GOP battles in Dist. 3

Two Republican challengers in Spokane’s 3rd Legislative District are running uphill battles in their efforts to break Democratic control of this largely blue-collar, lower-income, urban district.

The GOP’s David Stevens, who is challenging four-term incumbent Rep. Alex Wood, estimates he has knocked on 3,000 doors in his run for the Position 1 seat.

In Position 2, Republican challenger Ryan Leonard has put even more wear on his shoes. He said he’s probably been to 10,000 homes since he began campaigning last spring. He hopes to knock off appointed incumbent Democratic Rep. Timm Ormsby, who is seeking his first election from the district.

Wood and Ormsby are countering their challengers with substantially more campaign funding. Ormsby has raised $42,000 and Wood $31,000. Both Democrats have received a mix of contributions from labor, industry groups and individuals.

Maybe that’s why Stevens and Leonard are emphasizing a grass-roots doorbelling campaign: They have raised $6,200 and $2,500 respectively.

“My prediction is the 3rd will stay solidly Democratic,” Wood said on Wednesday.

Leonard disagreed. “I think we (Republicans) have a fair shot,” he said.

If history is any guide, Wood may be right.

The 3rd District has been one of the state’s most reliably Democratic districts since the Great Depression. Only five Republicans have been elected here since 1932.

Redistricting from the 2000 Census increased the geographic reach of the district, changing its makeup by adding a handful of more conservative precincts on the South Side as well as some additions in northwest Spokane. It is now roughly bounded by Francis Avenue on the north, Havana Street on the east, 17th Avenue on the south and the Spokane River on the west.

The campaigns are focusing largely on the issues of health care, jobs, education, transportation and crime.

Position 1

Stevens, a deputy prosecuting attorney for Spokane County, began his race by talking about his ideas for combating crime and reducing the costs of incarceration by making more nonviolent offenders go through diversion programs, treatment for substance abuse and community supervision.

Forcing offenders into programs where they have an incentive to change their lives through an option of shorter cell time in exchange for treatment and supervision would reduce the volume of cases and the impact of nonviolent crimes, he said. The 3rd District has seen an increase in drug houses and drug-driven property crimes in recent years, according to Spokane Police statistics.

“I think diversion works,” Stevens said. “That’s my expertise.”

Wood said he thinks Stevens has solid ideas and plans to seek Stevens’ cooperation on implementing them during the coming legislative session, if he is re-elected.

As a way to bring down health care costs, Stevens said insurance companies should be allowed to offer stripped-down plans for catastrophic coverage. Requirements that alternative treatments be included in health plans should be eliminated, he said.

Wood said Democrats last session sought a package of 17 bills to lower the cost of health care, including measures to reduce the cost of malpractice cases, but Republicans killed it. He said limits on awards for pain and suffering would require a constitutional amendment.

“To make a long story short, it’s a battle that shouldn’t be happening,” he said.

Wood lamented that 40,000 families were taken off the state’s Basic Health Plan because of budget cuts. “Where’s the money?” he said, referring to voter-approved tax cuts dating back to 1999.

Wood, a former broadcast journalist, has served his tenure in the Legislature on the Transportation Committee, and includes road funding as a major issue in his campaign, in part because it also is a driver of economic growth.

He said he has supported funding for a north-south freeway, with $180 million now approved for the section from Wandermere to Francis Avenue in North Spokane. He said it’s only a matter of time before the freeway is extended to Interstate 90 in the East Central Neighborhood.

Position 2

In Position 2, Ormsby is running for his first election after being appointed in 2003 to fill an unexpired term of former Democratic Rep. Jeff Gombosky. Ormsby is a longtime union official in Spokane and currently is president of the Spokane Regional Labor Council and secretary-treasurer of the Northeastern Washington-North Idaho Building and Construction Trades Council.

Leonard holds a 1993 bachelor’s degree in journalism from Whitworth College and is now working as a telephone service representative for Pitney Bowes. He ran against Gombosky in 2002 and lost, and had volunteered in 2000 for the campaign of U.S. Rep. George Nethercutt.

Leonard said that he believes in lower taxes and reduced business regulations as a way to increase jobs in the 3rd District, one of the lowest-income districts in the state. Leonard supports tort reform through caps on pain and suffering awards, and he also wants to allow employers to participate in the state’s Basic Health Plan to extend health coverage to more workers.

Smaller class sizes and education funding are high on Leonard’s list of issues. He supports a sales tax initiative on the Nov. 2 ballot to increase funding for education. Leonard also supports granting authority for charter schools.

He criticized Ormsby for endorsing an amendment that provided alternative sentencing to child sex offenders, but Ormsby said the amendment preserved and improved a limited alternative used for sex offenders who are amenable to treatment. The amendment was supported by the prosecuting attorneys association, he said.

Ormsby is calling for improving Medicaid reimbursements for hospitals in Spokane, which would help them stem the current financial crisis at the city’s major medical facilities. He wants to expand the Basic Health Plan and views the GOP’s call for tort reform as a national Republican effort pitting lawyers versus doctors.

“Patient safety is huge,” he said.

Ormsby wants educational improvements for the state’s system of two-year and technical training programs. He also wants better funding for construction projects at high school skills centers, including one in Spokane.

On economic growth, Ormsby pointed to recently funded construction projects in Spokane, including the Riverpoint campus, as vehicles for growth.