.

Legislature protects right to stink

Among the many mind-boggling new laws enacted by this year’s Legislature was the expansion of Idaho’s “Right to Farm” law to cover food processing factories.

Pushed by a giant, particularly foul-smelling sugar factory in Nampa, this bill says neighbors of a food processing factory have no right to file nuisance lawsuits over smells, noises, or the like.

The bill went through even after Sen. Laird Noh, R-Kimberly, told how his small farming town was almost destroyed by a callous, out-of-state firm that set up a stinky food processing plant. Businesses were shutting down and people couldn’t sell their houses, until a threatened nuisance suit finally forced the out-of-staters to clean up their act. It just so happens that Micron Electronics, a high-tech firm in Nampa, has had a multi-year dispute with the very same Nampa sugar factory pushing the measure. Micron employees have complained about the hideous smell and possible health effects from emissions from their neighbor.

But don’t cry too much for the high-techies. They got their own law for a $200,000 sales tax exemption for firms with “clean rooms,” which is the area where they manufacture computer chips.